Recreation by Fred Ray of his Cover for Superman No. 17 (1942)

That's really cool!  What year did he do the recreation?

Simple question...but no simple answer.  Collectors Book Store in Hollywood, CA commissioned Fred Ray to recreate his covers as paintings to be sold in their monthly auctions.  The paintings were created from 1977 to 1984.  Mine is undated, and it is the only one for which the date of creation was not identified in the auction catalog through which it was sold.  All the paintings which were sold in the earlier, regular auctions [beginning Nov. 1978, after three preliminary, small auctions had been successful in 1977], were created in 1978, as was the one sold in August 1979, immediately after the auction in July 1979 from which I bought the Superman No, 17.  Therefore, I think that it is safe to assume that this recreation was one of Ray's paintings done in 1978, even though I actually bought it when it came around to be offered for sale in 1979.  I'm sure this is TMI for most people -- but that's my best shot since my best friend of 50 years, who wrote the one catalog entry I've needed to consult over the past 40 years, forgot, just once, to include the one bit of information which I needed to simply and confidently answer: 1978.