The Old 29 - DC Comics for August 1972

It's week two of our journey into DC's past. Last week I looked at DC's offerings for August 1982, and this week I'm heading over to the DC Database Wiki to look at August 1972:

• Action Comics #415 (super-hero)
• Adventure Comics #422 (super-hero)
• Batman #243 (super-hero)
• Detective Comics #426 (super-hero)
• Falling in Love #135 (romance)
• Forbidden Tales of Dark Mansion #6 (horror/mystery)
• Ghosts #6 (horror/mystery)
• Girls' Love Stories #172 (romance)
• House of Mystery #205 (horror/mystery)
• House of Secrets #99 (horror/mystery)
• Justice League of America #100 (super-hero)
• Korak, Son of Tarzan #47 (adventure)
• Larry Harmon's Laurel and Hardy #1 (humor)
• Mister Miracle #9 (super-hero)
• Our Army at War #248 (war)
• Our Fighting Forces #138 (war)
• The Phantom Stranger #20 (horror/mystery)
• Strange Adventures #237
• Superboy #189 (super-hero)
• Superman #255 (super-hero)
• Superman's Girlfriend, Lois Lane #125 (super-hero)
• Tarzan #211 (adventure)
• Teen Titans #40 (super-hero)
• Unexpected #138 (horror/mystery)
• Weird Mystery Tales #1 (horror/mystery)
• Weird War Tales #6 (war)
• Witching Hour #22 (horror/mystery)
• Wonder Woman #201 (super-hero)
• Young Romance #185 (romance)

(There were also two reprint comics: From Beyond the Unknown #18 & Wanted: The World's Most Dangerous Villains #1.)

That's 11 super-hero titles, 8 horror/mystery, 3 romance, 3 war, 2 adventure, 1 sci-fi, and 1 humor; for a total of 29 comics published by DC that month.

We should note here that at the time, many of DC's titles were on a bi-monthly or even quarterly schedule. So titles like Flash, The Brave and the Bold, New Gods, G.I. Combat, Inferior Five, The Forever People, Jimmy Olsen, Star-Spangled War Stories, World's Finest, Weird Western Tales, and others didn't have an August cover-date issue in 1972.

All titles were 20¢—$1.14 in 2014 dollars—for 22 pages of story. (Inflation figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator.)

In August 2014, DC published a whopping 76 different titles! 60 super-hero titles, 8 horror/mystery, 5 fantasy, 1 science fiction, 1 war, and 1 western. Many are $2.99 for 20 pages of comics; some are $3.99 for 22 pages of comics, a few are $4.99 for 35-38 pages of comics.

(Of course, today's DC comics have higher quality production—coloring, paper quality, etc.—which may or may not be worth the extra cost to you.)

Tune in next week, when we journey back even further in time to 1962!