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How are you doing, you wonderful nerd?
A lot of you out there probably have
a sweet comic book collection but I'd wager
it would look a little bit nicer with this bad boy.
Action Comics number one is the single
most valuable comic book in history.
In 2014, a copy sold for over $3 million.
Its value is not just based on the immeasurable effect
that it had and continues to have on the world,
but also because there aren't many copies left.
Wartime efforts to recycle paper,
sometimes printed in the comics themselves,
means that it's incredibly difficult to find comic books
from the golden age of the '30s and '40s,
especially one in pristine condition,
and that is made even harder for Superman
because the publishers ran a contest
that effectively asked readers
to destroy their copy of Action Comics number one,
and the sad news is, we have a record
of people who did exactly that.
As we recover from my emoji video
that everyone seemed to boycott,
let's go back to our roots today
with the very first appearance of the Man of Steel himself
that jump started the superhero boom.
Superman's creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster,
claim it took them six years to sell their story
which was originally conceived as a newspaper comic strip.
They cut the strip up into a format
that would fit the dimensions of a comic book
and lifted a panel from the story to use
as the last minute cover of Action Comics.
You can probably see the cover of Superman's
first appearance in your mind's eye, or whatever,
that jaw dropping image of Superman
effortlessly lifting a car over his head
while some stereotypical 1930s goons cower in fear.
The cover was seen as so outlandish at the time
that the publisher reportedly banned Superman
from appearing on any new covers of Action Comics,
which is why the next few issues feature characters
from other stories inside the anthology title.
After the initial print run of 200,000 books
sold out in record time, it wasn't long
before National Allied Publications,
the company behind Action Comics,
realized it was because of the popularity
of their Superman stories.
Wanting to capitalize on this,
the champion of the oppressed quickly returned
to making appearances on the cover page.
Action Comics number one launched a lot more
than just the cape wearing Kryptonian into the public eye.
It popularized superhero comics for decades to come.
As author Mike Benton so eloquently wrote
in Superhero Comics of the Golden Age,
"For a while, Siegel and Shuster's tiny art studio
"at 10905 Amor Avenue was the only place in the world
"where stories about superheroes were dreamed,
"written, and drawn, but not for long."
Action Comics number one is the grandfather of comic books,
the one that started it all, but before that,
it was simply yet another comic book
that National Allied Publications
had to advertise to make sure it sold well,
and thus we get this promotional image
printed in More Fun Comics number 31,
regarded as the first published picture
of Superman in history.
With the word out about this new comic title,
new fans were ready and waiting to stake their claim
as the first nerds to get involved in what would soon become
an enormous superhero explosion.
In the decades after many readers could show their nerdiness
by writing into a letters column.
That's been pretty standard fare throughout the industry,
but Action did not have a letters page.
It did, however, have another way fans could get involved.
Superman's big debut had a color page contest
that looked like this.
Readers could color in a black and white page
from the Chuck Dawson story,
which also appeared in Action Comics number one.
Once readers had colored it in to the best of their ability
they would have to rip out the page
from the comic and mail it to the publisher.
Let me restate that.
These readers not only took crayons
to what would eventually become
the most valuable comic book in history,
but they ripped out a page from it,
and here's the kicker, here is the part of the story
that might make some of you cringe.
That first page of the Chuck Dawson story
that fans tore out of the book?
Well, the flip side of that page
wasn't just some random unimportant filler.
If it was, we could forgive them because at least
they left the Man of Steel alone, but they didn't.
On the reverse side of Chuck Dawson was the last page
of the world's first Superman story.
The truth is, we don't know how many readers went through
with this, but we do know that 25 winners were chosen,
and normally I'd be against this sort of nerd shaming,
but these people are almost certainly dead by now,
so here are their names real quickly.
They each destroyed their own piece of history,
a story worth potentially millions of dollars
for a grand prize of exactly one dollar,
which to be fair is more like 17
when you adjust for inflation today.
Still, that's a much better takeaway
than all of the unnamed nerds who colored in and ripped up
their copies of Action Comics number one for nothing.
And look, obviously I kid about shaming these people,
but the fact is that they sacrificed
their priceless Superman comic
for something I'm sure a lot of us
would love to have, historical records
that they were the original comic book nerds.
And in case you were wondering,
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I've started working on a NerdSync web site
using Squarespace and I am excited
about getting that out for you guys.
We'll check in on the progress of that in the coming weeks.
Thanks so much for watching, especially if you are here
from the Super Carlin Bros collab.
Those guys are super awesome.
It was a ton of fun to work with them
and if you haven't seen that video,
there's probably a link onscreen
or in the description somewhere to go check it out.
Here are some other videos that YouTube thinks you'll like
and while you look those over,
I would love to thank our patrons,
especially Cristoffer Lange, Mike Harvill, Kendra,
Elizabeth Moncel, and the rest of the wonderful nerds
who support us over on Patreon.com/NerdSync.
Click on one of these videos and until next time,
my name is Scott reminding you to read between the panels
and grow smarter through comics.
See ya.