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Fightin\' Army #117 (Charlton, February 1975) — a Tom Sutton cover credited with pencils, inks and letters, plus a five-page Pat Boyette story opening the issue. Graded 5.5 Fine−.
Key Debuts and Story Milestones
- An Unusually Complete Sutton Credit: The index credits Tom Sutton with pencils, inks and letters on this cover — a fuller credit than he usually carries. The cover itself is unsigned; the attribution comes from the index.
- Boyette Opens the Book: \"The Game Of War!\" is written by Mike Pellowski and drawn, inked and lettered by Pat Boyette — a WWI story and the strongest art in the issue.
Behind the Scenes and Quirky Details
- Three Wars in Thirty-Six Pages: WWI, WWII and the Cold War, across five unconnected shorts. Charlton\'s war line had no continuity and no ongoing cast, which let the company assemble books from whatever inventory was to hand. Edited by George Wildman.
- \"Operation Barbarossa\" takes its name from the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 — written by Joe Gill, Charlton\'s most prolific writer by an enormous margin, with art by Bill Molno.
- Boyette\'s Route In: He was a San Antonio television news anchor and independent film-maker who did not start drawing comics professionally until his forties, then became one of Charlton\'s most recognisable stylists.
- No Barcode: The corner box carries Charlton\'s own code and no UPC — February 1975 predates Charlton\'s barcode adoption, and the direct market did not yet exist.
Condition:
FRONT
Bottom edge — whitening running along a good part of the margin — MED impact to the grade.
Corners — all four blunted, top-left with a soft bend — MED impact to the grade.
Left edge — small crease near the top staple — LOW impact to the grade.
Red cover field — bright and largely unrubbed, unusual for a fifty-year-old red Charlton — No impact on the grade.
SPINE
Structure — straight, no split, no roll, cover flush on the page block. Confirmed on both raking-angle views — No impact on the grade.
Stress — no colour-breaking stress lines found — No impact on the grade.
Staples — both visible along the fold, intact and holding, no rust — No impact on the grade.
BACK
Bottom-left corner — clear crease with the paper turned. The worst single defect on the book — MED impact to the grade.
Other corners — blunted — LOW impact to the grade.
Cream field — light foxing specks and a small rust-toned mark near the top-right — LOW impact to the grade.
INTERIOR
Page quality — Cream to Off-White
Pages — complete and supple, no tears, writing, cut coupons or water damage — No impact on the grade.
Staples — intact, no rust migration onto the paper — No impact on the grade.
Graded 5.5 Fine−, range 5.0–6.0. A bright copy that photographs better than it grades. The red cover has survived without the colour rub these usually show, and the spine is straight and unsplit under both raking angles with both staples holding. What pulls it down is at the edges rather than the middle: a folded back corner and whitening along the bottom margin of the front cover. Neither shows in a straight-on cover shot, so both are photographed directly.
Grading is my own opinion on a raw, uncertified book. Photos are of the actual comic you will receive, including close-ups of all eight corners and a raking-angle view of the spine. Shipped bagged and boarded in a rigid mailer.
