I think you're right, Ray. It goes back to the old newsstand days and it was sort of like the shelf life of that product. After that, they could send the unsold comics back to the distributor. After a while, it became too much of a hassle, and they would simply rip off the covers. That's why in those olden days of my youth, you would see comics bagged up for 3 for 25 cents or something....but without covers.