Rarest Disney comic in each country

[cacou]

I've always been curious about the rarest Disney comics publications in the various countries.

In the country I know most (France), that title definitely goes to inducks.org/issue.php?c=fr%2FJMAG+297A

The "Journal de Mickey" Disney weekly (published in Paris) was stopped after #296 was published (June 1940) because of WWII. Issue 297 was published several months after (September 1940) in Marseille.

Issue #296 is considered extremely rare, it's been said only people who subscribed to the journal received it, it was not on the newstand.

But it turns out there is one issue which is even rarer. A second #297 issue was published, discovered in 2011. Only one copy is known to exist.

At that time, it's been hypothesized that the printer used to print a few copies of the next issue alongside the current one as trials. Someone, probably employed by the printer, saved one copy of issue #297 that was printed along #296, and that copy stayed in an attic in Chartres until 2011. The issue must come from the printer as it is not cut. Many uncut issues from the same period where found along #297.

The person who bought it in 2011 sold it to a collector, and apparently asked other collectors quite a lot of money for a mere scan of the comic.

Contrary to the issue printed in Marseille, and like issue #296, this one is a full color issue. Fun fact, this unique copy is incomplete, as a part of the page (containing a Disney drawing) has been cut and is lost forever.

[hex]

Feb 4, 2021 21:13:10 GMT cacou said:

But it turns out there is one issue which is even rarer. A second #297 issue was published, discovered in 2011. Only one copy is known to exist.

[...] The issue must come from the printer as it is not cut.[...]

It doesn't sound like this one was published, so I'm not sure I'd count it as a rare comic. I guess there are a lot of proof and test copies sent to editors that only exists in a couple of copies around.

A more recent example is the American Mickey Mouse Classics: Mouse Mayhem where the final book was printed but is not known to have been distributed anywhere. But at few copies were sent to the editors.

[That Duckfan]

Wow, what a story!

If I could hazard a guess about Belgium, I suspect the rarest comics will be the editions of Donald Duck/Journal de Mickey from 1959 that had a Mickey Magazine logo on the cover. The last Dutch-language comic in INDUCKS is 471 or 1959-42, but the last known comic is 481 (1959-52, or the end of the year). These comics would be sent to subscribers to fill out the year. Any of these, from 469 to 481, could be the rarest Belgian comic -- or their Walloon equivalents, or course.
www.catawiki.nl/l/806477-donald-duck-tijdschrift-469-t-m-481-speciale-vlaamse-overgangseditie-13x-sc-1e-druk-1959

[cacou]

Feb 4, 2021 21:54:59 GMT That Duckfan said:

Wow, what a story!

If I could hazard a guess about Belgium, I suspect the rarest comics will be the editions of Donald Duck/Journal de Mickey from 1959 that had a Mickey Magazine logo on the cover. The last Dutch-language comic in INDUCKS is 471 or 1959-42, but the last known comic is 481 (1959-52, or the end of the year). These comics would be sent to subscribers to fill out the year. Any of these, from 469 to 481, could be the rarest Belgian comic -- or their Walloon equivalents, or course.
www.catawiki.nl/l/806477-donald-duck-tijdschrift-469-t-m-481-speciale-vlaamse-overgangseditie-13x-sc-1e-druk-1959

Thanks for the info. I've added be/MMN 472 to 481 in Inducks. Do we know for sure that there French equivalents exist and up to which issue? (currently only two issues are listed: inducks.org/publication.php?c=be%2FJM )

I can imagine that e.g. subscriptions did not correspond to a calendar year but run from Sept. to Sept. Or simply that subscribers would get normal issues without the "Mickey Magazine" logo.

[That Duckfan]

Feb 5, 2021 8:36:10 GMT cacou said:

Feb 4, 2021 21:54:59 GMT That Duckfan said:

Wow, what a story!

If I could hazard a guess about Belgium, I suspect the rarest comics will be the editions of Donald Duck/Journal de Mickey from 1959 that had a Mickey Magazine logo on the cover. The last Dutch-language comic in INDUCKS is 471 or 1959-42, but the last known comic is 481 (1959-52, or the end of the year). These comics would be sent to subscribers to fill out the year. Any of these, from 469 to 481, could be the rarest Belgian comic -- or their Walloon equivalents, or course.
www.catawiki.nl/l/806477-donald-duck-tijdschrift-469-t-m-481-speciale-vlaamse-overgangseditie-13x-sc-1e-druk-1959

Thanks for the info. I've added be/MMN 472 to 481 in Inducks. Do we know for sure that there French equivalents exist and up to which issue? (currently only two issues are listed: inducks.org/publication.php?c=be%2FJM )

I can imagine that e.g. subscriptions did not correspond to a calendar year but run from Sept. to Sept. Or simply that subscribers would get normal issues without the "Mickey Magazine" logo.

