DARK SHADOWS FORUMS
General Discussions => Current Talk Archive => Current Talk '25 I => Current Talk '11 I => Topic started by: Mysterious Benefactor on January 10, 2011, 05:23:22 AM
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This blogger (http://templeofdemogorgon.blogspot.com/2011/01/wotc-i-do-not-wish-you-well.html) reminisces about his school days and being part of a "secret society" that watched ST and DS reruns:
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Yeah, and Night Stalker too!
Fun little article.
G.
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contemporaries of mine often remember DS from it's syndicated runs in the 1970's but i actually have absolutely no childhood recollections of it. perhaps it was not syndicated in the new england area where i grew up.
it's sci-fi channel runs in the late 1990's were my first exposure to it.
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I'm thinking that the only station in New England that ran DS in the '70s was Boston's Channel 56 - and of course, its signal wouldn't have carried to all of New England - and they only showed it for a year, starting in April of '76.
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Channel 9 out of Vermont ran it from approx. the fall of '77-78. Although well out of even our fringe reception area, their listings were in our TV Guide (Newport RI). One weekend when my parents were away, I tried to rig my father's TV with various makeshift antennae made from various pieces of wire and foil. The best I could do was rein in a very snowy picture of the episode in which Joshua confronts Barnabas in the Old House. I recorded the almost totally garbled soundtrack on cassette. That episode aired on August 28th 1978. Jeffrey Aresenault, who I blieve hailed from Cumberland RI (he was based somewhere in RI), wrote about seeing the first year of syndication again, on this channel after having watched it out of Boston. WLVI TV 56 had indeed carried it from the spring of '77-78. From my best recollection, it probably premiered in early April and of course went off in April of the next year. WLVI cancelled it partway through the run, but relented and finished the syndication package. It ran without a gap; the calls started when TV Guide announced that it would be replaced by the "Best of Groucho". Soon after it went off, the Providence Journal's TV insert carried a piece that stated that DS had a small but "vocal minority" and that it never got above a 1 in the ratings for 11:00 PM. They also reported that World Vision had pulled the program from its syndicatoin offerings. I think that Channel 9 was the last US station to offer the show in the '70s . Can anyone confirm this?
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I need to point out some things I may have remembered inaccaurately about the syndicataion of DS in New England. I just looked up stations in Vermont and cannot find a Channel 9. It is possible that I identified the wrong state. I'm quite confident I got the numerical designation, 9 correct, but wouldn't bet much on it. Those are details that I could have wrong. The dates are correct. I still have the tape, why I don't know!!!! Also, I tell those newer fans who Jeff Aresnault is. He edited and wrote much of The Collinsport Call, a fanzine that was my introduction to DS fandom. Jeff moved from RI to NY. I lost track of him soon after I finally met him at the Manhattan Shadows convention.
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Somewhere around 1982-83, WMTW out of Poland Spring, Maine ran at least the first year of syndication. I couldn't get decent reception way up in Bangor, but I taped the audio track to several episodes, including the sequence when Barnabas catches David coming out of the mausoleum.
Petofi
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DS definitely began its run in Boston in April of '76 - and the reason why I'm certain of that is not only because I watched it, but because I have a full page ad from Weekly Variety that Worldvision placed about it just starting its run in Boston, and it's dated Wednesday, April 14, 1976.
Wow - I'd forgotten all about the Providence Journal's article - though I probably have it around here somewhere.
And you're right about Channel 9 - I'd forgotten about that, too. Channel 9 (WMUR-TV) was out of Manchester, NH, and even on a good day I was barely able to bring it in. DS was on Monday through Friday at 4:30pm (at least according to the TV Guides I just checked.) (Yes, I still have TV Guides from back then. [snow_cheesy]).
And I went to high school with a Jeff Arsenault who lived in RI and who was active in fandom. Could that be who you're referring to? Wow, I haven't been in touch with him in years and years and years. But I remember how I found out he was a DS fan like it was yesterday: we had gym class together, and one day I saw a copy of Barnabas, Quentin and the Frightened Bride on the top of his books as they were sitting on a bench in the locker room. [snow_laugh]
After the Channel 56 run ended, I didn't get to see DS in syndication again until I discovered in '85 that WCVX- TV58 from Vineyard Haven/Hyannis, MA had begun running it. In fact, that discovery was the very reason I bought my first VCR. [snow_wink]
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The only thing I can reminisce about with the original is listening to the album at my grandmothers. I was ten years old and the music and back cover creeped me out so much. I loved it but knew nothing about how to find DS. Then it wasn't on home video and I know that it wasn't carried anywhere in my town. It took us years to get SCI FI or SY FY...whatever they call it now. I remember when Sci Fi was cool and played The Bionic Woman, Six Million Dollar Man, DS, etc. Oh sorry for getting off topic. Thankfully I found that album because that is what lead me to DS 1991 and to the original show and to fandom and to this wonderful board! [snow_wink]
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we totally got channel 56 where i grew up. spent many a saturday afternoon with "creature double feature". wasn't "dale dorman" the continuity announcer.
