A copy of “Superman No. 1” that spent decades tucked away in a dusty attic has become the most expensive comic book ever sold, fetching $9.12 million at a Texas auction house. The surprise discovery was made by three brothers sorting through their late mother’s San Francisco home.
Hidden in a cardboard box beneath brittle newspapers and layers of dust sat a pristine first-edition Superman comic from 1939. It’s one of the rarest and most sought-after issues in existence.
Download the SAN app today to stay up-to-date with Unbiased. Straight Facts™.
Point phone camera here
The discovery
Their mother had always insisted she kept a valuable comic collection, but the brothers had never seen it. Only when they prepared the house for sale did they finally climb into the attic and start digging for heirlooms. What they found was a treasure trove of early Superman comics. It included five “Action Comics” issues and the now-record-breaking “Superman No. 1.”
Lon Allen, vice president at Heritage Auctions, said the way the book surfaced made the discovery even more remarkable.
“I think what actually really added to the story was how it was found. That this was, you know, a new find that no one had ever seen before,” Allen said.
This story is featured in today’s Unbiased Updates. Watch the full episode here.
Comic book’s value
The comic was surprisingly well-preserved, thanks in part to the cool Northern California climate. Graders gave it a 9.0 out of 10 — an unheard-of score for a book printed before World War II.
Experts also identified a small in-house advertisement unique to the first batch of 500,000 copies ever printed, making the book even more valuable.
The copy originally sold for ten cents. Now, it surpasses the previous record set last year, when an “Action Comics No. 1,” Superman’s first appearance, sold for $6 million.
