Detective Comics #29

Batman's second cover

Batman was only a few weeks old when Detective Comics #29 went on sale. He had debuted in Detective Comics #27, cover dated May 1939, and the anthology was still built around a rotating crew of detectives and adventurers. This issue carries a July 1939 cover date; the Catalog of Copyright Entries records its publication on May 31, 1939. It cost 10 cents for 68 pages and appeared under the indicia of Detective Comics Inc., with Vin Sullivan credited as editor.

It was Batman's third appearance and only his second time on the cover. Bob Kane drew and signed the cover, which shows Batman with Doctor Death. As one auction description notes, Batman's cover run started in fits: he did not appear on the fronts of #28, #30, #32 or #34 before taking over the cover for good. An earlier description called the image eerie, a Batman easily distinguished from his more colorful counterpart in Action Comics.

The rest of the book shows how crowded the anthology still was: Larry Steele, the spy Bart Regan by Jerry Siegel and Mart Bailey, the Crimson Avenger by Jim Chambers, Speed Saunders and a text story by Fred Guardineer, Bruce Nelson, Cosmo the Phantom of Disguise printed in black and red, and a 13-page Slam Bradley story by Siegel with art ghosted for Joe Shuster by Wayne Boring. There were stamp-dealer ads and fireworks ads too.

Who wrote it: Fox, Kane and a disputed credit

The main bibliographic index of comics credits the 10-page Batman story to Gardner Fox, with Bob Kane on pencils, inks and lettering, signed on the cover and again on the last page. A Batman history blog notes that the first two Batman stories were written by Bill Finger, the character's co-creator, and that this one marked a change of writer to Fox, a staff writer for Detective and Action Comics, who pushed the strip from hard-boiled crime toward pulp adventure.

Not everyone agrees on the byline. A standard reference on the character says the writer of issues #29 and #30 is disputed: Kane is officially credited, and Fox, who wrote #31 and #32, later claimed authorship. A 2025 auction listing goes further and credits the two-part story to Fox and Jerry Siegel with art by Kane, Shuster and Chambers, apparently mixing in the issue's other features. This page follows the index and notes the dispute.

Several auction descriptions say the issue contains interior art by Shuster, Superman's co-creator. By the index, that art is the Slam Bradley story, which it attributes to Boring working as Shuster's ghost.

Pollen, a personal ad and a bullet

In his study, Dr. Karl Hellfern, who calls himself Doctor Death, tells his servant Jabah that he has perfected a poison made from pollen extract. He plans to use it on any wealthy man who refuses to pay him tribute. Expecting the Batman to interfere, he lures him with a newspaper notice telling him to collect a letter addressed to "John Jones" at the post office. The letter names a murder planned for that night.

Bruce Wayne loads glass pellets of choking gas into his belt and takes suction gloves and knee pads to scale the building. Two gunmen ambush him; he knocks a statue onto them and threatens to kill them if they do not talk, until Jabah walks in and shoots him. He escapes behind a gas pellet and a leap from the window, then answers Doctor Death with an ad of his own and visits the family doctor, laughing off the bullet wound.

Wayne later spots Jabah on the street, follows him, and saves the next victim, John P. van Smith, from a dose of blown poison. That night Batman cuts through Doctor Death's window, strangles Jabah with his lasso and chases Hellfern through a trap door. Cornered in his laboratory, Doctor Death reaches for his chemicals, Batman throws a fire extinguisher, and the spilled chemicals set the room ablaze. Doctor Death stands in the flames laughing and seems to die. He returned, burned and bandaged, in the next issue.

Reference sources list several firsts here. Doctor Death is Batman's first named villain and is described as his first traditional supervillain and first recurring foe; the utility belt makes its first appearance; it is the first two-part Batman story; Batman takes his first bullet wound; and, by one account, the hero's name begins to be spelled "Batman" in this issue, though the story's own logo still reads "The Bat-Man." The city is not yet named Gotham.

Spring 1939

The comic reached newsstands in a season of spectacle at home and dread abroad. The New York World's Fair had opened on April 30. Lou Gehrig ended his 2,130-game playing streak on May 2, and the Yankees announced his retirement in June after doctors found he had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Days after the comic went on sale, the SS St. Louis, carrying 907 Jewish refugees, was refused permission to land in Florida.

Superheroes were becoming a business. Superman got his own title in June, and DC was in court that spring against a publisher whose hero, Wonderman, it said copied Superman. Batman was one more bet in a crowded field, and this issue gave him his first named villain, his belt of gadgets and his first serialized story.

