Dynamic Donation

Yahoo reports that Marvel has donated a whole bunch of books from the company's early history to a musuem in France.

Jean-Pierre Mercier, who manages the collection for France's National Center for Comic Books and Images, said he was "flabbergasted" when he learned in March that Marvel Enterprises wanted to donate the huge quantity of comic books dating back as far as the 1950s.

Makes me wish they would have kept this collection stateside, but now I have a reason to travel.

There is some bad news though:

The agreement with Gifts in Kind allows the museum to destroy duplicate copies, but it cannot barter, trade, sell or give any away.

"We have received e-mails, phone calls and letters from fans and specialists who protest and complain about this decision, but there is no way for us to deal with that in any other way," Mercier said.

So, unless you want to pull of a National Treasure-type heist, which would be pretty cool, don't expect to get any handouts from the French.