Vintage Halloween postcard: "Make a ring of pumpkin seeds..."

Make a ring of pumpkin seeds
An odd old-fashioned charm,
Makes the goblins howl with fear
And keeps you safe from harm.
That's the verse on the front of this trippy old Halloween postcard, which was mailed to Mr. George Pritchard of South Whitley, Indiana, but has a postmark that's too faded to read.

The illustration shows a quite-calm woman in a white dress who is, indeed, sprinkling a circle of pumpkin sets around her while a parade of witches and goblins gather. It's not clear how long she'll have to remain inside this ring. Or why the goblins looks like Martians.

A post on the blog Disenchanted & Co. has a couple of other postcards that are clearly from this same artist and series. The goblins have the exact same look. And those cards also contain four lines of verse.

The witches and goblins — such creative illustrations — really are the best part of this postcard. They're unlike anything else I've seen on the imaginative postcards of this era. Here are some closer looks at some of them...

Bonus mystery

This postcard to Mr. George Pritchard does not contain a standard note. Instead, it contains what appears to be a code. Morse code, perhaps, with its series of dots and dashes. Take a look...

If it's Morse Code, however, my attempts to translate the first portion of the message were thwarted, because this is what I came up with:

HETTI
HIW
HIU
WASM
IRHIM

Is there a code layered within the code? Or was it just silly pseudo-code to begin with? Someone will have to dive into this mystery and get back to us.

Vintage Hallowe'en postcard: Witch declares that she's No. 1

OK, maybe I shouldn't assume she's a witch. Maybe she's just a daffy old lady wearing colorful clothes who went out to sweep the dirt road in front her house and is raising a finger for a passing ESPN College GameDay cameraman.

Unfortunately, no publisher is listed on front or back of this Hallowe'en postcard, which was mailed in October 1911 and also features an alarmed black cat, an owl, a bunch of carved pumpkins in a field and a starry night. Does anyone have any ideas about what her raised index finger really means? She could be pointing upward to something that we can't see, perhaps flying witches or Rodan or an alien mothership. She could be indicating that she, herself, plans to ride upward on her broom in a few moments. Or she could be testing the wind direction in preparation for such flight. So many possibilities...

This postcard was mailed to Miss Ruth Miller in Erie, Illinois. It's a tiny settlement in the northwest corner of the state that had about 800 residents in 1910 and has about twice that number now.

The note states:

Dear Ruth.
Don't you ever come to Albany anymore? I haven't seen you for such a long time. Can't you come in and see my? [sic] I'll take you over to school with me. Sounds interesting doesn't it? Haha.
Lovingly, Lida.

Albany must be Albany, Illinois, which is also located in northwestern Illinois, about 12 miles northwest of Erie. That's not too daunting of a distance, even for 1911. I hope Ruth went for a visit eventually.

Other vintage Halloween postcards

• The Witch's Dance
• Girl with head inside pumpkin
• Witch hugging black cat and sitting atop huge pumpkin
• Pumpkin thief chased by a "ghost"
• The Witch (Julius Bien)
• Run, little boys, run! Run from the Pumpkin Man!
• Running away from the ghosts
• Kind witch and little pumpkinheads
• Little boy beings scared by trees with faces
• Two cute kids sitting atop a smiling pumpkin

Dark & stormy night Halloween flick picks from Twitter's cool kids

Happy Halloween! This post is, appropriately enough, emanating from the Witching Hour (Eastern Daylight Time) of Halloween 2016. For me, one of the many great things about Halloween is that it's a socially acceptable time to watch and discuss scary movies. A conversation starter I've come up with along those lines is this: The trick-or-treaters are gone. It's getting a little stormy outside. You're going to turn out the lights and settle in for the night with a bowl of popcorn, perhaps some good friends or a three-legged black cat, and a triple-header of horror movies. What three movies would you pick?

I want the answers to be personal favorites. Comfort-food horror, if there is such a thing. My three, which change slightly over the years, are very solid but fairly uninspired. But they're my picks, so they're perfect in my world: 1959's House on Haunted Hill with Vincent Price and Carol Ohmart, the iconic 1968 Night of the Living Dead by George A. Romero, and 1978's Halloween by John Carpenter, the holiday's ultimate dark fairy tale. Two unsurprising picks and a Vincent Price flick that Sarah and I could watch every single day. I love many other horror films, from classic to funny to terrifying. But those three represent the perfect Halloween night, in my eyes.

I wanted to share some other responses and thoughts. So I posed the horror-movie question to some of the great folks my Twitter feed (I'm @Papergreat, of course). They stopped what they were doing and here are the responses that they very generously came up with when I asked them about their personal three movies to watch on Halloween.

