The post with 18,000+ pageviews

A "popular" new Papergreat post will get maybe 20 pageviews in its first 24 hours. This blog isn't exactly a buzzing hub of internet activity. So it was to my great surprise last month when I discovered that the quick and silly post Ingredients list found in the parking lot of a Circle K in Florence had thousands of pageviews during its first day. It has now accumulated about 18,400 pageviews.

All of this is because the post was chosen for aggregation by an AI-powered "news" site called Newsbreak, which gathers others' reporting on community news and puts it together in one stream for local readers. 

I imagine that the "found in the parking lot of a Circle K in Florence" portion of the post title is what caught the "eye" of the AI. Because a human being with journalism training would never have selected such a post to aggregate as "breaking news." So let that part be yet another lesson regarding the deep limitations of AI. 

At least Newsbreak states up front: "It’s essential to note our commitment to transparency: Our Terms of Use acknowledge that our services may not always be error-free, and our Community Standards emphasize our discretion in enforcing policies. As a platform hosting over 100,000 pieces of content published daily, we cannot pre-vet content, but we strive to foster a dynamic environment for free expression and robust discourse through safety guardrails of human and AI moderation."

I'm not sure how many people read that note, though. Newsbreak's readers questioned why it was aggregating an incredibly nonessential post from Papergreat. Some of their comments:

• Why is this news worthy?
• how is this news
• lmao why is this in the news?
• lmfao I cannot believe this made the news!
• Well this source is getting blocked
• why in the f**k is this a news article
• Why is this even a post.
• slow day huh
• why is this news and why did someone actually take the time
• This is news worthy because of what??? I’ll wait for a reasonable answer

Clearly, some of them still don't understand this is what you're going to get when you remove humans from the equation and let a bunch of code try to figure out what's "newsworthy." It just so dumb that we're trying to have AI reinvent a wheel that wasn't broken.

Thomas Baekdal asked in 2024, "Why do news aggregator apps keep failing?" and found that the initial answer is quite simple: 

"We already have all the news aggregators we need. ... Every single national and local newspaper is a news aggregator. It's a publication where the journalists look at millions of different things that have happened in the world over the past 24 hours, and then they have picked out (aggregated) the news stories that they feel you need to see. ... So, newspapers are news aggregators. Which also means that all the news aggregators are just aggregating other news aggregators... and that just doesn't make much sense, neither in terms of audience or business model. ... For some strange reason, many tech entrepreneurs never realized this."

* * *

For what it's worth, all of the interest generated did get some folks to comment on the blog post (not the Newsbreak post) with ideas regarding what all the ingredients were for.

Guesses ranged from "some sort of sweet and spicy marinara sauce using honey" to pork roast with hot honey drizzle to pizza to pork barbecue. It's not clear whether they might have asked an AI chatbot to generate those guesses...

My Weekly Reader: "Kentucky Has a Singing Festival"

Kismet! This is a companion post to a Papergreat post from exactly nine years ago today. Nine years! Gosh, it especially seems like time flies sometimes. With regard to the June 10-14, 1940, edition of My Weekly Reader, I had previously featured the front page photo of photographer/folk festival promoter Jean Bell Thomas (1881-1982). 

Here's the entire front page of that issue, with the photo of Thomas plus the article headlined "Kentucky Has a Singing Festival." The article states that the festival is held not far from Ashland, Kentucky, "near a little log cabin" in which Thomas lives. The 1940 article indicates that the festival had been going on for 10 years. That jibes with what I read on this website, which states that the American Folk Song Festival, founded and organized by Thomas, was held from 1930 until her retirement in 1972.

The website (which seems to pull from Thomas' Wikipedia biography) further states: "The festival followed an unchanging script that Thomas said was intended to show 'authentic sequences in America's musical history.' Overall it reflected the belief of Thomas and many of her contemporaries that the speech patterns, songs, and other traditions of early British Isles settlers still survived in Appalachia." 

Fortunately, some recordings of the festival have been preserved.

