Force of Evil

Discuss all the girls comics that have appeared over the years. Excellent titles like Bunty, Misty, Spellbound, Tammy and June, amongst many others, can all be remembered here.

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colcool007
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by colcool007 »

Phoenix wrote:
colcool007 wrote:issues not being returned
That can't happen at the British Library because all volumes issued are issued to your card, and you have to have them checked back in when you have finished with them. If you want to work with them again the following day you just ask the librarian to keep them for you. They will then retain them for three days before returning them to stock or to Boston Spa. It is therefore a courtesy if you have finished with them to tell whichever librarian takes the volumes from you that you will not be needing them again.
Actually, it can. I spoke with a number of the specialists in the Public Records Office and they said it was amazing how many items could disappear in any year. Admittedly many of the items they mentioned were things that I had never heard of. All it takes is for someone to be a lot less scrupulous than any honest researcher to request some of the valuable at the time issues and to have a method of moving them out of the building without arousing suspicion. Also no one would think to check on a researcher who was just popping out for lunch, would they?
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Tammyfan »

colcool007 wrote:
Phoenix wrote:
colcool007 wrote:issues not being returned
That can't happen at the British Library because all volumes issued are issued to your card, and you have to have them checked back in when you have finished with them. If you want to work with them again the following day you just ask the librarian to keep them for you. They will then retain them for three days before returning them to stock or to Boston Spa. It is therefore a courtesy if you have finished with them to tell whichever librarian takes the volumes from you that you will not be needing them again.
Actually, it can. I spoke with a number of the specialists in the Public Records Office and they said it was amazing how many items could disappear in any year. Admittedly many of the items they mentioned were things that I had never heard of. All it takes is for someone to be a lot less scrupulous than any honest researcher to request some of the valuable at the time issues and to have a method of moving them out of the building without arousing suspicion. Also no one would think to check on a researcher who was just popping out for lunch, would they?
While I was in a second hand bookshop once, the owner came across a book about Superman from a pile of new arrivals. The book looked like it had been stolen from a library. He phoned the library and they were very pleased to have it back! :)

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colcool007
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by colcool007 »

Phoenix wrote:
colcool007 wrote:copies not even being sent to the Library in the first place
Where Thomsons are concerned that situation is extremely unlikely to have arisen. Don't forget that I have been consulting the British Library's holdings of Thomsons titles for boys and more recently for girls since at least the 1970s when I was hard at work during school holidays cataloguing The Wizard. In later visits I completed my noting down of the content of my missing issues of The Hotspur, Adventure, The Skipper and The Rover. I would have noticed any issues that were missing. It is only relatively recently that I have turned my attention to the company's titles for girls. I must go now as a big parcel, more a box in truth, of issues of M&J arrived while I was in Cornwall, and I need to check them in, then integrate those that I haven't already got and those that are upgrades on those I already have.
With regards to Thomsons and the British Library, you concur with what I was told back in the mid 1990s. The people I spoke to were very free in their praise of D C Thomsons always sending copies of their publications to the British Library. However, as we are talking about the National Library of Scotland (NLS), I find that praise to be significant in its' absence when I spoke to those that I know. Part of the problem was that the NLS was seen as the poor cousin to the British Library and while several publishing houses were meticulous in their donations to the British Library, they were not as meticulous in donating to the NLS.
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philcom55
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by philcom55 »

I've found that since historical documents were microfilmed then digitized it's become much harder to gain access to the originals. I suspect that something similar will eventually happen with comics in institutions like the British Library.

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Phoenix »

colcool007 wrote:With regards to Thomsons and the British Library, you concur with what I was told back in the mid 1990s. The people I spoke to were very free in their praise of D C Thomsons always sending copies of their publications to the British Library. However, as we are talking about the National Library of Scotland (NLS), I find that praise to be significant in its' absence when I spoke to those that I know. Part of the problem was that the NLS was seen as the poor cousin to the British Library and while several publishing houses were meticulous in their donations to the British Library, they were not as meticulous in donating to the NLS.
Look, Col, it is a legal requirement on everybody who publishes anything in Great Britain that they send one copy of that published item, even a flyer, to all six copyright libraries. These are the British Library, the National Libraries of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, Oxford University and Cambridge University. No ifs, no buts. Reference copies of both my books are in all those libraries, and six copies of my history of Bunty when I write it will join them, as will Ray's and my history of Adventure.

