Still Analog in a Digital World

On Nov. 1-2, NAA member Mound City Auctions of St. Louis, MO. Held a Silver Age Comic Book Auction that could only be described with one word Super! The auction featured 1,140 lots of mostly Silver Age comic books, and set 502 world records, some shattering previous records by as much as 88%.



Tina Weiman (the co-owner and Vice President of Mound City Auctions) came across the the comics while setting up the auction in the basement of a split-level home in St. Louis. The owner thought the collection was worth  $5,000.00. “We were happy to add a few zeros and a times 2 for him” said Auctioneer Rob Weiman AARE.

A copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 (First Appearance of Spider Man) sold for $78,750.00.

And a particularly nice copy of X-Men #1 brought $1,072,050.00.


Tina asked the owner for his permission to remove the collection from the home and sell it in a bigger  venue.  The collection has since been named the Mound City Collection because like the auction company that found it the collection it is from St. Louis. St. Louis was known previously to riverboat pilots as Mound City due to numerous Indian mounds in the area.  The auction featured both live bidding and Internet bidding via two platforms (Proxibid and iCollector). The collection sold for a staggering $1,072,050.00 (including the  15% on-line and 5% in-house buyer's premium). The collection included over 1,000 comic books that had been graded by the Certified Guarantee Corp. (CGC), many were the highest known graded copy on Earth.

The auction was well publicized and an article in the local newspaper was picked up by USA Today, UPI, API, & CNN. “My nephew called us from Korea, he heard about the auction over there” said Auctioneer Rob Weiman.

We knew we had something special when A dealer called early on and offered us $50,000 for the collection. Later we turned down another dealer offering $650,000.

The highest selling comic of the two day sale was a copy of  X-Men #1 graded 9.4 (out of 10) by the CGC selling for a whopping $1,060,050.00 (including the 5% on-site buyer's premium). A copy of Amazing Fantasy #15  in CGC 8.0 brought $78,750.00 10.78% higher than the previously held world record.

The auction started strong on November 1st with a world record $6,300.00 for a copy of Daredevil #1, and sales remained strong throughout the 2 day sale. The sale was held at the Ameristar Casino in St. Charles, MO. And attracted on-site bidders from as far away as Toronto, Canada  to Dallas Texas and on-line bidders from Walla Walla, Washington to Hong Kong. Auctioneer Rob Weiman was pleased with the results and credited his son (they call him Rob Lite) with understanding the value of the collection. “My son had to convince me to go the whole way with this collection including spending over $50,000 to have the collection graded. It was a substantial investment for our tiny company with (at the time) 3 full time employees.  We were competing with some the biggest auction houses on Earth on this job and were literally wined and dined by a representative of the largest collectible Auctioneer in the world where they made us a very attractive offer. In the end we decided to go it ourselves and plowed forward. There were times when we thought we might not get done in time but it all came together in the end. The results of the sale speak for themselves. Our little company now holds 502 world records, and we were competing against companies with more people on their cleaning staff then we have in our whole company!”

Mound City Auctions has decided to remain in the comic book auction market with this successful sale. “I am actively seeking more comic books for our upcoming sale next year” said Auctioneer Rob Weiman, “my son has always loved comic books and we have found a niche that they will have to pry us out of with a crow bar and Vaseline.”

Mound City Auctions was started by Rob and Tina Weiman in 2000 and held it's first live auction in 2004 when they aided the families of Officers Sloan and Kiethley two St. Louis officers. Officer Sloan was killed, and Officer Kiethley was seriously injured while on duty. The auction raised over $84,000.00

Mound City Auctions can be reached at
314-680-8599
moundcityaucitons@gmail.com
www.moundcityauction.com