Halloween newspaper snippets from 100 years ago

Here are some Halloween clippings from the October 31, 1925, edition of the Winston-Salem (N.C.) Journal. This is the "Women's Page," filled with recipes, party ideas, etc. A headline states of Halloween: "The Mad Hour When Witches Ride and Black Cats Stalk on Fence Tops May Be Celebrated With an Eerie Party." It includes a recipe for "drop doughnuts," which is included in an image below. And there's an advertisement for Merita bread, which claims that it's great for Hallowe'en sandwiches.

50 years ago today: Crazy curl perms & "Crazy Mama"

Just for the halibut, here are some headlines and advertisements from the Friday, July 25, 1975, edition of the Worthington (Minnesota) Daily Globe:

• Main story on A1: Yellow gas knocked out astronaut
• House rejects lifting ban on sale of arms to Turkey
• Voting rights act extension passes; Ford plans to sign
• Americans pay more than ever for beef
• CIA reveals how it monitored U.S. mail
• Dairy, swine judging held at Osceola County Fair
• Ford presented Mayaguez wheel
• Accused rapist will press charges against avenging feminists

When H.R. Haldeman essentially predicted the world of today

One of my bedtime browsing books these days is 1980's The Book of Lists #2. It's amazing how much of it I remember from the early 1980s afternoons when I read page after page in the attic of the house on Willow Street in Montoursville. I'm also coming across things that meant little to me then, but are pretty cool now, such as Grace Kelly listing Marie Dressler as the greatest actress of all time, or Susan Kelz Sperling advocating for words such as bedswerver, bellytimber, merry-go-sorry, mubblefubbles and smellsmock to return to our daily lexicon.

Anyway, I was a bit gobsmacked when I read the passage pictured above in the David Wallechinsky-penned list "6 Outrageous Plans That Didn't Happen."

Citing the 1979 book The Shadow Presidents: The Secret History of the Chief Executives and Their Top Aides, by Michael Medved, the passage discusses an early 1970s idea by H.R. Haldeman (President Richard Nixon's chief of staff) to create something remarkably similar to the internet as we know it today by linking up all the homes in the United States. "There would be two-way communication. Through computer, you could use your television set to order up whatever you wanted. The morning paper, entertainment services, shopping services, coverage of sporting events and public events," Haldeman is quoted as stating.

Wallechinsky adds speculatively: "One can almost see the dreamy eyes of Nixon and Haldeman as they sat around discussing a plan that would eliminate the need for newspapers."

Of course it was newspapers, most notably The Washington Post, that brought them down.

It wasn’t until a quarter-century after Haldeman’s early 1970s notion of an interconnected digital world that those ideas began to come to fruition. Haldeman died of cancer in 1993 and, near the end, he may well have been aware of the early 1990s rise of dial-up internet and web browsers and those soon-to-be-ubiquitous AOL CDs. The transformation was underway. A decade later, newspapers began to feel the deeply unfortunate pain of the internet's rise ...

If only we knew then what we know now...

On November 3, 1990 — 34 years and 5 months ago — I was a second-year student at Penn State University, learning the ropes of journalism and calling all of my sources via landlines. 

Also on that date, the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal published this short editorial about AT&T's new SmartPhone. Looking back, it's quite the curiosity...

Revisiting 2016 (Part 3)

OK, it's time to conclude cleaning out the time capsule marked "Calendar Year 2016." Here's the final collection of running observations and snapshots from this eclectic collection of everyday ephemera dating to the last full year of the Obama administration...

1. We were involved in the York County 4-H Alpaca Club, so I reckon that one of its associated events is how I came across this delightful and ridiculous flyer for a "Galactic Genetic Gathering of Alpacas" in Iowa. 

2. I kept so many yellow receipts from the York Emporium, and I will continue to hold onto them. They're great for tucking away inside books.

3.  An empty wrapper for key lime Creamy Coconut Patties from Anastasia Confections.  

4. A menu for Masa Bistro, one of our favorite York-area restaurants back in the day.

5. There was a little blank notebook in the time capsule with the note "Log the stories you find in this box." I guess I'm blogging as my way of logging. I'll use the notebook to document something else.  

6. On the back of this business card, I wrote "Funniest card I picked up on drive to FL." (I was on a road trip to visit Dad.)

