HOW A LONG-SHOT BID IN THE 1980S SECURED A STANDOUT COPY OF ACTION COMICS NO. 1, NOW THE HEADLINE LOT IN A BLOCKBUSTER AUCTION
By Jesse Hughey | May 5, 2026
Sometime in the early 1980s, one longtime comic book fan began getting serious about collecting despite not having a serious amount of money to put into the hobby. What he lacked in wealth, though, he made up for in determination.
Rather than make large bids on carefully selected prizes, he took a high-volume, low-bid approach. He would pore over auction house catalogs and call in lowball offers, hoping a listing or two had escaped the notice of deeper-pocketed collectors. Occasionally he’d win.
One day he got a telephone call letting him know his had been the highest bid for a copy of Action Comics No. 1, the 1938 issue that introduced Superman to the world — the Holy Grail of the hobby then and now. The bid he’d made was ridiculously low for the pinnacle of comics collecting, half its value if even that, but nonetheless a head-swimming amount of money for a young working man.
“So do you want to buy it?” the voice on the phone asked.
Fortunately for this hobbyist, the auction house offered payment plans.
Some 40 years later, his copy of Action Comics No. 1, the longtime top issue in the Overstreet Comic Price Guide, is the headline lot of Heritage Auctions’ May 7-9 Comic Books Signature® Auction. That is no small feat. The auction boasts Overstreet’s top seven most valuable titles and at least one copy of 20 out of the 30 most valuable from the Overstreet Golden Age list.
‘Action Comics’ No. 1 (DC, 1938) CGC Conserved FN/VF 7.0. Available in Heritage’s May 7-9 Comic Books Signature® Auction.
Timmy Heague, a comics writer and owner of Arsenal Comics & Games stores in Newbury Park and Ventura, California, contracted with this Action Comics No. 1 copy’s longtime owner, who wishes to remain anonymous, to consign the book on his behalf. As a shop owner, Heague has stuck it out through hard times — Covid, wildfires, a burglary — and is inspired by his client’s doggedness.
“To me, what I really respect and relate to is the dedication, the hustle, the sacrifices he made to make sure he would own this book after getting that call,” Heague says. “He slept in his store, borrowed money, sold possessions. And then what’s even more special to me is after 40 years, he never once had to sell it — he kept it safe and sound, never needing to sell it when times got tough, only selling it when he was ready and wanted to sell it.”
The client kept it very safe, in fact. The copy has undeniable eye appeal, with bold cover colors and beautiful page quality that have earned it an impressive CGC Conserved 7.0 grade — the second highest of the five Conserved copies currently on the CGC census.
Heague is donating a portion of the commission the owner is paying him to broker the sale to three industry-related organizations: the Hero Initiative, which helps comic book creators in need; the Book Industry Charitable Foundation, which provides assistance to bookstore and comic shop owners and employees; and Comics Professional Retail Organization, a trade organization that promotes advocacy, education, and opportunity for comics retailers. They’re close to his heart, having helped him through some of those aforementioned tough times, and his client has agreed to match his donation.
“We’re really excited about this because it’s a Conserved label, so it has had a little work done, but that eye appeal and bold colors — you don’t see that very often,” says Heritage Auctions Vice President Barry Sandoval. “We have had some copies of Action 1 sell for a lot of money that didn’t look as good as this one.”
