I've always been a HUGE fan of MAD magazine; ever since first getting turned on to a "Mad Fold-In" in elementary school I've collected as many issues as I could get ahold of and have never looked back!
Over the years I've managed to track down a bunch of issues, including some very early issues- my earliest copy was issue 37 from waaaay back in 1958(!), but one thing that I've always wanted to have was one of the original first 23 issues.
As some of you may know, MAD magazine started out as a comic, yes, a EC Comic title in fact, alongside such notorious titles as Tales from the Crypt and Shock SuspenStories, and didn't turn to magazine format until issue 24!
Mad would occasionally reprint facsimile copies of those issues in Super Specials, but I really wanted a real one, ANY one, for my collection!
Among them was a cover I'd always liked, featuring Lewis Carroll's Alice In Wonderland Tenniel illustration on the cover, and I recently found someone selling a copy for VERY reasonable amount!
Getting it in the mail recently, it is simply BEAUTIFUL and SUCh a SIGHT to behold! And yanno, the inside stories? Some of them I'd already had in some of those aforementioned facsimile issues, including a big fave, a spoof of Gasoline Alley! Such a surprise!
(Funny, the issue it was in had a completely different cover though!)
Now, these issue are pretty pricey, and I have no expectation of "completing the set" as it were, but I'm entirely happy to at least own one of the original 23 in my collection!