7. A movie ticket stub for Star Trek Beyond, the last movie I watched in a theater with Mom.

8. A printout from the website I Waited 96 Years! ... The website still exists and includes this message as of today: "In the weeks before the 2016 election, this website featured 186 women, ages 96 to 105, who were eager to elect Hillary Clinton. These women were born before the 19th Amendment and were, for the first time, voting for a woman for president of the United States. ... Then, in 2020, we followed up with a few of the (now) centenarians when the female presidential candidates suspended their campaigns. And in 2024, we gathered reflections from one inspiring 106-year-old. At this critical and challenging moment, our nation needs these women’s voices and wisdom more than ever."  

9. A copy of LNP | LancasterOnline's Trending section that leads with an article about Little Free Libraries. The article is still online.

10. A printout of an email sent to me with the subject line "The Troubles," in which one of my former Penn State University journalism professors, discussing the Penn State child sex abuse scandal, tells me "You make incisive comments on Twitter. Keep up the good work."

Speaking of Twitter...

11. ...Not all of my comments were incisive, although the sentiment about Philip Seymour Hoffman still stands.

Also speaking of Twitter...

12. ... This is pretty darn funny. I had mentioned 2016's Pokémon Go phenomenon in Part 1. This also marks the first appearance of a Bulbasaur on Papergreat.

13. A brochure for the Long's Park Summer Music Series in Lancaster.

14. An editorial cartoon, relevant then and now, that I printed and saved.  

15. A Powerball ticket that wasn't a winner. Jackpot was $142 million.

16. A business card for Too Many Books in Roanoke, Virginia. On the back, I wrote "This store had a big friendly black poodle. And some books." The bookstore is still in business. Last August, a Yelp reviewer wrote: "Talk about charming! The store is two floors and has a lovely collection of history/non-fiction upstairs and fiction downstairs. ... I found several names/titles that were new to me and felt like I was prowling around my Pop-pop's basement the whole time. Magical!"

17. Finally, there's a sealed envelope inside the box. A time capsule within a time capsule. "Random old photos of unknown, unrelated folks," the front of the envelope states. I don't have the energy right now, so look for exploration of this one in a future post, maybe.

1950 Thanksgiving ads

A handful of advertisements from the November 19, 1950, edition of the Sunday News of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, highlighting Horse Shoe Grill, Bennett's Restaurant, Aunt Sally's Kitchen and Esbenshade Turkey Farm. Those prices look good, even adjusted for inflation. $1.75 in 1950 would be about $22.50 today.

Brochure for the Boris Karloff Wax Museum in Niagara Falls

Every October needs a little Boris Karloff. This is an undated brochure for the Boris Karloff Wax Museum, which was located at the corner of Oakes Drive and Buchanan Avenue in Niagara Falls, Canada. It was a longtime fixture of the entertainment district known as Clifton Hill, a touristy spot near the falls filled with museums (usually hokey rather than prestigious), arcades and similar attractions.

I can't find an official history of the museum, so much of what I've assembled here is via two sources:

• Reddit: History of Clifton Hill Part 3: "Wax Monsters and Mini Golf" (which is excellent)
• Universal Monster Army: A three-page message board thread about the Boris Karloff Wax Museum

The museum opened around 1968, and I found evidence on Newspapers.com that it still existed as late as 1992. It was built and managed by Robert Dunham, an entrepreneur behind numerous popular attractions in Niagara Falls. The Dunham family had a company named Waxattract that constructed wax figures and other components. Waxattract had a subdivision named Enter-Tech.

The brochure notes: "Once you step inside the Boris Karloff Wax Museum be prepared to enter an entirely different world. A world of the supernatural ... a chilling, eerie world ... a world that will eliminate common everyday thoughts and feelings. Thirty-three different scenes will boggle your mind and thrill your senses." It goes on to specifically mention Jack the Ripper, the Phantom of the Opera, the Mummy, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, Medusa, zombies and the Devil himself.

