Johnny West

I opened a box the other day and found this relic from my 1970s Johnny West figures. It's a poster around 10x20 and the only thing I have left.

Well, except for these photos, which for the life of me I can't understand why I felt compelled to photograph them.

No one shall mention the fact that Jay West is clad in a cape from a superhero doll that I had.

Also there shall be no mention of the two Tarzan dolls in the front, which are from he same line as the superhero who provided Jay with the cape. One Tarzan was my brothers. We could never tell which Tarzan was which - until my brother left his Tarzan sitting on top of a light in his room and Tarzan's leg melted against the bulb. He probably would have melted further if we hadn't smelled that horrible burning plastic odor.

The Comic Ad Lied!!

When I was a kid I loved to look at the ads in the comic books. Everything looked really neat. I thought it would be so cool to own the items advertised and how much fun it would be to show it to my friends. However, things are not always as they seem, especially in the world of comic advertising circa 1970.

Everyone loves a magician's sleight of hand tricks, and what better way to be a magician than to own his hat? All you do is place the hat made of wire and top quality silk on your head and presto chango - you're a magician!. Once again, a disappointment for kids who thought that somehow this would help them to do magic tricks.
Holy moly!! It's the Magne Power Ring! And it comes with the Magne Actuator!! Oh yeah, I'm going to be magne-ing the hell out of anything I can get my hands on. You know, I'm not really sure what a Magne Power Ring does, or what Magne itself is. But judging from the ad, apparently it's something that can turn devices on and off....like you'd can do with an on/off switch.....and your finger.
During the Decade of Steve Austin-ism, all you needed to turn products into gold was to dub them bionic. But this ad says the hand is bi-onic. Is that the same as bionic? Does one hyphen make a difference? How big is it? How does it work? If I hit the bully from Miss Sawyers class during recess, will it go straight through his skull?

I am skeptical that $1.00 can buy a bi-onic hand when Oscar Goldman had to shell out six million dollars for Steve's bionics. It's not like the government is going to pay millions of dollars for a $1.00 hand..... oh. Um, well, if bi-onic hands were $1.00 back in the 70s, we all should have been rolling in bionic hands. And in case you were wondering, we weren't.

Romero, Romero...wherefore art thou Romero?

I'm still in the spirit of Halloween. So here are a few more George Romero film posters for you to gaze upon.

Oh Dracula, Your Fangs Are Delicious

My favorite illustrations from my Scholastic book fair horror books are the ones in Dracula. The purple colored drawings by Harry Borgman are amazing. Here are my favorites.







I thought they were incredible when I was a kid, and I still love them now. I've got nothing else to say. You just can't top them.

The Ghost Ship....soon will be making another run

Here are illustrations from the Scholastic book, The Ghost Ship. These were drawn by Norman Nodel and I like them much better than the ones in Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. The red is a much better color than the yellowish brown of the Jeckyll/Hyde ilustrations. No other explanation is necessary. These are creepy and cool. My favorite is the skeleton.

Dr. Jeckyll, I Presume?

I thought I'd post a few illustrations from the cool books I picked up in the early 1970s at a Scholastic book fair at my elementary school. Previously I posted the cover for Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. While the cover is amazing, the inside of this book is disappointing. Part of it is due to the drab brownish yellow color used in the drawings, but it is also because the illustrations in Dracula and The Ghost Ship are so fantastic, that these just don't compare.

These are the only two illustrations that I really liked in the whole book. The others just didn't do anything for me.


However, I was fascinated with Dr. Jeckyll's transformation into Mr. Hyde.
He goes from Christian Bale....

to Mr. Chugalug, Dean Martin....

to Rod Steiger.

I'll post some illustrations from the other two books, but these needed to go up first. If you see them after the other two, they're truly disappointing.

They're Coming to Get You, Barbara

The living dead walk the earth...and we are there. This movie, while tame by todays standards, is still terrifying in it's premise.

Perhaps I have always had an overactive imagination, but if I were in a cemetery and a strange looking man was staggering in my general direction, I would make damn sure that I didn't come within 50 feet of him. After all, cemeteries are creepy and deserted. If the guy isn't a masher, he could be a corpse.

I found myself wanting to smack this woman in the head with a log to snap her out of her stupor. Then once she started babbling on and on about Johnny, I wanted to smack her in the head to shut her up.

Parlor of Terror

This is the type of ad which seems very appealing, but as with all ads in comic books, you're sure to be disappointed when it arrives. Well, except for the fake vampire blood as any kid is going to get excited about putting fake blood on the face and neck.

Any kid reading the ad would read the last line about how all the spooky stuff is in the package, and would totally skim over the first sentence where it says what you're really getting is a manuscript. And would little kids know what a manuscript was? I think not, oh evil comic ad of yore!!

Want a scary costume? Be a Norwegian Troll

When I was a kid my grandparents went to Norway and brought back this book of Norwegian Folk Tales. The stories are along the lines of the Grimm Brothers Fairy Tales, which means they can really creep you out.

I used to think of Norway as the land of Nordic blue eyed, blonde, outdoors-y, heathy youngsters with bright white teeth. Now when I think of Norway, I think of trolls. Trolls, trolls, trolls, and more trolls. They're everywhere and the Folk Tales are filled with horrible stories of youngsters being terrorized and eaten by trolls. Norway has to keep it quiet or else their tourist market would suffer.

The scariest story is about a kid named Butterball who is the target of a hungry troll. If you were a troll, wouldn't you pick the kid named Butterball? Sounds like good eatin'. But I digress... the thing that always freaked me out about this particular story was that the troll carried it's own head under it's arm. And the little things that look like sticks coming up out of the neck just make me queasy. Even now looking at them makes me feel slightly ill.

Hey Kids, Give Us Your Allowance for Monster Products

These masks don't look like the goriest masks I've ever seen, but they are only $2.98 each. Unfortunately in 1973 my allowance was about 25 cents, and I spent it immediately. So goodbye any chance of owning a monster mask. The one thing I'm curious about is what type of mask you got if you ordered the one called "The Goon."


Monster Studios is a fantastic name for a business. You just feel like they're so dedicated to the monster concept that they must have tons of cool monster items. I find their monster picture more disturbing than the monster masks shown above. But I am enthralled by the notion of the monster himself sending me my free monster gift. Then again, I'm a little nervous that the monster would then have my address and could show up in the middle of the night by the side of my bed.


Vampire blood....what kid didn't want their own tube of vampire blood? Well I'm guessing the only one would be that kid who always threatened to take his ball home if you didn't let him be the pitcher. Yes, every child wants a tube of succulent bloody goodness to play tricks on their parents and friends, as well as doctor up fake wounds or bloody bandages. Yet wouldn't the ad be more effective to show blood dripping vampire fangs rather than the mystery scribble with the red dot?