Playboy #1 CGC 9.0Q, Rare Page 3 Copy, Second Highest Graded! Marilyn Monroe!

Description: CGC Qualified Grade 9.0 (staples replaced).Highly sought-after Playboy #1 'Page 3 Copy' (HMH Publishing Co., December 1953) with white pages, featuring Marilyn Monroe on the front cover and inside.Of the several variants of Playboy #1—a newsstand edition, a 'Red Star' copy, and a 'Page 3' copy—the 'Red Star' is considered rarest, followed closely by this 'Page 3' edition; the newsstand edition is much more common. The Page 3 Copy is one of three variants of the initial printing of the groundbreaking first issue, so named because unlike the more common newsstand copies, the "3" is actually printed on the page! These were actually the first copies printed, but were largely pulled from circulation almost immediately on Hefner's orders. For page count purposes, the front cover and the inside front cover were counted as pages 1 and 2, meaning the first inside page was considered page 3. It seems Hef did not want to confuse readers into thinking pages 1 and 2 were missing when they noticed a "3" on the first inside page, so his intent was to simply not number that page at all! To Hef's dismay, a conscientious employee "corrected" what he thought was an error and inserted the "3" just before the initial print run! Try as he might, Hefner was unable to retrieve all the original "Page 3" copies, but relatively few survived. The "Page 3 Copy" version comprises only an estimated 5% of the total copies sold of the first issue. CGC census records only one example of this Page 3 version graded higher. That copy, a CGC 9.2 which is signed by Hefner, was sold by Heritage last month for $60,000!!Hefner didn't know how well his concept magazine would be received, especially in the beginning, so the print run for the first issue was just about 50,000 copies. That was only about 5% of the print run of Superman comics in the mid-1950s. Do the math, and you can see that high-grade copies of Playboy #1 are not very plentiful, and the fact has been borne out with the recent and ever-rising demand for copies of #1.Some other recent sales to compare:CGC 8.5 (Newstand Edition), 2/15, $28,680CGC 9.0 (regular edition - I presume also Newstand), 11/16, $26,290CGC 8.5 (Page 3 copy), 5/17, $20,315This was one of my holy grails to own, and it is a great investment as well!

Price: 37999 USD

Location: Rockville, Maryland

End Time: 2024-02-27T15:54:29.000Z

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