1. David Southwell (@HooklandGuide and @cultauthor)
Author, creator of fantastic realities such as Hookland County. I interviewed him for a two-part post last October, which starts here.

• Quatermass and the Pit (1967) "The horror we love is often the horror we grew up with. It will not scare, the special effects creak and yet this is a gem of an English horror cinema. Both as well-structured thriller and depiction of swelling mystery, it stands up to repeated viewing."¹
• The Wicker Man (1974) "Possibly the best horror film of all time. Watch the uncut version and you will find a map of fear that leads you back to ancient places within the DNA museum. Stunning."
• Who Can Kill A Child? (1976) "I first saw this whilst in a war zone. It takes a lot for a horror film to mean anything when it is viewed in the context of true human brutality, true monstrosity. More bloody than I usually like my horror, this turns the stomach and the mind."

2. J.W. Ocker (@JWOcker)
Creator of the Odd Things I've Seen (OTIS) website and author of several books, the most recent of which is A Season with the Witch: The Magic and Mayhem of Halloween in Salem, Massachusetts.

• The Body Snatcher (1945, with Karloff & Lugosi)
• The Changeling (1980)²
• Dark Was the Night (2014)

3. Cheryl Zaidan (@FeralCherylZ)
Her Twitter bio: "Full-time marketer, part-time writer, horror movie lover and hardcore dreamer. I write awful stories about terrible people." She's one of the coolest folks I follow on Twitter.

• Halloween (1978)
• Trick 'r Treat (2007)
• Night of the Demons (1988)

4. Colin Lorimer (@Colin_Lorimer)
He's a writer/artist whose supernatural comic book, The Hunt, from Image Comics, needs to be on your pull list.

• The Innocents (1961)
• Let's Scare Jessica to Death (1971)
• Dead of Night (1945)

5. Emma Finlayson-Palmer (@FinlaysonPalmer)
Her partial bio: "Mom to 5, Ravenclaw & Writer, I love witches, vampires, cakes, tattoos, tea & zombies." You can read her blog here.

• A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
• The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
• Shaun of the Dead (2004)

6. Undine (@HorribleSanity)
Bio: "Edgar Allan Poe/strange history blogger. Horseplayer. Tweeter of damn fool nonsense. Crazy Cat Lady. Grouch. Abandon hope, all ye who follow here." Blog: strangeco.blogspot.com. Note: If you like seeing how cats are featured in vintage advertising, this is a must-follow Twitter account.

• An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe (Vincent Price, 1970) "Hey, Price and Poe. What more do you need?"
• Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) "What makes this film so terrifying is that the world in recent years leaves me feeling like Kevin McCarthy in the final scene."
• Carnival of Souls (1962)³ "I first saw this on TV when I was about five years old. Cheap and cheesy though it might be, there is something about this eerie movie that has held my imagination ever since."

So there you have it! Thanks again to all of the great people above who took the time to share their thoughts. (I also queried Bill Rebane⁴, who follows me on Twitter, but he didn't get back to me.) I definitely have some great new suggestions for scary movies to check out between now and Halloween 2017.

What are your favorites? Share them down in the Comments section and I'll include them in a future From The Readers post.

Footnotes
1. I grew up loving Quatermass and the Pit. Only, it was titled Five Million Years to Earth over here in the States.
2. I love The Changeling, too. It mention it in my 2013 post "Which movies gave you the biggest fright?"
3. Carnival of Souls became another one of my favorites after I discovered it about 10 years ago.
4. Bill Rebane, 79, is the director of such horror films as Monster a-Go Go, The Giant Spider Invasion, The Alpha Incident, The Demons of Ludlow, and The Game (aka The Cold). He is a former candidate for governor of Wisconsin. If he eventually answers, I'll share his selections.

Vintage Halloween postcard sent to Hulda Jacobus: The Witch's Dance

Here's a beauty of an old postcard; one of the most colorful ones I've had the opportunity to feature. It's part of the Halloween Series issued by Julius Bien & Co. It's labeled "The Witch's Dance" and it, indeed, features a red-headed witch dancing with a pair of anthropomorphic pumpkin men and an extremely gleeful black cat. The fiery autumn leaves lay on the green grass and stars are twinkling in the crescent-moon sky behind them. What a fun postcard! Not at all creepy, but 100% Halloween.

Dancing a little jig is a totally appropriate response to it being the day before Halloween, too. (And I still have two more dandy vintage cards remaining to share tomorrow.)

Underneath the illustration, someone has written, in pencil, "IS THAT YOU? HA HA." So, perhaps, this postcard was intended for a red-headed witch, a black cat or even a pumpkin-based person. Probably it's the first one. The address on the back had this going to Hulda Jacobus in Millstadt, Illinois.

