From: Mary Fantucchio
Dear family and friends - as most of you know, John died in August of a stroke. Please pass this on to anyone you know who might be interested. For more information about John's work in fandom, see Aaron Caplan's website www.fantucchio.com.
CGC has recognized a new Silver Age Pedigree. The John G. Fantucchio Pedigree features nearly every comic published by Marvel and DC Comics from the inception of the Marvel era in the early 1960s through the mid-70s. Rounding out the collection are numerous other high grade comics from other publishers including Charlton, Gold Key, Dell, ACG, Tower and many others.
"This collection was beautiful," said Paul Litch, CGC's Primary Grader, "It is a rare treat when a previously unseen collection of high grade comics becomes available to the public. It is even more rare for a collection to be recognized as a pedigree... a collection like this, cannot be denied."
The books were collected by artist John G. Fantucchio and stored in ideal conditions. The result is a collection of beautifully preserved comics with amazing color and page quality. John had been a serious collector since the 1940's and was an adult at the beginning of the Silver Age. These books had been stored for decades until being viewed by Rick Lowell of Casablanca Comics.
"I had known about these books for years, but nobody had ever seen them" says Lowell. "I was unsure what I was going to find and as I unpacked them I was amazed at the quality. I was also stunned at how complete the collection is."
John Fantucchio was one of the most prominent artists during the early days of comic fandom. He created hundreds of covers and illustrations for fanzines such as Rocket's Blast Comic Collector, Fantastic Fanzine, Comic Crusader and many others. John also did covers for the early issues of The Buyer's Guide for Comic Fandom, including the very first issue.
"It has been over eight years since we've brought out an original owner collection dating back to the early Silver Age of comics with depth like this," stated Josh Nathanson, Founder and CEO of ComicLink. "There is a distinct beauty in looking at book after book with a homogeneous look and feel, having been stored in the same place in the same way for decades. It's one of the perks of this job that I relish. I'm thrilled that ComicLink is working with Rick to disperse the collection into the hands of today's collectors. We've decided that Amazing Spider-Man will be the first title to be offered, within the ComicLink.com Winter Featured Auction commencing on February 15th. I'm looking forward to the event!"
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