Fun and Games
Sorry that it’s been a couple of months since my last column. It’s become increasingly difficult to make a living in Canada as a small business and we’ve been focusing on trying to make ends meet. This column is not…
Comic Book Daily
Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
Comic Book Daily
Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
brian Campbell
Dr. brian Campbell is an Anthropologist based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His PhD research focused on the used-goods trade in Halifax. Dr. Campbell is co-owner of East Coast Toys and Games, one of Atlantic Canada's largest eBay stores specializing in pop culture collectibles. Dr. Campbell left academia in 2019 to focus on his business. During his spare time, he researches Canadian comics that were released between 1960-1990.
Read MoreFun and Games
This is Neil the Horse
It dawned on me after re-reading last month’s column, “An Introduction to Neil the Horse,” that I jumped right into things and didn’t really introduce the three main characters at all. Who is Neil the Horse? I recently stumbled upon…
An Introduction to Neil the Horse
When I was visiting New Brunswick in December, I was fortunate to stumble across the first three issues of Neil the Horse Comics and Stories at a collectibles store that I often drop into when I am in Saint John.…
Hunting for Vortex Merch
Happy belated New Year Forgotten Silver Readers. After taking a short break during the holidays that brought us to Saint John, New Brunswick for Christmas, we are back in Halifax and focusing on a couple of new initiatives. Something that…
Paradax!
November ended up being a bit of a time warp. Tania and I caught RSV at Hal-Con and spent a couple of weeks recovering, only to get infected with Covid for the first time in the middle of the month.…
You’re Short, Bald and Ugly Charlie Brown
Well folks, October was a crazy busy month for us at East Coast Toys and Games. We vended at five different events, including the Wolfville Vintage Market, the Curio Collective, the Halifax Record Fair, and the Funky Flea Market (twice).…
A Transitional Period
John Bell categorizes the Canadian Silver Age as coming to an end in 1988 when the black and white comics market collapsed. I, on the other hand, have long looked at the publication of the first issue of Drawn &…
The Soul of Your Community
I mentioned a couple of months ago in my “50th Issue Spectacular” that I have found myself dismayed by the political and economic direction of Canada. To say that I have soured on this country is an understatement and my…
Free Magic Tricks
I recently became acquainted with François Bourdages. Mr. Bourdages is one of the preeminent experts on bandes dessinées québécoises (BDQ), having previously curated a museum exhibit on the subject with historian Michel Viau in 2018 at the Musée POP in…
50th Issue Spectacular Starring FreeKluck
It’s hard to believe that I have been writing Forgotten Silver for nearly five years. I have tried to stick to a monthly format, but there have been a few starts and stops during the pandemic era. In fact, due…
Spring Cleaning
Welcome back to another edition of Forgotten Silver. As regular readers know, I did not publish a new column last month. East Coast Toys and Games appeared at three major events over four weekends in late March and early April,…
Jim Somerville’s Maelstrom
The original Aircel comics from the mid-to-late 1980s are some of the best-known from the Canadian Silver Age. Barry Blair’s titles Samurai and Elflord continue to have fans more than thirty years later and other series, like Dragonring, Stark: Future,…
The World’s Toughest Milkman
David Boswell and Reid Fleming are topics that I have wanted to write about for some time. The reason why I haven’t already profiled the “world’s toughest milkman” is that I had been unable to procure a specimen of the…
Investing and Finding Value in a Down Market
Comic books and other collectibles are generally not treated as serious investments in the world of finance. However, in 2020 and 2021 they became more interesting to investors who had access to large amounts of credit and who were looking…
The Precious Legacy and A Glitch in Time
The normalization of antisemitism recently in the United States is extremely disturbing. The fact that this normalization is occurring among members of the Black community is also cause for concern. Unfortunately, the ebbs and flows of antisemitism are nothing new…
The Emergence of the Fredericton Scene at the End of the Silver Age
Greetings everyone. It’s been a long couple of weeks with Hal-Con sucking up most of my time and energy. It was the first major fan convention that Tania and I have vended at since the pandemic began. Despite the work…
A Trip to New Brunswick
Happy belated Thanksgiving to our Canadian readers! It’s good to be back after not writing a Forgotten Silver column last month. I had far too much on my plate in August and preparing for the NBAAC Flea Market in Sussex,…
Spectrum Addendum
Well, folks, I must say that I wasn’t expecting last month’s column, “A Spectrum Publications Checklist,” to receive such an enthusiastic response from readers. It obviously struck a chord. Quite a few people commented and numerous others contacted me privately…
A Spectrum Publications Checklist
When the second Canadiana auction (hosted by Walter Duralija’s eBay store, International Collectibles Exchange) ended on June 8, the talk of the comics community was the record price achieved for the first Canadian comic book, Better Comics # 1. This…
The Emergence of Comic Fanzines in Ontario in the Late 1960s
Before getting started on this month’s topic, I want to direct readers to Robin Bougie’s recently published Gutter Hunter # 2. Note that this Canadian publication is NSFW and Bougie calls it “The adults only guide to the history’s wildest…