Hulda Jacobus is a great name and I intend this in the best way possible when I say that it totally sounds like a name that an awesome witch would have. Clearly, a good witch. Because her name is so uncommon, it's not hard to find a little information about Hulda. She was born in Millstadt¹, a village filled with Americans of German descent, on February 22, 1896, to Peter Jacobus and Caroline Tegtmeir. She had a sister named Viola. She married Eugene Edward Brucker (1896-1987) and had a child. And she died on December 7, 1961, in St. Louis, Missouri.

And that's it. A little more biographical information would be nice, but that's a good start.

This postcard, by the way, has no stamp or postmark, so I'm not sure if or how it was ever delivered to Hulda. But here's the short note:

Hello,
How do you intend to celebrate Hallowe'en. I was to a Hallowe'en Party last night.
Viola

Viola! So we can be 99% certain, I think, that this postcard was from her sister. I'd like to think they were both good witches.

Footnotes
1. As of this writing, the Wikipedia page for Millstadt includes a short section that I hope remains there forever. If not, here it is for posterity: "Some of the great stores in town include Dollar General, Casey's General Store, and Circle K. Circle K is a popular kid destination."

Mystery vintage postcard: "Haunted House" near Delaware, Ohio

This postcard was mailed from Delaware, Ohio, to Washington, D.C. in the final few days of October 1906.¹ The recipient was Mr. Walter Dill of 910 E. St. N.W. The short note on the front states: "Write to 33½ S. Second St., Newark, Licking Co. We changed our minds since I wrote. Allie." Licking County is located in smack-dab central Ohio, and was named for the salt licks there.

And so this postcard, which was produced by Evans & Sons, features the mysterious caption: "HAUNTED HOUSE — THE, TOMB, near Delaware, Ohio." (Not quite sure what's up with that comma after "THE." It could be either a typo or a clue.)

Delaware, Ohio, is the county seat of Delaware County, which is adjacent to and west of Licking County.

The picture on the postcard is, indeed, something that resembles a tomb. But what's up with the "haunted house" and this forlorn tomb?

First discovery: There were variations of this postcard back in the day. A 2013 post on the wonderfully titled blog "The Strange and Spooky World of James A. Willis" features a card with the same photo but a slightly different design. No other answers there, though.

A different postcard, produced by The American News Company and featuring two images, is featured on the Delaware County Historical Society website. But, again, there is little other information.

I guess there's always the possibility that, 100-plus years ago, a photographer working for a postcard company got a good photo of a creepy tomb and they decided that a postcard with a creepy photo and the words "haunted house" would sell well. So they slapped it together and published it, without there being any actual good ghost stories associated with the site.

One last source I might try to track down is author John Ciochetty, who has written at least one book on the historic ghosts of Delaware, Ohio.

Either way, whether there's a spooky story that goes with this postcard or not, it's possible that information is lost in the sands of time.

Footnote
1. Also that month, the Chicago White Sox defeated the Chicago Cubs, 4 games to 2, in the World Series. It was the first of three World Series appearances in a row for the Cubs, who trail the Cleveland Indians, 2 games to 1, in the 2016 World Series, as I write this.

Yes Virginia, there is a place called the Castle Halloween Museum

This dandy modern postcard, featuring creepy toys gathering in the forest, is an advertisement for a place called the Castle Halloween Museum. When the card was printed, the museum was located in Benwood, West Virginia, a tiny city in the northern prong of that state.

But, as I started to do some research, I discovered that the museum moved and is now located in central (slightly west-central) Pennsylvania — Altoona, to be exact. Here are some images from the museum's website, which is simply www.castlehalloween.com.

The most important thing to know, if you want to make a spook-tastic field trip to Altoona on this Halloween weekend (or any other time) is that admission to the museum is by appointment only. Specifically, the website states:

HOURS/TOURS ARE BY APPOINTMENT ONLY
AND MUST BE BOOKED IN ADVANCE
So call the museum at (814) 940-1031 before you solidify your Pennsylvania haunted road-trip travel plans.

The trip would be more than worth. Here's a rundown of some of the museum's contents:

• over 35,000 Halloween-related artifacts "from Arcade Machines to Zany Day of the Dead displays"
• Southern pottery face jugs, from Meaders to Rogers (over 200 examples)
• Voodoo flags and paintings
• figural folk art by artists like Jack Roads, Alan Cunningham, Linda Wolf, Debbee Thibault and Tubby Brown
• "learn about Mother Shipton, Dennison & the Bogie Book"
• candy and ice cream molds
• "vintage Jack O lanterns, advertising, toys, candy containers and decorations"
• "Original art, sheet music, magazines, Salem Witch, bats, spiders, fortune telling, games ... and Harry Potter"

And you might even come away with an awesome collectible. According to the website: "The antique shop here is where you will find most of our duplicate items and that is one of the ways we try and pay the heating and electric bills and restore the building."