But the museum wasn't entirely horror, it seems. You should read the entirely of the long and well-researched Reddit thread on the museum, but here's an excerpt: 

"The structure the museum was housed in had formerly housed the motel restaurant and gift shop on the lower floor and suites on the top floor. The bottom floor became the museum and gift shop, and looking at old photos it appears the rooms were kept above, but cleverly integrated into a castle-like facade. ... It was the first horror themed wax museum, but was by no means a total haunted attraction. What limited photos exist in the brochures show it being fairly well-lit, and describe many non-horror scenes like Charlie Brown, MLK, Santa, Lincoln and Snow White. It's heavy animation, lighting effects, sound design, and unique theme made it a massive success."

The thread on the Universal Monster Army message board includes images of some different brochures for the wax museum. Plus images of some nifty pennants from the gift shop. Several people also share their memories of touring the museum as children. This anecdote made me laugh: "My parents took me to Niagara Falls around 1970.  After a lot of begging, my parents dropped me off at the Wax Museum. As I recall, it was attached to a hotel. I bought my ticket in the lobby and looked at entry to the museum. It was all blinged out in cobwebs, skeletons, and other scary s**t. Well, I was too afraid to enter. I stood in the lobby for an hour and waited for my ride. When my parents showed up, I made up a complete description of the museum."

Writing for The Junior Reporter Club in the July 12, 1968, edition of The Evening Standard of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, young Judy Zajac shared her story about a family trip to Niagara Falls: "Both falls were very beautiful and I had a very enjoyable time. When we were leaving, we stopped at a wax museum. The name of the museum was Boris Karloff's Wax Museum of Horrors. When one enters, there is a statue of Boris Karloff. Some of the things in the museum are: The Living Heart, The Electric Chair, The Creatures, The Mummy and many more. They also had such things as Santa Claus, Little Red Riding Hood, and Snow White for younger children."

In July 1973, someone stole Dracula's red-and-black cape, valued at $300, from the museum, according to police reports. (That sounds like a good opening hook for a horror movie.)

Finally, here's a groovy advertisement from the August 30, 1969, edition of the Niagara Falls Review that describes a "ghost party" movie marathon at Hollywood Drive-In that was done in conjunction with the Boris Karloff Wax Museum.

The Sunbonnet Women of America and their 1925 Halloween seance

Witches! A seance! And a dance!

Oh my. It's a History Mystery. I want to know everything that can be known about the Sunbonnet Women of America. There are only a handful of clippings, all from 1925, about this group on Newspapers.com, and there's zilch on Google.

It's the above clipping that first caught my eye. Headlined "Wicked Witches Listed At Pre-Halloween Seance," it's from the October 18, 1925, edition of The Sunday Star of Washington, D.C. — exactly 99 years ago today. The Sunday Star was the Sunday edition of the Washington Evening Star.

The first paragraph states: "The Sunbonnet Women of America wish to solve the problems of their business brothers and sisters, so they invite them to come and help invoke the wiles of the 'wickedest witches' in a pre-Halloween seance and dance Thursday evening, October 29, at the Central Armory, Eleventh and Clifton streets northwestern."

The invitation itself is in verse:

So the ancient near-witch, Sunbonnet Sue,

Extends a summons to all of you

Who'd dance and laugh and brew and plot

To try the luck of the witches pot.

Disguise yourselves in Halloween hues,

If you'd be favored in the pot that brews,

And present your card at the door of Fate

For the fun begins at half-past eight.

There are favors that may be got,

So be on time to brew in the pot;

You may not know, but it sure is true,

Sunbonnet girls are among the few

Descended from the Salem witches

And work their wiles for Halloween wishers.

"Now, come you all, so eager to learn

If Fate for you her wheel will turn.

The business men do recognize

The worth of Sunbonnets wary and wise,

So they have placed in the witches's pot

Some lovely things which they will plot

That may be won by only those

Who please the witches by their clothes.

Now, brothers and sisters, eager and true,

Dress up quite well, it may be you."

Yes, the 1920s were certainly roaring. This was not an event to be missed. Keep in mind, though, that it was held in the midst of the Prohibition. Given the very public nature of the event, it's unlikely that there would have been any alcohol openly served. But perhaps some was smuggled in or, ahem, conjured. Maybe some historians who are most astute than I am about the skirting of Prohibition laws see some hints within the witches' invitation regarding what would be available at the dance.