Anything on the Walloon side is just speculation from me. A quick Google search gives me no results, but the "Mickey" / "Mickey" names might not be too clear to a search engine.

[Special Mongo]

Hi! I write from Italy, so please forgive me for my macaronic English, whenever that is the case.
In Italy we have very rare magazines: here are two interesting pieces containing Barks' Darkest Africa in its original edition. I think that recent American editions of the story were based on these Italian editions (the magazines are almost identical except for the cover):

inducks.org/issue.php?c=it%2FCLEO++1

inducks.org/issue.php?c=it%2FCLEO++2

Federico Provenzano

[That Duckfan]

The rarest comic in the Netherlands, that's hard to say. There's a hard cap on that number, I recently found out: a hardcover collection of Dutch Zorro comics from the '60s had a limited print run of 125. That's very low for the Netherlands --- I'm pretty sure even the rarest Donald Duck weekly (1953-01) has more than 125 remaining issues in existence. The rarest comic would likely be something from before WW2, or some giveaway nobody kept around. Probably an early scheurkalender, a type of wall calendar where you tear off a page each day. Can't imagine many of those have survived nearly 40 years. Maybe something that hasn't been indexed in Inducks yet (yes, there exists such a thing). I honestly wouldn't know. Do newspapers count?

[timoro]

In Finland Snow White and 7 Dwarfes (Lumikki ja seitsemän kääpiötä) is one of the rarest and most expensive Disney comic book. Published in 1951 and sold exclusively on newstands. Of 15 000 printed copies 5000 were sold and the rest unsold copies were destroyed (yes, it's true!).
inducks.org/issue.php?c=fi%2FAA1952B09


Undoubtedly one of the rarest Disney-book in anywhere in the world is Three Little Pigs (Kolme potsin poikasta) picture book published in Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1938. Only 3-4 known copies know to survive, since soviet authorities burned most of them. Translated in Carelian lanquage using cyrillic alphabet. (How can I attach a picture on a message?)

[alquackskey]

Feb 11, 2021 21:45:59 GMT timoro said:

In Finland Snow White and 7 Dwarfes (Lumikki ja seitsemän kääpiötä) is one of the rarest and most expensive Disney comic book. Published in 1951 and sold exclusively on newstands. Of 15 000 printed copies 5000 were sold and the rest unsold copies were destroyed (yes, it's true!).
inducks.org/issue.php?c=fi%2FAA1952B09


Undoubtedly one of the rarest Disney-book in anywhere in the world is Three Little Pigs (Kolme potsin poikasta) picture book published in Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1938. Only 3-4 known copies know to survive, since soviet authorities burned most of them. Translated in Carelian lanquage using cyrillic alphabet. (How can I attach a picture on a message?)

In a reply (Can't be a quick reply), it's the grey square with the picture frame (Between the envelope with the orange arrow and the clapboard).

You can't actually upload pictures here - only display them.
It would have to be either a direct image link from another webpage, or it would first have to be uploaded to another image sharing site (Such as imgur).

[Mesterius]

I can recommend postimages.org as an image hosting site. It's simple to use and lets you upload pictures both with or without an account.

[timoro]

Okei, I see now what I made wrong. I used that "Quick Reply" function.
Here we go, Kolme Potsin Poikasta from 1939 (not -38 as I previously said):



Timo

[cacou]

This book does not contain comics, does it?

[timoro]

No, it is just a picture book.

[cacou]

The same illustration as above is published in inducks.org/issue.php?c=fr%2FHL+A++4
(But the book has a different cover as you can see)

[Mesterius]

And here are the same illustrations from the 1934 Norwegian book edition of Three Little Pigs, or "Tre små griser" to use the Norwegian title. Clearly they're both based on an American original.

Note, though, that the artwork in the Soviet edition is redrawn (this is especially noticeable in the title page drawing)... while the Norwegian book uses what I would guess is the original art.