Copies, grades and the restored copy

Unrestored copies are scarce at any grade. The grading census, as reported in auction descriptions, showed two copies at 7.0 and two higher in February 2012; one at 8.5 and two higher in June 2022; two at 6.5 and seven higher in November 2024; and two at 7.0 and six higher in January 2026. An auction description in 2024 called it the third most valuable issue in the title's run, and it ranks in the top 15 of a leading guide's list of the most valuable Golden Age comics.

The best-known copies carry pedigrees. The Billy Wright copy, graded 7.0, was described in 2012 as the best copy then offered publicly in the grading era. The CGC 8.5 sold in June 2022 for $276,000 was called the finest copy its seller had offered; the census then showed two copies graded higher, so it was not the highest-graded copy. A 7.0 from the James Baxter collection brought $231,800 in February 2026.

This entry tracks a restored copy graded CGC 4.0, sold in February 2025 for $21,960 against a presale estimate of $25,000 to $30,000. Its label lists color touch, pieces added, tear seals, reinforcement and replaced staples, a restoration grade of B-5. At the time the restored census showed four copies at 4.0 and 25 higher. The gap between restored and unrestored copies is wide: an unrestored 5.0 brought $102,000 in June 2024.

The numbers

Cover price

10 cents

Pages

68; the Batman story is 10, Slam Bradley 13

Print run

Not documented in the sources consulted

Census, February 2012

Two unrestored copies at 7.0, two higher

Census, June 2022

One at 8.5, two higher

Census, November 2024

Two at 6.5, seven higher

Restored census, February 2025

Four restored copies at 4.0, 25 higher

Census, January 2026

Two at 7.0, six higher

Known copies

No total count is published in the sources consulted

Timeline

1. May 1939

   Batman debuts in Detective Comics #27, cover dated May 1939.

2. May 31, 1939

   Detective Comics #29, cover dated July 1939, is published, by the copyright record.

3. 1939

   Doctor Death returns, scarred, in Detective Comics #30 and is captured.

4. Jul 4, 2002

   An unrestored CGC 5.0 is offered at auction, described as a copy that does not turn up often.

5. Feb 22, 2012

   The Billy Wright pedigree copy, CGC 7.0, sells; the census shows two at 7.0 and two higher.

6. Feb 2015

   A CGC 2.5 sells for $28,038.

7. Jun 2022

   A CGC 8.5 sells for $276,000, the record for the issue.

8. Sep 2023

   A CGC 5.5 with slightly brittle pages sells for $81,000.

9. Jun 2024

   An unrestored CGC 5.0 realizes $102,000.

10. Nov 2024

    A CGC 6.5 realizes $120,000; the census shows two at 6.5 and seven higher.

11. Feb 18, 2025

    The restored CGC 4.0 tracked by this entry sells for $21,960.

12. Feb 26, 2026

    A CGC 7.0 from the James Baxter collection realizes $231,800.

13. Sep 2026

    A restored copy graded Apparent 4.0 is sold at auction.

The world in 1939

• Apr 9, 1939

  Marian Anderson sings before 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial.

• Apr 14, 1939

  John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is published.

• Apr 30, 1939

  The New York World's Fair opens.

• May 2, 1939

  Lou Gehrig ends his streak of 2,130 consecutive games.

• Jun 4, 1939

  The SS St. Louis, carrying 907 Jewish refugees, is refused permission to land in Florida.

• Jun 12, 1939

  The National Baseball Hall of Fame is dedicated in Cooperstown, New York.

• Jul 4, 1939

  Gehrig gives his "luckiest man on the face of the earth" farewell at Yankee Stadium.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, Detective Comics #29 is number 47 of 100 in the comics entries of the FLOAT 100. 92 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (54 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Doctor Death contacts Batman through a newspaper personal ad, telling him to pick up a letter addressed to "John Jones."
• Batman is shot in this story and later laughs off the wound when his family doctor asks about it.
• The utility belt makes its first appearance here, loaded with glass pellets of choking gas.
• Doctor Death's murder weapon is a poison made from pollen extract.
• After his two 1939 stories, Doctor Death did not return until Batman #345 in 1982, according to one comics history.
• The same issue includes a Slam Bradley story by Superman writer Jerry Siegel.
• After this cover, Batman was left off the fronts of Detective Comics #30, #32 and #34 before he took over the cover for good.