The last paragraph lists some of the newest members of the Sunbonnet Women of America, "all prominent in Government, professional and business circles." I'm going to list them here, because maybe this post will help someone track down something new about one of their ancestors:

Mrs. Susie Moore

Miss Helen E. Burnett

Miss Helen C. Clark

Miss Nita S. Hinman

Mrs. Amelia E. Byrne

Mrs. Elsie C. Gulli

Miss Elizabeth M. Wall

Mrs. Mabel Driver

Miss Elizabeth K. Prender

Miss Mabel J. Carter

Miss Bertha V. Zeller

Miss Alice M. Blandforth

Miss Margaret R. Shedd

Miss Annie Louis Carroll

Miss Edith L. Tate

Miss Madeline Diers

And just imagine, all of them descended from the Salem witches (wink).

Sifting through some of the other Newspaper.com clippings from 1925 sheds little light on the Sunbonnet Women of America. They are first mentioned in early May and seem to be associated with the National Club of the Younger Business Women. That month, they were organizing "the first annual organdy dance of the Sunbonnet Women of America."

An October 9 article specifically mentions the "Washington branch of the Sunbonnet Women of America" and its meeting to discuss the upcoming Halloween dance. 

And that's pretty much it. How long did the organization last? Did it actually have branches in multiple cities? Were they really witches? Did they all vanish after the October 29 seance and summoning? 

Maybe we should do a new seance and try to contact "Sunbonnet Sue" for an eyewitness recap. Stuff like that always ends well in movies. 

1978 Halloween movie marathon at MacArthur Drive-In in Orange, Texas

This newspaper advertisement (via Newspapers.com) was in the October 27, 1978, edition of The Orange Leader of Orange, Texas. It showcases a five-film Halloween movie lineup that was slated for the next night, Saturday, at the MacArthur Drive-In. It's an interesting slate that would have ended just a few hours before dawn, for those who stuck it out (or fell asleep in their cars).

Based upon movie lengths and allowing for about five-minute intermissions between movies, this is roughly when the movies would have started:

7:30 p.m. — The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972, PG)

9:05 p.m. — Return to Boggy Creek (1977, G)

10:35 p.m. — Nurse Sherri (1977, R)

12:10 a.m. — House of Psychotic Women (1976, R)

1:45 a.m. — The Mysterious Monsters (1975, G)

3:15 a.m. — It's over! Go home!

Children under age 12 were allowed to attend. I reckon the idea was that they'd have fallen asleep in the back seat by the time the R-rated films started, lest they see something that scars them for life.

The Legend of Boggy Creek is a super-low-budget, documentary-style horror film about an Arkansas cryptid that was fairly popular on the 1970s drive-in circuit. Parts of it served as an inspiration for The Blair Witch Project, decades later.

Its unauthorized sequel, Return to Boggy Creek, has nothing to do with the original and can barely be termed a horror movie. It's definitely the clunker of this MacArthur Drive-In lineup and was probably included because the licensing rights were dirt cheap. Of note, it features Gilligan's Island's Dawn Wells and Diff'rent Strokes' Dana Plato. One reviewer on IMDb called it "a movie that would make some Walt Disney movies look dark. Really, this movie was just a bunch of light fluff with virtually no boggy creek creature to be seen."

Nurse Sherri has a rating of 3.8 out of 10 on IMDb, so it was no prize either. But, in attempting to follow in the footsteps of The Exorcist, it probably had enough shocks, blood and titillation to keep the adults awake and eating popcorn from the snack bar. It also features the horror of this sofa; imagine that on a huge drive-in screen.

At first I was confused in attempting to research House of Psychotic Women, because that's also the title of a 2012 memoir/film studies book written by Kier-La Janisse. It's also the title of a themed collection of movies that Severin and Janisse teamed up to release a few years ago. Then I figured out that House of Psychotic Women is the title of the edited American release of the 1974 Spanish horror film Blue Eyes of the Broken Doll, starring Paul Naschy. The American title served as the inspiration for Janisse's book title. Anyway ... Blue Eyes of the Broken Doll is definitely not a film you'd want your kids in the backseat to wake up during. They might catch an eyeful of eyeballs in a bowl of water, for one thing. 