The museum owners and curators are Pamela Apkarian-Russell and Chris Russell. Pamela Apkarian-Russell is an author, lecturer and curator of all things Halloween. Some of her books include Collectible Halloween, More Halloween Collectibles: Anthropomorphic Vegetables and Fruits of Halloween, A Collector's Guide to Salem Witchcraft and Souvenirs and Halloween Collectible Decorations and Games.

If you've been to the museum or go at a future date, let us know what it's like in the comments section.

Halloween horror for chickens

So much of Halloween is about scaring humans. We should have some spooky stuff for poultry, too.

This should do it.

The 3¼-inch-wide piece of paper, possibly intended as a flimsy coaster for drinks, features a perspiring chicken being chased by a chef with a large knife. The chicken seems to understand the mortal danger facing it and is fleeing like it's a teenage babysitter being pursued by a slasher in a Shatner mask.

Buen Provecho! translates to bon appétit, which translates to "enjoy your meal." (With your meal coming at the chicken's expense.)

Hotel Avila gets three stars (out of five possible) from TripAdvisor and is ranked as the 32nd-best (out of 86) hotel in Caracas, Venezuela. But that's by no means a scientific assessment.

And it doesn't include any of the reviews provided by chickens, who would presumably give it one star, at most, if they could get onto the internet.

Vintage photos of folks in costumes

What are you going to dress up as for Halloween on Monday? Clearly, this is not a smart year to dress up as a clown, scary or otherwise. (Mimes and jesters are probably right out, too.)

I hope we're spared from having too many people amble around as Trump or Clinton. From some of the stories I've seen, it would appear that we'll have a lot of superheroes, Star Wars characters (trending toward the most recent movie), pirates and witches. So, in other words, a typical year, with perhaps a few more Harley Quinns than usual walking the streets and seeking candy.

Here are a few old photographs of people dressed up in costume, starting with a pair of found photos that have no identifying information.

This next one is from the family archives. I don't think it's Halloween, per se, because it's dated May 1914. It features a large group of men, half of whom are in drag. (There are also, unfortunately, a couple of men in blackface, a practice that didn't start to disappear until the 1960s in the United States.) Apparently, my great-grandfather, Howard Horsey Adams, is in this group photo, possibly dressed as a woman.

Here's the whole photo (which can be seen in a larger version if you click on it), plus a few closeups...

Finally, because it's only fair, here's a photo of me dressed up for a Halloween party 20 years ago. I kind of miss that shirt.

Exaggerated postcard: W.H. Martin is very proud of his pumpkins

This never-used "real" photo postcard, printed on Kodak's Azo paper, features some century-old photo trickery that makes is look like these farmers are harvesting pumpkins the size of Volkswagen Beetles.¹ The effect is fairly well done. If you didn't inherently know that gourds of that size were implausible, you might not immediately doubt the veracity of the image. The subterfuge is helped by that fact that it's a black-and-white photograph, and thus there are fewer colors and shades that have to match tonally.

There is an extensive history of exaggerated, or tall-tale, postcards from the early 1900s through at least the 1960s. Fruits, vegetables, peanuts, animals and bugs were all subjects of the humorous cards. They are highly collectible and there are many websites featuring galleries of vintage cards.

Here's a closeup of the text from the bottom of this postcard...

It states:
Copyrighted Photograph 1908
by W.H. Martin Ottawa, Kan.

A different version of this card, seen here on Flickr, has a caption in the upper-right corner that states: "pumpkins grown on our soil are profitable."

According to The Robinson Library website, Martin was a pioneer in this "field":

"One of the first producers of exaggerated postcards was William H. Martin, of Ottawa, Kansas. Martin's photography studio began experimenting with trick photography around 1908. His work featured huge ears of corn and peaches, a giant rabbit being tracked by a car, and pumpkins uprooting a farmstead. He was so successful that he established the Martin Post Card Company in 1909, and reportedly produced seven million exaggerated postcards the next year."

More about Martin, who was nicknamed "Dad," can be found in this 2013 article by Michael Bushnell at northeastnews.com.

