I'm wondering (and the web hasn't helped so far) what the first ever Trade Paperback of collected comics was. Graphic novels don't count.

Anyone know? Was it Watchmen?

I only started collecting in the early 90s, and while there weren't near as many trades as there are now, I remember primarily being stocked with Watchmen, Death of Superman, Sandman trades and Wonder Woman: The Contest. I'm sure there were more available even then, but that's what I seemed to remember seeing.

Was it this?

Origins of Marvel Comics perhaps?

I was typing while Mike was posting!

They weren't the oversized "trade" format, the the pocket book reprints were what hooked me on Marvel comics as a kid. And they were nothing but sequentially collected comic books, organized in numbered volumes.

If we're up around the time frame of Watchmen, I'm pretty sure The Dark Knight Returns primed it.

I got the first Wonder Woman trade in early '72. When did Stan's Origins get published?



(I'm sure that there was some sort of Spirit book or some other reprint prior to '72 though.)

StanLee.org says:

I need this!

Some early forays would be the Special Edition Warlock that was published in the early 1980's. Those issues weren't the square bound trades, but they crammed more issues in there. They got the whole saga in six published issues.

The complete EC Comics was published in hardcover form in the 1970's. Bill Gaines was one of the first to ever save original art (or print plates, or anything, for that matter).

DC's Blue Ribbon Digests were pioneers in this area.

These were published in 1971.

Feiffer's book came out in '65.

We're working backwards here. Get with the program.

Eisner saved the plates for his Spirit work... although I don't think he saved from the war years when he wasn't actually running the strip.

Gaines is unusual in that he kept the original artwork that was created by others. He's one of the only ones who didn't get hit by the change in the law that made DC & Marvel return the original artwork, since he had the foresight to establish in his contracts that he got to keep them.

I know that's the first one I owned and read. It was also an eye opener for me with Stan Lee's chapter introductions, his anecdotes gave a peek behind the curtain and got me to think for the first time about how comics and characters were created... plus that cover, decades before the likes of Alex Ross, mesmerized me.

These were at the library but were not allowed to be taken out - so I would park myself in there and read them.

I am a proud owner of a dog-eared copy.

For Jay:

DC puts a toe in the digest water in 1972:

I has these. Read em until they fell apart!

I had the FF one. For years that was the only place I had read the origin, which was chopped up all to hell to fit into the digest.