Welcome back to all my members of my Grave Robber Union!
I really “dig” you cats and chicks coming back every week to join me in a little horror merch shopping. Like I really need more crap for my housekeeper/cryptkeeper to knock off the shelf and break, but hey, it gives her something to do and me a reason to go out and collect more crap.
Okay, speaking of collecting, first off I need to address something. I’ve been asked time and time again about the name of this section. It is pronounced “recollections” as if you were to say”…as far as I can recollect”. However, everyone knows that I have a fondness for a good “plague” on words, so since I feature items from our childhood and you are probably like myself and you are “re”-collecting these once again, that is the reason for the hyphen. Get it? Alright settle down. Everyone get back in their own seats. Class in horror collectable memorabilia is about to start again this week.
Deathrealm #1 Horror zine
This is the grandfather to Horror-Wrtiers.net! Long before the old interweb that can contains the answer to every question in the universe (but instead we use it to look at porn and get into arguments with people that we don’t know) there was the publishing world of paper! However not every writer could get a book deal (insert personal cynical remark here) so in 1987 independent publisher Stephen Mark Rainey set out to give first time writers, poets, and artists in the horror community some coverage. The magazine only had 31 issues but won two awards from the Small Press Writer’s and Artist’s Association as well as the Small Press Genre’s Association. Today, these copies are still abundant and highly collectible. I can’t say that I don’t own a small handful myself. For those of you that grew up on the books, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, these items are for you!
Usually sold for about $5 a piece.
Monster Ghost 7ft tall Mail Away
This was THE toy for all mail order monster kids! Clip the coupon, beg your parents for money, mail the shit out, and wait six weeks for…a balloon with Casper’s face on it? What the hell? The ad states that you control the ghost and can make him dance up to 50 feet away. Sure, anyone can do that when they tie a string to it. Mail order items were generally rip offs to get a dollar from little Jimmy and a dollar from little Tommy while adding up in the long run. Many were grounded in the horror genre, some got the attention of science dorks (Sea Monkeys), while some perverts like myself saved up for the xray glasses that were supposed to be able to see through clothes.
These really aren’t worth crap. What I would like to see is a framed collage of the ads!
Monster in My Pocket figures 1st Ed.
What I love most about these things was the name! Every quick thinking pervert could come up with a smart ass line for this one. Fueled by the popular MPC monster figures of the 1960s and M.U.S.C.L.E. figures from only a few years before, Monster in My Pocket came out in 1990 and spawned comics, games, toys, and trading cards. The smart bastards that created the board game thought of a marketing ploy that required you to have figurines in order to play the game. Of course something that is a colorful piece of plastic could not be without religious opposition. Despite having figures such as witches, behemoth, ghost, ghoul, and goblins, Hindu groups complained that the representation of Kali and other of their gods were represented as “monsters”.
$1-$2 a piece is a decent price for these.
The Mummy’s Tomb on Super 8 mm film.
Come sit around and let old Uncle Renfield tell you kids about Super 8! Yes, before DVDs, before VHS, before BETA there was Super 8. For those household that could afford a projector, films came on Super 8 mm or 16 mm and had to be threaded through the projector by hand and strung from reel to reel. They were silent of course, and when you were finished watching the Attack of the 50 ft Woman, you could watch your little sister’s birthday party that your dad recorded on the family’s camera that was the size of an Igloo cooler.
Films in the box can go for about $20 a piece.
Don Post Cyclops Mask
This is one of the cooler things I’ve seen this week! Don Post was a mask maker that speciailized in semi professional Halloween masks which appropriately earned him the name “The Godfather of Halloween”. His masks were so popular, that the altered William Shatner mask that Michael Myers wears in Halloween was actually a Don Post! This one in particular is based on the character of the Cyclops from the 1958 movie The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad. This character was thought to be so cool that the Misfits used it as their mascot for their Cyclopean Music distribution company.
I’d give $100 for this mask easily!
Well I hope you enjoyed this hellish version of Pawn Stars as much as I enjoyed searching out the items from the dark side of the ‘ole interweb for ya! Come back next week as I carve out more things to thin your pocket books while I stretch out your knowledge of horror merch. Until then, keep watching the skies…everything you know is a lie!
Until you call on the dark,
Renfield Rasputin
Renfield Rasputin’s highest honor is being a finalist in the screenplay competition at 2014 Shriekfest Film Festival. Until then it was when his team won a dodgeball game in third grade.