To see galleries of exaggerated postcards from the past, you need only type that phrase into Google. Or, if you prefer, some sites you can check out are the Wisconsin Historical Society, io9, The American Museum of Photography, Postcrossing and Doctor Fong's House of Mysteries.²

Footnotes
1. Of course, this postcard is from 1908 and the Beetle wasn't introduced until 1934. So that's a retroactive-anachronistic metaphor (depending when you are in the space-time continuum while reading this post.)
2. As if I would ever pass on an opportunity to include the title "Doctor Fong's House of Mysteries" on Papergreat. In fact, I might just start over from scratch with the whole blog and rename it Doctor Fong's House of Ephemera.

Remembering the horror that once lurked in Brigantine, New Jersey

The Jersey shore hasn't always been about sand, sun and surf.
There were horrors, too...

As a young kid growing up South Jersey for a few years in the late 1970s, I was mesmerized by the television commercials for Brigantine Castle, a haunted-house attraction located in Brigantine, New Jersey, just a few miles northeast of Atlantic City. The place looked like a schlocky (in the best way) 1960s or 1970s horror movie come to life. I was 8 or 9 years old, so, upon viewing these commercials, it didn't really register to me that these were just a bunch of college kids in pancake makeup making good summer money.¹ (That's an over-generalization, but not terribly off the mark.)

I never did get there. The Castle's heyday ended with a damaging storm in 1982. It closed for good in 1984 and burned down in 1987.

But, because of those commercials, I've remained intrigued by Brigantine Castle. Here are two of them, from YouTube...





While there is a great website and digital archive of the history of Brigantine Castle, which I'll get to in a moment, actual ephemera is difficult to track down on the open market. I did come across this 1977 postcard for Brigantine "Horror" Castle & Amusement Pier a couple years ago. It was pushing the idea that this was "an exciting complex for the entire family." Because homicidal mimes and severed heads make for the perfect day with Gramps and Missy!

The photographs on the postcard were taken by Manos Angelakis, and the card was distributed by Joseph Harris of Brigantine. Here's a look...

If you really want the skinny on Brigantine Castle, the best — and perhaps only — place to go is www.darkinthepark.com, which was created more than 15 years ago by Seph and Bill Cherkasky as a repository of Brigantine Castle history. It was then expanded to encompass three classic dark rides of New Jersey, as the Cherkaskys added Dracula's Castle in Wildwood and the Haunted Mansion of Long Branch. Other dark rides and haunted attractions have also been reviewed and discussed on the website over the years.

But Brigantine Castle remains the centerpiece of the website, and the depth of history and information featured there is such that I hope there are backups and printed archives of all that material. I would hate to see this information become a Lost Corner of the Internet and then disappear altogether.

The Cherkaskys' documentation includes Brigantine Castle's history, three pages worth of photos of the actors who worked there, a large archive of pictures, some of the original sound effects and screams (including one described as "different men laughing with jack-in-the-box sounds"), and a look at what has become of the former site of the attraction in Brigantine. As far as ephemera goes, there fantastic scans of posters and brochures and other advertising material for Brigantine Castle that you should really check out. In particular, this poster is pretty terrific.

And if all that isn't enough, the Brigantine Castle website hosts 15 years worth of emails that the Cherkaskys have received, filled with memories of both Brigantine Castle employees and those who were thrilled and spooked while experiencing the castle back in the late 1970s and early 1980s. That is the part of the website that I most hope is preserved for posterity. Here are a couple of examples of those great memories...

• I was lucky enough to be a member of the Brigantine Castle for the last 3 years. The memories I have from my experiences there are among the most cherished I have. For those of you reading this that share the knowledge of being a "monster" in the Castle or in any other haunted house, hayride or attraction, you understand. ... In the brief time I was employed at the Castle I became acquainted with many people, some of whom are my closest friends to this day, as close as any blood relation a person can have. One of the people I met was a man by the name of Joe Little. His name was a source of pure irony because he easily stood 6'4" if not taller. When he donned the platform shoes, green makeup and metal bolts, he was one of the most imposing Frankenstein's Monsters to have ever scared a shoobie into the fetal position.
• My daughter and I have hysterically funny memories of one visit to the castle in the summer of 1976. My sister-in-law (Dot) and nephew were with us, and I had to lead the way. We spent a long time debating how to get over the hole in the path in the dark forest until the lurking werewolf finally told us it was glass. The Castle was genuinely creepy, even though we knew what it was, but my sister-in-law's terror had her clutching the back of my shirt in a knot and squeezing the kids between us. We did a lockstep through the castle with me laughing hysterically and Dot screaming hysterically. The body that sat up in the coffin really made her scream.

And now you probably want to read them all. Go ahead! Go!
(But you might want to keep a light on.)