Last up was The Mysterious Monsters. Its rating is incorrect in the advertisement. It's a G-rated documentary hosted by Peter Graves that discusses Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster and other popular 1970s cryptids. It's fairly well-regarded, as that genre goes, but I can't imagine it was keeping many people awake that deep into the witching hour. Maybe it should have replaced Return to Boggy Creek as the second movie! 

I'd love to program a Halloween movie marathon for a group of horror fans. I think it would be more fun at an indoor theater, with quality picture, quality sound and no worries about weather or bugs. Maybe, after some ruminating, I'll do a post later this month about what movies I would include in such a marathon. And I'd love to hear in the comments what your dream Halloween movie marathon would be!

But drive-in theaters represented a wonderful time in the history of movies, too. And they definitely helped to further the horror genre through the 1970s. There's a Facebook page devoted to memories of the MacArthur Drive-In in Orange, Texas. According to that page, the drive-in opened in 1950 and, in January 1983, "slipped into history like most drive-ins."

"Triple Horror Bill" in Greeley, Colorado

While I was looking for something else on Newspapers.com, I came across this awesome newspaper advertisement for a "Triple Horror Bill" in the June 25, 1943, edition of the Greeley (Colorado) Daily Tribune.

"WARNING. Don't attend if you can't stand thrills" the advertisement states.

The trio of cinematic terror consisted of:

1. Dead Men Walk, (1943), a 64-minute flick that IMDb.com describes thusly: "The twin of a kindly small-town physician returns from the grave for vengeance against his brother, who secretly killed him because the twin served Satan." It has a 4.8/10 rating. It was shot in six days and was one of the final movie appearances for Dwight Frye (1899-1943), who gave memorable performances in the 1931 classics Dracula and Frankenstein.

2. Terror House (aka The Night Has Eyes and Moonlight Madness), (1942). This 79-minute film from the UK has a respectable rating of 6.2 on IMDb.com. It's a thriller that takes place in an Old Dark House¹ amid the Yorkshire moors and stars James Mason a young man who may or may not be the villain. I'm going to track this one down, and I love what one reviewer wrote about it on IMDb.com in 2010:

"Of all the movies I love, none has had a wider ranging impact than this one. I saw it on late night TV when I was 9, Halloween night, at a sleepover where everyone else was sleeping. I had nothing to do and couldn't figure out how to change the channel on the TV, so I was sitting there grumpily watching something random when this... strange movie came on. It was in black and white, but the people in it were beautiful, as were the clothes, the sets, everything. I was transfixed. ... Thank you to the people who made this film with love. They'll never know what it's meant to me."

3. Nightmare, 1942. I don't know that this one truly falls into the category of horror. But it's a thriller. The IMDb.com summary: "An ex-gambler helps a beautiful widow, and becomes involved with a murder, secret agents, and saboteurs." It has a 6.3 rating and features the wonderfully named Elspeth Dudgeon, who is so memorable in 1932's The Old Dark House.

Also on the bill is the screwball comedy The Palm Beach Story, a Preston Sturges film that's well-regarded but certainly doesn't fit thematically with everything else.

The films were shown at Greeley's Park Theatre, which was in existence from 1922 to 1952, according to Cinema Treasures. Admission would have been about 20 cents, a darn good deal. That's about $3.60 today. Popcorn not included, though.

Spooky footnote

1. Some links for more about Old Dark House type movies:

• Martin Grams blog post from 2019
• Letterboxd list by Rugby
• Original Cinemaniac blog post from 2020
• Papergreat: Poster for 1935's "One Frightened Night"

A few old newspaper stories about people rescuing cats

From the January 8, 1927, edition of The Gazette and Daily in York, Pennsylvania. Thank you, John Almony.

From the January 26, 1925, edition of the Atlantic City (New Jersey) Daily Press.

