THE FLASH #172

Cover shows a horizontal crease/stress line across the upper logo area with slight color break, and visible texture/wave distortion across the surface possibly from the protective sleeve or minor cover waviness. Corners appear reasonably sharp with only slight blunting, and edges show minor wear without significant chipping. Book is housed in a plastic sleeve which obscures some fine surface detail; interior and back cover were not assessed.

The Flash #172 (August 1967) is a standard entry in DC's long-running Silver Age Flash title, part of the sustained run that established Barry Allen as one of the era's defining superheroes. Published during the height of the character's popularity, the issue reflects the house style of the period: tightly plotted science-based adventure scripted in the Gardner Fox/John Broome tradition, with art handled by the rotating Infantino-influenced creative team that carried the title through the late 1960s. It is not associated with a first appearance, origin, or death, and its cover, while typical of the period's dynamic action-figure style, is not among the covers singled out in price-guide key lists.

Market data shows a book that trades as a steady mid-run Silver Age title rather than a speculative key. Prices climb gradually through the mid grades, with 7.0 copies fetching around $70 and 8.5 copies averaging near $140 over the past year, before rising more sharply into the low 9-point range, where 9.2 copies have traded around $220 across a dozen recorded sales. The absence of any 9.8 on census, combined with only two 9.6 copies and no recorded sale at that grade, indicates real scarcity at the top of the pyramid even though overall population (84 census copies) is healthy — a pattern typical of common-but-collected Silver Age issues where high-grade survival, not demand intensity, drives the top-end premium.

This is a book for Silver Age Flash run-builders and DC completists rather than key-issue investors. Low- and mid-grade raw copies move steadily but modestly as reading/collection-filler material, priced in line with other unremarkable issues from the same run. The real action is concentrated at the top of the grading scale, where a small population of pristine copies commands outsized premiums purely on condition rarity; a certified 9.8, were one to surface, would likely draw competitive bidding from census-chasers and registry collectors even though the book itself carries no key-issue premium.