THE BIDDING WAR FOR THE 1963 DAN DARE ANNUAL STEVE WINDERS RECALLS HIS BATTLE TO BUY A DAN DARE ANNUAL AT A SCHOOL AUCTION.
It was late October 1964 and I was in my first year at secondary school, when the class decided to hold an auction to raise money for charity. A wide variety of items were donated, including a nearly new pair of football boots, a collection of Preston North End programmes (my school was in Preston), a couple of Jennings books, a Kodak Brownie Box Camera, a 1960 Wagon Train Annual, a Davy Crockett Indian Fighter hat and a View Master with several film reels. However the item that took my eye was a copy of Dan Dare’s Space Annual 1963. Actually produced for Christmas 1962, as all annuals carry the forthcoming year on their covers, this book was highly desirable for a fan like myself, who thanks to my father, had taken Eagle since the age of three. Unfortunately my best friend was also a keen fan and he was in the same class. I realised at once that I would face a fierce battle to buy the book. Despite the title, Dan Dare books were not an annual affair. During the run of the original Eagle, there were actually only two: An extremely rare 1953 book called Dan Dare’s Spacebook, produced by Dan’s creator Frank Hampson and his studio team and the 1963 edition, which was produced by Don Harley, Bruce Cornwell and Eric Eden, all members of Frank’s old team, after he left the strip. By the time it came out, they had all been replaced by Keith Watson and David Motton, in the radical changes made to Eagle in March 1962. For me, the Space Annual represented Eagle’s better times, when Dan and
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