'It's a lot of money for a comic book': How a Milwaukee shop got a rare copy of Spider-Man's first appearance
MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- There are plenty of historic artifacts in Milwaukee, and now, one of them is for sale. Collector's Edge Comics in the Bay View neighborhood has a copy of the rare magazine in which Spider-Man dropped in for his first appearance.
There are currently about 3,800 graded copies of the "Amazing Fantasy" edition that introduced the world to Spider-Man.
Steve Dobrzynski, the owner of Collector's Edge since 2000, now has one of those copies in the 'vault' that now occupies what used to be the boiler room at the store's location on S. Kinnickkinnic Ave.
While Dobrzynski estimates the store houses somewhere between 600,000 and 800,000 comic books, it's not often he's in possession of such a highly sought-after copy.
A couple, who Dobrzynski would only say is from the Milwaukee area, recently brought in a stash of comics after the death of a parent.
"It's part of their father's collection, and they wanted to just make sure they weren't advantage of," Dobrzynski said.
Dobrzynski said the couple noted they also had a copy of Spider-Man's first appearance.
"I said, 'Do you have that with you?' They said no," he recalled. "I said, 'Good 'cause you don't want to carry this around.'"
The couple still owns the book, but Collector's Edge is now trying to sell the book on their behalf. In return, they'd get a slice of the sale and a great story to tell.
Dobrzynski had the Certified Guaranty Company grade the book's condition. On a scale from one to 10, this copy came back with a rating of 3.0.
"It's a good-plus, very good-minus," Dobrzynski said. "Right in between those two grades."
The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide is typically the standard used for establishing how much a book is worth. While a 3.0-rated copy of Spider-Man's first appearance is valued at $18,000 by the guide, Dobrzynski thinks he can fetch more than that.
"The books have been selling in the range of $24,000 to I've seen as high as $35,000," he said.
Dobrzynski said he initially believed someone in his inner circle of collectors would want to buy the uncommon comic, but the price tag was a bit too rich, so now he's branching out.
"Hopefully, the more people that know about it, the sooner we'll be able to sell it at the best price we can," he said.
Steve Dobrzynski, the owner of Collector's Edge, estimates the Bay View location houses between 600,000 and 800,000 comics.
Supply wasn't always this slim
Hardcore comic collectors like Jeff Williams said they can recall a time when it wasn't so difficult to get their hands on Spider-Man's first appearance.
"I've owned several [copies], yeah," he said. "Probably five copies."
Williams, who estimated he travels to Collector's Edge from his home in Janesville about four times a year, was at the store Friday to add to his collection.
Williams said he once had a 9.2-rated copy of Spider-Man's debut but sold it in the mid-'90s. While he says he made a decent amount then, he acknowledged such a high-quality copy now would likely fetch more than $1 million.
"Suffice it to say, I made good money when I sold it but nothing like that," he said.
The popularity of Spiderman, the X-Men and other characters has exploded since around 2000, when numerous feature films based on the comics were released.
"You would've had to have had a crystal ball to know what was gonna happen. It was just a bunch of nerds and an Overstreet price guide," Williams said. "We had no idea that the books we had in our collection were gonna be worth millions of dollars someday."
Williams said he has no regrets about selling his copies when he did. Aside from not being able to predict the future, he also cautioned collectors-to-be against getting into the hobby for the purpose of making money.
"If you enjoy having it and collecting it, pursuing it, the hunt, the passion is so much of the fun," he said. "And so, if there's anyone out there who want to start collecting, I'd advise you to just start to collect what you like."