Wed, October 22nd, 2008 at 9:58PM PST

It was so successful, even in the depths of the Depression, that it instantly spawned dozens of imitators vying for comic strip reprint rights, thus launching both the comic book industry and the legend that comics do well in times of economic downturn.

2) NEW FUN #1 (National Allied Publications, 1935)

Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson: savvy visionary or a desperate businessman? In any case, eager to get in on the new comic book market, the major-come-lately made the disheartening discovery that all the comic strips worth publishing had already been bought up by other publishers, so he pursued the next best option, and solicited new material to publish, creating the first all-new comic book. Not that there were any strips of particular note in it, nor that someone else wouldn't have ended up in the same place sooner than later, but Wheeler-Nicholson got there first.

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