Footnote

1. Speaking of which, Ashar, now 16½, is working as one of the scary performers this month at a horror attraction called Panic at the Ballpark in York's downtown baseball stadium. From the brochure: "York's professional baseball stadium, PeoplesBank Park, become[s] a terrifying den of horrors as a force of vengeance and evil wreaks havoc on fans of the great American pastime." The different areas are called Head Basher's Hideout, The Dismemberment Shop and Dead Man's Play Land. An obsessed police officer, using his fingers as a gun, runs around trying to catch an evil, undead ballplayer.

1918 postcard: "That Nightmare Sure Was A Horse On Me"

This non-subtle but punny postcard from a century ago plays off the etymology of nightmare, which, when used in the sense of a bad dream, only dates to the 1820s. The mares, though, weren't literally horses. They were considered to be demons or goblins that "rode" on people's chests while they slept, thus causing frightful dreams (or potentially death, in some cultures).

The word "mare" has a confusing etymology that involves Old English, Norse, Germanic, French and perhaps all the way back to Greek. It was thought that mares could haunt (or ride) more than just people. They could leave horses sweating and exhausted or tangle the branches of a tree. In Slavic countries, some of the methods of repelling nightmares included leaving a broom upside down behind the door or placing a belt atop the bedsheets.

This postcard was mailed in 1918, during the 20-month period when postage was raised from 1¢ to 2¢. It appears to have been mailed to Al Guffey in the unincorporated community of Nettleton, Missouri. The message, clearly written by a child, states:

Dear Al,
The weather is fine here. It is New Year's day. I got a watch [and] a pair of gloves for Xmas.
Marvin.

Book cover: "Galaxy of Ghouls"

Here's a perfectly appropriate vintage book cover for Halloween Week.

• Title: Galaxy of Ghouls
• Incredibly awesome subtitle: A Handy Guide for Vampires and Werewolves, of Spells and Sorcery of Switches on Witches of Shape-Stealers and Soul-Swappers of Demons and Damnation...
• Seriously, is that the best subtitle ever? Yes.
• Did the awesome subtitle appear in the official copyright listing? I don't think so.
• Would this book have been in Catholic school libraries? I don't think so.
• Editor: Judith Merril
• Authors included in anthology: Ray Bradbury, Fredric Brown, Theodore Sturgeon, J.B. Priestley, Richard Parker, Anthony Boucher, Robert Sheckley, Fritz Leiber, Arthur Porges, Leslie Charteris, Bruce Elliott, William Tenn, Clifford Simak, Manly Wade Wellman and Walter M. Miller Jr. Plus one story co-written by Jerome BIxby and Joe E. Dean.
• That's a lot men: Yes.
• Probably white men: Yes.
• What about Leslie Charteris: Man.
• What about Manly Wade Wellman: A very Manly man. But nothing like this Manly.
• But, hey, at least the editor was a woman: Correct. Judith Josephine Grossman (1923-1997) was a pioneering science fiction writer, editor and political activist. Her three published novels were Shadow on the Hearth, Gunner Cade and The Tomorrow People. There are a few collections of her short stories, including two published in the 1970s — Survival Ship and Other Stories and The Best of Judith Merril. She was a peace activist who once, according to Wikipedia, traveled "to Ottawa dressed as a witch in order to hex Parliament for allowing American cruise missile testing over Canada." You can read more about her writing at The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.
• Cover art: B. Thomas
• Man? Not sure, actually.
• Publisher: Lion Library (LL25)
• Cover price: 35 cents
• Year: May 1955
• Pages: 192
• Format: Paperback
• Reprints: Pyramid Books republished this book as Off the Beaten Orbit in 1959 and 1961 (with new covers each time).
• What others say about this anthology:
• Todd Mason, writing on Sweet Freedom, states: "A thoroughly enjoyable anthology of fantasy, sf, horror and Merril's then-favorite term for all fantastic fiction, 'science-fantasy' (often in the specific sense of that which mixes fantasy and sf aspects, tropes and furniture, as well as Merril's more broad sense, which she would eventually trade for a broad definition of Robert Heinlein's 'speculative fiction' suggestion of some years earlier)."
• Reviewing the book on Goodreads, Heidi writes: "The whole book is really a convergence of science fiction stories which have an element of the occult. (A few are just strictly ghost and/or horror stories.) Almost all of the stories here are pretty good and there are a few real stand-outs."
• Margaret L. Carter, writing on Vamp Chix, begins her review by stating: "OFF THE BEATEN ORBIT (1961; first published as GALAXY OF GHOULS, 1955), compiled by distinguished SF writer and editor Judith Merril, isn't a vampire anthology as such. But it does include three vintage vampire tales (two being a couple of my all-time favorites), plus two other stories with some vampire content. It also features two werewolf pieces. This anthology holds a special place in my heart. I first heard of it from my high school boyfriend, who described some of the contents to me but never got around to lending me the book. I'd given up on ever actually seeing the elusive paperback when I stumbled upon it in a used book shop, long before Internet searches existed."
• Just realized. "Switches on witches" is a little kinky, no?: Yes.
• So, definitely not in Catholic school libraries?: Correct.

