(BLACK PANTHERS) The Black Panther Black Community News Serv

Sale 2534 - Lot 117

Price Realized: $ 2,125

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500

THE SCARCE FIRST ISSUE (BLACK PANTHERS.) The Black Panther: Black Community News Service. 4 pages, 14 x 8 1/2 inches, on 2 sheets stapled together at corner; folds, light wrinkling, minor toning and wear, "Number 1" circled in blue ink. Oakland, CA, 25 April 1967

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The first issue of the iconic Black Panther newspaper, issued just a few months after the party's creation, when they were still little known outside of Oakland. The cover story is on the killing of Denzil Dowell by the police in nearby North Richmond, and the subsequent Panther rally--one of their first: "15 Black Brothers, most of them armed; with Magnum 12 gauge shot guns, M-1 rifles, and side arms, held a street rally. . . . They had their arms to defend themselves and their Black Brothers and Sisters, while they exercised their Constitutional Rights: Freedom of Speech, and the right to Peacefully Assemble. . . . The racist cops could only look on." This first issue was crudely produced and apparently printed by photocopier; its production was greatly professionalized even by the time of the second issue just 20 days later (see the following lot, from a different consignor). None others traced at auction.