Thursday, February 01, 2018

How my horror/monster passion began

Hello everyone

As many regular visitors to the Cobwebbed Room may of noticed the total lack of posts, its been nearly a year now since I posted anything. Well I don't have any excuses apart from nearly every week I kept telling myself I must start putting something on the site but of course I never did, I think one of the reasons I didn't bother was because I was using Internet Explorer and every time I attempted a post it kept acting weird and not letting me upload pictures or if they did upload it would place them in a random place which made the page look terrible. So now I am using Google chrome which seems a lot better. I am so sorry if you have been returning to the Cobwebbed Room every so often and not seeing anything new for so long. I am hoping to get in to the swing of things again. I have a few ideas of things I want to post about but if you yourself can think of something you would like to see on here then please do let me know or maybe you would like to contribute an article or something.
Thank you.


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I thought I would tell you how my horror/monster fascination began. I remember it well, I was 5 years old in 1973 and in March [I managed to find the actual date and time from the issue of the TV times of that week] there was a showing on ITV of the Universal monster classic 'Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein', I was engrossed, sat there on the floor in front of the telly, I don't remember the whole film from that time but just certain scenes. This is also the first film I do remember watching as well.
Another thing I remember was my Dad and his best mate doing  impressions of Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's Monster and Bela Lugosi as Igor, I was quite amused by their antics but I had no idea who these movie characters were, maybe they told me at the time but I don't remember. One time when me and my brother went to London with our Mum to see our Nan, stayed there for about a week. Dad didn't bother coming with us. Anyway when we got back home my Dad had painted a large mural on the living room wall of a spooky scene complete with a castle, trees, and Dracula all painted in black and white. Well I thought it was amazing, Mum wasn't too pleased though. Dad also had 3 Aurora monster kits that he kept on the window sill of Dracula, Forgotten prisoner of Castel Mare and The Witch. He had these until the early 1980's, 2 of them must of got damaged and thrown out, only the Dracula kit survived. He gave me this one eventually. My Dad I guess must of been a monster film fan at the time, he didn't carry it on as such like the collecting side of things but he still enjoyed the monster films.
What memories do you have of your first interest in horror and monster films etc?  




My Dad's original Aurora Dracula kit, few pieces missing and little paint work




   

9 comments:

Dr. Theda said...

Thank you for sharing... our first Monster Movie (that w e remember) was the Drive-in... "Valley of Gawangi"... the Gypsy's little hunchbacked lacky eaten and the cage smashing the Scientist... That scene stuck with us...
have a pleasant end of the week !!

BrianF said...

I am one of those faithful readers who has you bookmarked and patiently awaits contributions.I know of several other readers who enjoy whatever articles they can read here also.I speak for all of us when I say it's great to hear from you again and ,most importantly,go at your own pace and ENJOY what you do here.I you force yourself,then you won't be happy.I am not from the UK but I enjoy the British take on horror and Sci Fi.Keep up the good work

WOODSY said...

Welcome back and glad the Cobwebbed Room is open for beastliness once more! I think I've read every post you've done over the years and often cite your excellent nostalgic pieces on monster colouring books. Glad youre back on the saddle and like Brian F says, take it steady and keep writing... when you want to. Readers are patient. We are out there!

Paul said...

Hi Dr.Theda

I haven't seen 'Valley of Gwangi' for many years, great film and wonderful stop motion by Ray Harryhausen. I wish we had Drive-ins here in the UK. Are there many Drive-ins left in America?

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Hi BrianF and WOODSY

Thank you so much for the nice and postive comments, it means a lot to me knowing that readers are enjoying the content here and get something from the articles or evoke fond memories. I do enjoy posting on my blog and it helps that readers enjoy what I write. I will certainly post more often.
Thanks again.

Anonymous said...

Im very chuffed to see the blog continuing.
For me, my early years of horror were driven by the book "Horror Movies..." by Carlos Clarens, stolen from one of my sisters. I think i was 7 years old.
In addition, the usual Hamlyn/ Usborne books and (far too) late night BBC horror double bills played their part.
Ive been here ever since...

Paul said...

Thank you Anonymous
'Horror'Movies' by Carlos Clarens was also one of the first genre books I bought, got it secondhand. The Hamyln/Usbourne books are great too. I always liked Daniel Farson's 'Hamlyn book of horror', I just adore the cover art. Yeah I really miss the BBCs Horror double bills. Nowadays I just don't watch TV like I used to, I just watch the odd things that sound good on Catch up. Even though there used to be only 3/4 channels there was so much good stuff on.

Anonymous said...

Always a delight to see new posts on Cobwebbed Room, whenever you can.
We appear to be exact contemporaries.
Not sure if my first exposure to spooky stuff was Scooby Doo or a TV showing of Carry On Screaming in 73 or 74. But I definitely got nightmares from Scooby Do, and remember being scared witless by Carry On Screaming.
From there, I lived through loads of the stuff on your blog - Horror Bags, Spookies stickers, Dracula ice lollies, Usborne books, Monster Fun and Shiver & Shake, and so on.
Also, it tuned out that my father was a spooky stuff fan too... and I remember him telling me at length about that Abbot & Costello film ("allow me to introduce myself... I'm the Invisible Man.")
And there were even a few rubber skeletons in my father's closet.

Anyway, big THANK YOU for your blog.

Neil said...

Oh I do remember these. Brilliant models. My Bother bought and painted several from when we were in Leysdown :) The Wolfman, Dracula, Phantom of the opera or it may of been Dr Jekll and hyde ( or both ) and this prisoner one :)

Neil said...

I always pop by as this is the best place for memory lane as well as all the info I need for my collecting :)