Halloween is almost here, so get your head out of that pumpkin!

Time has lunged forward and we are now just days away from Allhallowtide, so I'm going to try to squeeze in as many themed posts as possible between now and then.¹

This embossed vintage postcard, which has no publisher listed anywhere, contains a lot of surprises beyond just the central image of a young girl with a large carved pumpkin on her head. There is a flower with a creepy face, two different moons, stars, a ring, a witch, a candle and, of course, a black cat.

The cat has a strange and tiny winged creature sitting upon the tip of its tale. I'm not sure what's up with that. Maybe it's a tiny owl. And, of course, black cats and owls are both extreme omens of death in European folklore, so if you see these two animals hanging out together, it's pretty much a double-whammy.²

This postcard was mailed in 1911 and sent to Miss Martha Lewis, who lived in the small borough of Williamstown in northern Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. (I found some evidence of a Martha Lewis was was born in Pennsylvania in 1902 and was the child of Edward Lewis and Amelia Thresa (Minnie) Temple. Martha also appeared in a 1930 census as a resident of Williamstown.) The short note on the card states:

Hello Martha. How are you getting along.
I guess you thought I was lost.
Leda.

Footnotes
1. And, of course, you can go back and see all the awesome vintage Halloween postcards that were featured as part of Mild Fear 2015.
2. Also, while looking for answers about that Cattail Creature, I discovered these unrelated creatures of world folklore: Tailypo (Appalachia), Bakeneko (Japan), Alp (Germany), Hombre Gato¹ (South America) and Pard (medieval Europe).

Secondary footnote
1. Hombre Gato would be a great name for a band.

Postcard: Little Nell and her (zombie) grandfather

The uncredited illustration on this postcard¹ shows two characters from Charles Dickens' 1840s serialized novel The Old Curiosity Shop. They are two of the main figures in the story — Nell Trent, a beautiful and kind 13-year-old orphan, and Nell's grandfather, who is not given a name by Dickens.

Dickens' cheery tale involves Nell's lonely orphan existence, poverty, gambling, a "hunchbacked dwarf moneylender," destitution, health problems and, ultimately, a lot of death.

But forget all of that for a moment. Why is Nell's nameless grandfather depicted as a zombie in this illustration?

Other depictions of the grandfather are not nearly this grotesque. There is, for example, this circa-1930 painting by Harold Copping in which the grandfather at least looks alive. And here's an 1888 photogravure by Felix O.C. Darley.

I am not the only one to wonder about this illustration. Back in May, Jenny Provenance of the Provenance and Pilgrimage website wrote about finding one of these postcards under odd circumstances.² She called it "one of the creepiest images I have ever seen."

I do have a non-zombie theory for this illustration, but it involves a spoiler for the book.

*** 175-YEAR-OLD SPOILER ALERT ***

The Old Curiosity Shop concludes with penniless Nell falling into poor health and dying after she and her grandfather have made a long and difficult journey to evade the dwarf and other Dickensian villains. Her grandfather, beset with dementia, refuses to admit she is dead and sits every day by her grave waiting for her to return. Eventually, he dies too. Fade to black.³

So here's my thought for how this illustration could work: It's supposed to be Nell's ghost, sitting silently beside her grandfather as he waits, catatonic and near-death, by her grave.

I'm sure that's not the case, but it's much more poignant and could help to explain why Nell looks so robust here, when she was the first die.

(Or maybe this is just how all of us look at this point in the U.S. presidential election)
Footnotes
1. The postcard is in good condition and has never been written on or used. The reverse side is generic, with no publisher or signature mark. My broad guess on a year of publication would be 1920 through 1950, with the earlier part of that range more likely.
2. The circumstances involve ephemera of a girl holding a chicken, which is awesome.
3. This ending was NOT well-received. Critics skewered the over-angelic character of Nell and her death. Angry readers destroyed their copies of the final serialized chapter to express their displeasure with the conclusion. This came after there had been a great deal of excitement leading up to the conclusion. According to Wikipedia:

"The hype surrounding the conclusion of the series was unprecedented; Dickens fans were reported to have stormed the piers in New York City, shouting to arriving sailors (who might have already read the final chapters in the United Kingdom), 'Is Little Nell alive?' In 2007, many newspapers claimed that the excitement at the release of the last instalment of The Old Curiosity Shop was the only historical comparison that could be made to the excitement at the release of the last Harry Potter novel, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows."

