The DC Vault: A Museum-In-A-Book (2006)

The DC Vault arrived in the mail this week and I was extremely excited to paw through it. The museum-in-a-book presents a great deal of insight on the history of DC and the creative process as well as numerous reproduced items/ephemera. My primary focus was the portions of the book featuring Swamp Thing and there are a few!
Action Comics #1 ashcan preligion army cover (left page) and an ad for the book on the right.

A reproduction of Double Action Comics #2! Only three original ash and are known to exist. None of #1 are known to exist.

Batman #30 (from notes to finished cover) helped to support the war effort.

I love reading and seeing the creative process.

I was really excited to see the Junior Justice Society secret decoder. This page includes a Batman mask (1942), Wonder Woman pin and secret decoder (circa 1943).

This page featuring the cover to Brother Power The Geek caught my eye. Not only do I enjoy the short lived book,  the title plays a small part in Swamp Thing series 2. Chester Williams has a long history with Brother Power.

The book includes a few exl pleas of foreign merchandise. When the Swamp Thing museum-in-a-book comes out, I hope I can contribute some wacky, hard to find collectibles.

Swamp Thing shares a spread with a really great RagMan sketch.

Swamp Thing #12 process sketch and finished cover by Nestor Redondo


Ragman #1 sketch with notes

DC’s internal stationary was pretty awesome! I haven’t seen many of these floating around the Internet.

Here’s a detail of the Plastic Man stationary.

When DC moved locations they released this promo announcement to let everyone know.

Swamp Thing #43 process sketch and finished cover by Steve Bissette

History of the DC Universe Poster

DC color palette guides/brand standards

Wonder Woman pencils and inks

The DC holiday cards

I was surprised to see this Charles Vess card in the mix. I was able to track down an original copy of the holiday card a few years back. I wrote about it here.

It’s great how DC was able to pack so many cool things into one book. I was able to find a copy for less than $10. Ebay and Amazon have copies available for around the same price.