Preservation

[dreamticket]

Does anybody here bag their old British annuals? If so, is it recommended? I've a memory of bagging some back in the eighties and when I checked them a few years later they seemed to have dried out a bit. (It might have happened anyway as they probably weren't new). As I've been amassing a lot of them lately I'm wondering if it's worth my while bagging the ones in better condition.

Any advice/thoughts?

[Lew Stringer]

Generally I don't bag annuals, but I don't see how bagging them would dry them up. Perhaps it's where they were stored?

[Captain Storm]

Seeing as paper ultimately comes from wood , it has to be allowed to "breathe". Keeping it away from bright light and odours helps a lot and of course make sure its environment is dry as moisture is the enemy,

sincerely,

The Cap.

[big bad bri]

i have all my annuals bagged sitting on book shelves but i do this to keep dust off.i have also bagged the few hardback books i have ie harry potter set & wrestling autobiographies,so am i to understand this is not recomended.i have the majority of my comics bagged as well apart from the 100s i have bought from ebay recently.

[wilsia]

I am not too sure what you mean by saying they are "DRIED out"?

Big bad bri - Keep them bagged mate. I first bagged my comics back in 1978 (Krazy, Tiger,Roy of the Rovers, Cheeky Buster Victor ect) and 30 years and more they are as good as new. A few of them have some brown spots appearing but thankfully they are in a minority.

My brother had also loads of comics but unlike me grew out of them and they just layed in my mums attic not bagged. When my mum died two years my bro had to move the comics as the house was beng sold all his comics from the same period as mine were tanned despite being kept in dry environment.

The difference was like chalk and cheese.
I would advise to keep them bagged if you want to keep them as new looking as possible. In the case of annuals some keep their condition better than others due to better quality paper being used.

My Dandy and Beano annuals from the seventies are as white and crisp from the day they were got as is a 1969 Wham annual. Whereas my IPC annuals are tanned at the edges IPC used cheaper paper for their annuals. I never originally bagged my annuals but I bag all of them now.

I recall reading somewhere that it is the acids in the air that destroy the paper but who am I to know.....

[Phoenix]

I recall reading somewhere that it is the acids in the air that destroy the paper

I'm sure there are some firms who advertise their comic bags as being acid free, which would suggest that ordinary plastic bags might do as much damage to comics as any acids in the air. Personally, I keep my text story papers in boxes or box files, and the picture ones on shelves in cupboards, all in numerical order and in year batches, although I do need quite a few more cupboards to house the ones still on the floor and, frankly, in the way. I am quite happy to sacrifice the whiteness of all pages in the interests of access, the greater good as far as my needs are concerned. I would find it incredibly irritating if I wanted to read, or even just consult, a 15-episode serial in The Wizard, for example, if I had to debag them all before I could get started. And what if I wanted to compare that serial with a repeat in The Victor, and another with a similar title in Judy? And when I'd finished I'd have to bag them all up again! No thank you very much.

[stevezodiac]

I've always used those rolls of food bags that household goods shops sell. (eg 300 bags for a pound). They are the perfect size for DC Thomson comics and the larger freezer bags fit the Comic Cuts/Rainbow sized comics. Some have been bagged like this since the 70s and no harm has come to them. With comics in those professional comic bags I find once you stack them up they slide all over the place.

[paw broon]

Remembering my advice to customers back when I had a shop, and based on what we were told by serious American collectors who had been involved for decades, comics printed on newsprint or similar non-glossy paper, should always be bagged, preferably in Mylites which are acid free. It's the acids in the cheap paper that do a lot of the damage. But, as my pal and late lamented colleague, Peter always said, when you get to our age, your comics will outlive you.
As for annuals, I've just taken my Radio Fun 1957 annual, out of its bag (just an ordinary golden age bag) but I don't really think it's necessary to keep annuals bagged. I'm a bit lazy and the bag keeps the dust off them.
I use Mylites for my small collection of Dells and also for Golden Age American comics but many are too big to fit, so I use G.A. ordinary comic bags with an acid free backing board, which also helps to keep the comic's shape. British comics traditionally come in all shapes and sizes, so for me it's a matter of finding something to fit but some American bag sizes often fit the bill. Ask in your lcs or go on line. Mega City do Mylites. Other suppliers are, I suppose, available.
But remember, most British comics were printed on poor paper, and it does deteriorate.