Gearing up for some Halloween Postcrossing fun

Shown above are some of the Halloween- and autumn-themed postcards, all with original artwork, that I'll be sending around the world via Postcrossing this month. Redbubble is my website of choice for getting most postcards. Their cards come on high-quality stock, the site has frequent discounts and sales, and a wide range of excellent artists showcase their work there.

Here are links to the five postcards shown above (clockwise, from the witch in the top left):

• October Fields Halloween Witch and Scarecrow Fantasy Art, by Molly Harrison
• The Harvest Moon, by kirbeekatz
• Yar - pumpkin halloween fall autumn throwback retro style, by wackadesigns
• Fall Magic, by Juli Cady Ryan
• The Trick or Treaters, by Ryan Conners

The awesome Conners has been featured on Papergreat before. She allowed me display a couple of her postcards for Papergreat's 1,600th post. And I'm actually using two of her postcards for Halloween mailings this month. The other one is Scary Story Time.

You should check out and considering supporting the work by Conners and all of the artists mentioned here.

Meanwhile, one of the stamps I'll be using on this year's mailings is this 10-cent beauty from 1974...

It's U.S. #1548, and it was issued on October 12, 1974, in North Tarrytown, New York. (North Tarrytown officially changed its name to Sleepy Hollow in 1996.)

Here's some information on the stamp from Arago, the online database of the Smithsonian Institution's National Postal Museum:

"[T]he 10-cent American Folklore stamp features a scene from Washington Irving's 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow' in which the infamous Headless Horseman pursues protagonist Ichabod Crane. The short story demonstrates two qualities for which Washington Irving is best known: his humor and his ability to create vivid, descriptive imagery. Irving first published the short story in 1819-1820. He lived at Birmingham, England, at the time. Designed by Leonard Everett Fisher, the stamps were lithographed with an initial printing of 140 million. The stamp dimensions measure 1.44 x 0.84 inches and have one plate number. 'Mail Early' and Mr. Zip appear in the selvage on both the left and right side of each sheet."

Found photo: She's waiting for someone to throw flowers with

Clearly, this cute little girl is just waiting for a Friend to shamble by, so that she can teach him how to throw flowers into the water. Right?

Of course, it's all fun and games until someone runs out of flowers...

Happy October, everyone!

This old photo is 2¾ inches wide, and I'm not sure if it has a date or not. There's a very faint circular stamp on the back and part of the text appears to be "Se'38." Does that mean September 1938? Maybe.

That would be, speaking of Old Bolt-Neck, about seven years after the original Frankenstein (1931) was released in movie theaters and chilled audiences. Regarding The Monster and the little girl, here are some fun tidbits from imdb.com:

• In one scene, the Monster walks through a forest and comes upon a little girl, Maria, who is throwing flowers into a pond. The monster joins her in the activity but soon runs out of flowers. At a loss for something to throw into the water, he looks at Maria and moves toward her. In all American prints of the movie, the scene ends here. But as originally filmed, the action continues to show the monster grabbing Maria, hurling her into the lake, then departing in confusion when Maria fails to float as the flowers did. This bit was deleted because the censors objected to the violent end of the little girl. This scene is restored in the DVD reissue.
• During production, there was some concern that seven-year-old Marilyn Harris, who played Maria, would be overly frightened by the sight of Boris Karloff in costume and make-up when it came time to shoot the scene. When the cast was assembled to travel to the location, Marilyn ran from her car directly up to Karloff, who was in full make-up and costume, took his hand and asked "May I drive with you?" Delighted, and in typical Karloff fashion, he responded, "Would you, darling?"
• Harris had done several takes of the drowning scene, none of which turned out quite right. Although wet and tired, she agreed to do one last take of the scene, the one that appears in the finished film, after director James Whale promised her anything she wanted if she would do so. She asked for a dozen hard-boiled eggs, her favorite snack. Whale gave her two dozen.

Coincidentally, Young Frankenstein was on TCM on Thursday night, as part of a tribute to the late Gene Wilder. I love that movie's twist on the original's iconic little-girl scene, as the Mel Brooks version has her exclaim, "Oh dear. Nothing left. What shall we throw in now?" followed by Peter Boyle's perfect deadpan look into the camera. And then the teeter-totter...

* * *You can look forward to many spooktacular posts this month, along with "normal" (as opposed to Abby Normal) posts, too. Last year was the Fortnight of Mild Fear and back in 2011 there was the Halloween Countdown of Horrifying Ephemera. What's a good label for this month's haunted ephemera?