The Playful Antiquarian

Philanthropic comic book collectors

August 10th, 2003

Comic book collectors, it seems, are becoming the bibliophile-philanthropists of this era. Today, I read two stories about university libraries adding comic books to their special collections. Duke University has recently established the Edwin and Terry Murray Collection of Pulp Culture, a collection of 55,000 comic books and 500 role playing games, plus other related materials. The collection was donated by the Murray brothers last year, and once the collection is processed, it will be one of the largest comic book archives in the United States. And Duke’s neighbor, UNC-Chapel Hill, also recently acquired a comic book collection of 2600 books from UNC alumnus and former Rare Book Collection staff member, Dan Breen. Duke’s collection should be open for research beginning in the fall. UNC’s collection, which was transferred to the university in July, will not be open to researchers at least for another year or two.

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