"Indeed, only two copies (both of issue #13) are known to exist."
Acaeum listings take time (usually years?) to be updated.

As of 1st September 1970:
King - Rob Kuntz
Steward, Earl Palatine, OMSC - Gary Gygax
Lord Prince of Arms, Viscount, OMS - Bill Linden
Viscount, OMS, Mercenary Captain, OH - Jeff Perren
Chief Scrivner, Viscount - Christopher Schleicher
Chamberlain, Baron, OMS - Terry Kuntz
Pursuivant, Baron - Dave Arneson
Justicar, Baron - Russell Tulp
High Constable, Baron, OH - Rick Crane
Baron, OH - Stefen Kwiatkowski
Baron - Ken Scher, Stephen A Thomas, Jr.
OMS - Tom Webster
Herald, Kt. - Harry Manogg
Sheriff, Kt. - H. Axel Krigsman, Jr.
Court Jester, Kt. - Chris Johnson
Kt. - Al Macintyre, Read Boles, Bill Hoyer
Esq. - Paul Cote, Richard Locke, Sam Ferris, Duane Jenkins, Terry Stafford
Gent. - Patrick Wilson, Bill Larson, John Bobek, George Kwiatkowski, Gerald Crane, Steve Umstead, Terry Winckler, Stuart Trembly, Tom Bray, Len Lakofka, Charles Pasco, Tom Hazlett, Harley Anton, James Lurvey, Bill Belke, George Patton, Mike Gutierrez
(total, 41)

Oooh. Great info!

Thanks very, very much.

Did anyone ever get the Domesday Book compiled into PDF?

I am working on some details of things, in hope. But, it will be very difficult to find missing issues, especially the first 4. However, if I can get things to work out right, I hope to have a "traveling museum" that goes to the major Cons as a perpetual tribute to Gary and the early days of D&D. The hard part is getting everything... (like a 1st print Chainmail, a 1st print woodgrain, and so forth, all of which are outside my budget.) But, I am trying. Will take some time to amass the funds to do it, though.

faro wrote:I suspect the ongoing .pdf suggestion might still get a smile from those who have laid down car deposits for near-complete runs.

The text of the magna carta and even photos are readily available, but a quasi-original* still sold for $21 million back in December 07.  I doubt have the contents of these available would impact the value of the originals to any significant degree.

* - This was not the one signed by King John in 1215, but rather one signed by King Edward I in 1297.

I agree as well. The PDFs of just about all early material is cheaply available but hasn't brought down the prices, if anything, it's helped grow a greater interest in them. I'd bet 1 in 50,000 people who are hardcore D&D players even know of the existence of these books. Getting the information out there and the legacy of them out there could only increase notoriety and most likely price of the originals.

I think the biggest tragedy of all is that this information is basically lost, or most probably will be soon. It would be like keeping the notebooks of Thomas Jefferson only in the hands of  a private collector and never allowing those contents to be released.

The worst part is the information is so narrowly distributed that it would be difficult for one to even begin to start to line up permissions for copyright. There isn't even an index of what information there is.

faro wrote:*g*. You do recall what Mike/improv had to fork out in that particular case, Gro'?

Reprints very rarely devalue the original, unless the original was overvalued to begin with.  This has been proven time and again in every collectible field there is.  I have not doubt if Bottle City were on the market now it would see a substantial increase.

Note: I forgot the item sold for $3600...I was sure it went for about two grand.  I wouldn't swear it wouldn't go for more though, some deep pocket European whose Euro is worth a lot more now.....  

Mike B.

Badmike wrote:Note: I forgot the item sold for $3600...I was sure it went for about two grand.  I wouldn't swear it wouldn't go for more though, some deep pocket European whose Euro is worth a lot more now.....

... wish I'd taken less than 15 minutes to reply there whilst multi-tasking, Mike!

No joke re. the Euro, though - it definitely stings to buy from those countries.

Regardless--and back to the subject at hand---I could see a limited edition reprint of the Domesday Book issues selling for $50-100 a copy on the print run, without too much difficulty, and likely it would sell more than the limited edition of Bottle City did.

That may be true, but there is much to consider:

1) copyright - who owns the rights? Likely Wizards of the Coast; are there references to their properties in Domesday? Anything about Chainmail, OD&D? Greyhawk or Blackmoor (not a WotC property as far as I know)? What about the original art?

2) cost of print run - it'll take, likely, $20k just to get a full run, if it can be found. Half that is for "common" issues, and the other half for the first 4, if you're lucky. That means you'd have to sell 200 of them at $100 just to break even at cost to start to print, not even considering the actual print costs (probably another $3 - 5k) and marketing costs. So you're looking at roughly 500 copies sold to make it even close to being worthwhile, and then, just barely... now, if you happen to already own a complete run, then you're doing much better, of course, but I highly doubt anyone that has this set is going to want to release it generally.

3) the above is just to purchase actual copies and has no estimate for buying rights to actually use them; that can get very expensive, depending on who and what. So, likely, tack on even more cost to get the rights to print, and you're looking at either upping costs (means less sold) or over-printing to save your hide and then being stuck with non-sells.

So, its a good dream, but I'm just not seeing a reprint as a viable option... that is why I prefer the "traveling museum." Of course, its not the same.