A question on Batman history.

[Svartalf]

Hey folk, are there historical experts around? I stumbled on a problem that I'd like to understand.
So, Batman was launched in 1939 and got his own comic in 1940. I recently learned that Arkham asylum was introduced in issue 258 (Oct 1974). And that caused me no end of wonderment.
I mean, a comic with an uninterrupted monthly run for 33 years ought to have around 400 issues or maybe more. Why have there been so many fewer issues than one would expect?

Any answers, or indication of better places to look are welcome.
Thx in advance.

 

[Prison Mike]

Just looking at the dates it looks like some of the issues came out quarterly or every other month. I don’t think it was coming out every month for 33 years straight.

 

[DocLathropBrown]

Right. Batman was a quarterly book for a long time. I think until the early 1960s?

Detective was monthly ever since the beginning though, although there were a couple of periods where it went weekly. It's been roughly 980 months since May, 1939. So the fact that we're over 1,000 issues on 'Tec is because of those periods when it when weekly.