From Dorothy Gaines' "In and About Tucson" column in the October 25, 1973, edition of the Arizona Daily Star. Sister Theresa Seraphim, a Russian Orthodox nun from England, wrote a 1966 book titled All God's Creatures. She died in 1990, but her legacy and work continue at The Hermitage No-Kill Cat Shelter and Sanctuary in Tucson. 

Late nights and weekend afternoons of horror in the 1970s

There's a long, wonderful history of horror and science-fiction movies, often presented by horror hosts, being shown on television, usually late Friday nights or on weekend afternoons. Today, the tradition continues via streaming platforms and online communities. 

Here are a small handful of clippings on the topic I came across while browsing through Newspapers.com.

First up, this December 23, 1971, article in the Dayton (Ohio) Daily News announces the forthcoming debut of Dayton horror movie host Dr. Creep (Barry Lee Hobart), who would ghoul-rule the airwaves starting on January 1, 1972. Interestingly, though his debut was days away, his host name hadn't been finalized when this article was published. It states that they were considering Frank N. Stein, the Creep, Mortis Macabre and Corpus D. Lecti.

Here are some TV listings from the January 8, 1977, TV page of The (Glens Falls, New York) Post-Star. (I think I applied there after college; I still have all of my rejection letters bundled somewhere.) Packaged between a couple of old pirate movies, Shock Theater is showing 1946's Catman of Paris, which is praised in modern reviews for having a pretty good horse-and-carriage chase scene.

This advertisement is from the October 23, 1975, edition of The (Pottstown, Pennsylvania) Mercury. It's for an appearance by WPHL-17's Dr. Shock at a local Halloween event. Dr. Shock was portrayed by magician Joe Zawislak from 1969 until 1979, when he died suddenly of a heart attack at age 42. There's an hourlong tribute video to him on YouTube. ( The bottom part of the advertisement is difficult to read, but the event location is Boscov's East at the Lebanon Valley Mall.)

Another TV listing, this one from the February 5, 1977, edition of the Asbury Park Press of New Jersey. In this one, Creature Double Feature is packaging one of the worst movies of all time, The Astro-Zombies (Ashar and I can confirm this), with one of the greatest movies of all time, The War of the Worlds.

Finally, here's an amusing reader letter published in the July 16, 1978, edition of The Tampa (Florida) Tribune. "F.G." was tired of the oldies, probably after years of watching Universal films from the Shock! package. He wanted more modern stuff. But, given that these programs had fairly low budgets, if his wish came true, he probably got a whole lot of 1970s fare such as The House of Seven Corpses, The Legend of Boggy Creek and The Bell from Hell.

Four years ago today...

Time flies ... and warps, distorts and eventually becomes a bullet train.

Four years ago today (May 30, 2020), I drove from Dover Township to the LNP | LancasterOnline newsroom at 8 West King Street in downtown Lancaster for the final time, to clean out my desk. 

No, not that kind of desk cleanout.

It was my first time back in the newspaper office since mid-March, when we had abruptly begun work-from-home protocol because of COVID-19, with no time beforehand to gather anything but the absolute essentials.

By late May, we were granted short windows to return to the office, one by one, and do a more deliberate cleaning and boxing-up of our workspace. We were boxing-up because, even before the pandemic, the plan for mid-2020 was to relocate to a brand-new, state-of-the-art newsroom a couple of blocks away in downtown Lancaster. 

But because of the pandemic, we never got to have an official farewell for 8 West King or a full-staff welcoming event at the new location. 

In fact, I've never been to the current LNP | LancasterOnline newsroom for a work shift.

I'm still working from home (50 months and counting) — only home is now the southern Arizona desert, instead of Dover Township, Pennsylvania. From here, I still do the same job I did in 2020, editing letters and columns about Trump and guns and democracy and public health. I just get up a lot earlier in the morning to start doing it on East Coast time.

Anyway, I took some photos four years ago today for posterity and am sharing them now for this four-year anniversary.

And this is a photo of a very green stairwell at 8 West King that I took in 2018. The building will live only in memories. The site is being turned into Mosaic by Willow Valley Communities, a residential high-rise for active adults ages 55 and over. I hope they include a plaque somewhere about all the amazing journalism that once took place at that location.