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Phoenix »

philcom55 wrote:I've found that since historical documents were microfilmed then digitized it's become much harder to gain access to the originals. I suspect that something similar will eventually happen with comics in institutions like the British Library.
That process has been going on for a long time, Phil. I think it was in the early eighties when I was researching those issues of The Rover that I didn't then own, that I was told that the bound volumes were no longer available to the general public, but microfilmed versions were issued instead. You needed to feed the filmstrip into a reader, several of which had been made available in one room for that purpose, and read the pages one at a time. At the time I was studying them the library was in the back of the British Museum. I was talking to one of the librarians about it, and when I asked her what they had done with their bound volumes she actually took me up to the stacks to see for myself. All of the volumes were wrapped individually in thick white paper with ribbon round them. They are unlikely to see the light of day again unless the odd one is required to produce a replacement for one of the filmstrips that has become mangled in a reader by some idiot who couldn't figure out the procedure.

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peace355
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by peace355 »

The bound volumes I've seen, certainly don't look damaged and it only seems that they are missing around 4 issues, so perhaps they were lost in transition before they were bound?

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by comixminx »

Phoenix wrote:
colcool007 wrote:With regards to Thomsons and the British Library, you concur with what I was told back in the mid 1990s. The people I spoke to were very free in their praise of D C Thomsons always sending copies of their publications to the British Library. However, as we are talking about the National Library of Scotland (NLS), I find that praise to be significant in its' absence when I spoke to those that I know. Part of the problem was that the NLS was seen as the poor cousin to the British Library and while several publishing houses were meticulous in their donations to the British Library, they were not as meticulous in donating to the NLS.
Look, Col, it is a legal requirement on everybody who publishes anything in Great Britain that they send one copy of that published item, even a flyer, to all six copyright libraries. These are the British Library, the National Libraries of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, Oxford University and Cambridge University. No ifs, no buts. Reference copies of both my books are in all those libraries, and six copies of my history of Bunty when I write it will join them, as will Ray's and my history of Adventure.
Are you reckoning on everyone across the nation being scrupulous and careful? Sure, those are the clear rules and most publishers will adhere to them. But will all small presses or not-so-scrupulous publishers do so? they should, but Col's experience suggests they don't always.
jintycomic.wordpress.com/ Excellent and weird stories from the past - with amazing art to boot.

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colcool007
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by colcool007 »

comixminx wrote:
Phoenix wrote:
colcool007 wrote:With regards to Thomsons and the British Library, you concur with what I was told back in the mid 1990s. The people I spoke to were very free in their praise of D C Thomsons always sending copies of their publications to the British Library. However, as we are talking about the National Library of Scotland (NLS), I find that praise to be significant in its' absence when I spoke to those that I know. Part of the problem was that the NLS was seen as the poor cousin to the British Library and while several publishing houses were meticulous in their donations to the British Library, they were not as meticulous in donating to the NLS.
Look, Col, it is a legal requirement on everybody who publishes anything in Great Britain that they send one copy of that published item, even a flyer, to all six copyright libraries. These are the British Library, the National Libraries of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, Oxford University and Cambridge University. No ifs, no buts. Reference copies of both my books are in all those libraries, and six copies of my history of Bunty when I write it will join them, as will Ray's and my history of Adventure.
Are you reckoning on everyone across the nation being scrupulous and careful? Sure, those are the clear rules and most publishers will adhere to them. But will all small presses or not-so-scrupulous publishers do so? they should, but Col's experience suggests they don't always.
This intrigued me as I had been led to believe that this was a donation by publishers, but to find that it was a legal requirement was quite interesting.

The only legal requirement is that a deposit has to be made in the British Library. The five other libraries can request a copy of any publication as long as the request is made by them within 12 months of initial publication. I have done a bit of delving but I cannot find what penalty any publisher would face if they failed to comply with this request. So if anyone can let me know what the penalty would be, I would be interested to know.

Minx, my experience is limited to being friendly with the custodians of our nation's records. But as I find that everyone likes to be treated as a hero, it is amazing how much information you can get from being kind to people.

Derek, as to complying with legal requirements, I give you the fact that the speed limits around the UK are legal requirements that all drivers are supposed to comply with and how many drivers blast through them on a daily basis?
I started to say something sensible but my parents took over my brain!

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Phoenix »

colcool007 wrote:speed limits around the UK are legal requirements that all drivers are supposed to comply with and how many drivers blast through them on a daily basis?
I suppose that depends on where you live, and whether you need to use a motorway on that daily basis. On normal roads there will be some minor infractions certainly. On motorways 80 is the new 70. On the M5, it seems to be 90, given that I'm doing 80 and I'm being overtaken, usually by Audis, whose owners give the impression that their car is some kind of penile extension.

Tammyfan
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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Tammyfan »

Okay, can we get back on the topic now?

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Phoenix »

Tammyfan wrote:Okay, can we get back on the topic now?
Why? Do you have more to say on the serial Force Of Evil? If so please say it. You should remember that threads do have a habit of apparently going off topic from time to time, and to be fair, they usually get back on it eventually.

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Re: Force of Evil

Post by Tammyfan »

Two more episodes of Force of Evil acquired now! :D

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