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

I find that a lot of IPC comics from 40 years ago have a bad habit of the overleaf page [ink and colour] seeping through to the other side-----only some copies, not all though...I suppose it must depend on the condotions they have been stored in.

[Lew Stringer]

I find that a lot of IPC comics from 40 years ago have a bad habit of the overleaf page [ink and colour] seeping through to the other side-----only some copies, not all though...I suppose it must depend on the condotions they have been stored in.

It depended on where they were printed too. The ones by Southernprint (Whizzer & Chips, Knockout, Whoopee, and some others) seemed to suffer from ink seeping through over the years more than those by the other printers that IPC used. Down to paper stock in that case.

Paper stock is one reason, storage is the other, but comics won't really deteriorate much if stored in dry, dark, clean conditions at room temperature. My 1960s comics only have very slight off-white pages (TV21s almost as new, due to the better paper). I've bought comics from the 1890s and 1930s that have never yellowed either. Very few are bagged by the way.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_448y6kVhntg/R ... thfall.jpg

Comics from the 1970s/80s might not fare as well as earlier comics because the paper was inferior to the stock used before, but if looked after they'll still outlast us. The glossier comics of recent decades should survive ok, although the paper is very thin.

The current heavier stock used on today's Dandy and Beano should ensure they'll survive well into the next century I'd imagine.

[dreamticket]

I am not too sure what you mean by saying they are "DRIED out"?

I mean the glue is going along the spine and some pages are beginning to detach.

[Muffy]

I bagged many of my comics and annuals in those special comic bags from places like forbidden planet in the mid 1980s. My bagged comics/annuals are also kept in boxes and in rooms that were not too cold. I've re-read them every 5 or 10 years since and all are still very fine or better. Some have suffered a little yellowing though, probably due from paper stock.

I guess though that a very cold room or very hot room could make a difference.

[Lew Stringer]

I am not too sure what you mean by saying they are "DRIED out"?

I mean the glue is going along the spine and some pages are beginning to detach.

Have you been storing them near a radiator or anywhere exposed to heat? Have you checked to see if any insects have been eating the glue?

[dreamticket]

My Dandy and Beano annuals from the seventies are as white and crisp from the day they were got as is a 1969 Wham annual. Whereas my IPC annuals are tanned at the edges IPC used cheaper paper for their annuals. I never originally bagged my annuals but I bag all of them now.

I'm noticing something similar, with a recently purchased Wham annual having crisp white pages. My early 2000AD annuals are showing signs of tanning, and have some pages working loose from the spine.

It probably doesn't help that the 2000ADs use several different types of paper stock in the same book.

[dreamticket]

I am not too sure what you mean by saying they are "DRIED out"?

I mean the glue is going along the spine and some pages are beginning to detach.

Have you been storing them near a radiator or anywhere exposed to heat? Have you checked to see if any insects have been eating the glue?

They've been much moved around. A cold damp flat in the eighties. An attic in the nineties. I've learned not to store them piled up against an outside facing wall. Too many temperature fluctuations!

It's not so much a big problem now as I'm currently buying stuff that's in "Reading Condition" (for indexing purposes, but also because I would also like to be able to read them). Buying stuff in mint, collectors-grade, condition (apart from being too expensive) would pretty much mean I couldn't bring myself to read them. But once in a while a gem shows up, and I'd like too be able to keep it in the best condition possible.

Slightly off-topic, but I'm wondering if anyone here collected the original run of Love & Rockets in the eighties? I did, and bagged them almost immediately. When it came time to put them in storage I rebagged them, and noticed many with rusty staples. Is this a common complaint with L&R, or was it more likely to do with my storage conditions?