somehow DS escaped me.
it's funny trying to explain to anyone under 35 what the pre-cable world looked like: the three major networks. a regional PBS station for sesame street and upstairs,downstairs. and a few crappy local/regional "UHF" stations that aired bowling tournaments, old movies and old television shows like DS. [snow_huh]
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Some people couldn't even get all three major networks. Back then I had family in CT who lived so deep in some valley that they could only bring in two out of three - and their ABC affiliate was actually a UHF station rather than a VHF like most. Though for the most part New Englanders were luckier than most because the states are smaller so we often had the luxury of choosing major network affiliates from the neighboring states if the signals from our own states were too far away/weak. I have no idea how people in other parts of the country where the states are so huge managed to cope...
OT but: Ah, Upstairs, Downstairs - do you know that PBS is producing a sequel - and Jean Marsh will be appearing in it as Rose?! [cheers]
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I remember those days; however, I am 33 so I am pretty close to 35. We lived in the sticks so we got everything late. That is why my Dad finally bought one of those GIANTIC Satellite's so we would actually be able to have some good channels.
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Somewhere around 1982-83, WMTW out of Poland Spring, Maine ran at least the first year of syndication.
Petofi
DS was reportedly removed from syndication some time soon after WLVI TV 56 ended its run in '77. There was a piece in either the Providence Journal, or the Boston Globe, or Herald or whatever that stated that. In spite of that claim. WMUR ran it in '77-78. I assume they ordered it before the deadline. In '82 or it might have been '83 WNBC relaunched a DS into syndication, although World Vision was claiming it was part of the same run that had ended some 5 years earlier, so they wouldn't have to pay more residuals. They offered it only to stations in markets where it had not already run or was it only excluding stations that had not run it??? I know that after WNBC ended, another NY station picked it up years later and they were compelled to tart where WNBC had left off, even though years had passed!!
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we totally got channel 56 where i grew up. spent many a saturday afternoon with "creature double feature". wasn't "dale dorman" the continuity announcer.
somehow DS escaped me.
YES!!! TV 56 had that guy acting very kid friendly, enticing them to watch The Flintstones, Batman, and whatever else was on during the after school hours. I remember the on air announcement he made about Star Trek. It had been off for a few days and he alluded to them being on "summer vacation". I presume the station had been deluged with calls!! I spent that summer reading a Blish adaption every day to fill the gap!
It's not surprising that DS escapetd your notice; it was on at 11:00 PM. I had a friend who had parents who let him go to bed whenever he wanted to; he's the one who told me it was on. Otherwise I doubt that I'd ever have noticed it. He also lent me a Ross novel, which got me interested in DS in the first place.
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In '82 or it might have been '83 WNBC relaunched a DS into syndication
It was '82. In the summer of '82 Soap Opera Digest even did a series of articles about DS - one focusing on a party that was held at Manhattan's Magique disco with Frid in attendance.
another NY station picked it up years later and they were compelled to tart where WNBC had left off, even though years had passed!!
I don't know about the part about being compelled to pick up where WNBC had left off, but you're probably thinking of PBS station WNYC. On rare occasions I could actually pull that in and would check to see what was going on. Even though at the time I was still taping DS on WCVX, and WNYC was behind where WCVX was storylinewise, it was still fun to watch the earlier eps on TV knowing that other fans were doing the same at the same time, as opposed to me watching eps on tape hours after they'd aired. [wink2]
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And I went to high school with a Jeff Arsenault who lived in RI and who was active in fandom. Could that be who you're referring to?
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I am almost certain he's the same person. His fanzine, "The Collinsport Call" lists his address as Cumberland Hills RI. Although I lived in Newport for 23 years, grew up there, I'd never heard of that town. Is Cumberland short for Cumberland Hills or are they two different places?
According Issue Two WLVI 56 ran DS from April 5 '77-April 1 '78. WMUR 9 NH ran it from Sept 19 '78. Issues 7-9 do not note an end date in the editorials. Rerun episode 234 was audiotaped by me on Monday Aug 28th. It should have been shown on a Thursday (all ep. #s ending with a 4 or a 9 would run on Thursday if there were no preemptions). Projecting forward from that date, it should have aired on August 11th, if my calculations are correct. I'm not rechecking. I'm procrastinating enough as it is! I have a ton of work I am SUPPOSED to be doing! If one assumes they would probably have ended their run on Sept 15th (the date they would have run out of episodes if they showed them Mon-Fri every week with no gaps), they would have ended on the gallows with rerun 248. It's possible they ran them all, but it seems unlikely. Most stations make programming changes in early to mid Sept. With no more episodes coming, I think they would have started something new in that timeslot at some point on or after Labor Day. I doubt they'd have cared at all about leaving viewers hanging, as Vicky was at the end of 1795.
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I don't know about the part about being compelled to pick up where WNBC had left off, but you're probably thinking of PBS station WNYC.
It was a PBS station, I believe it was channel 30. The part about being compelled is supported by a tape I have of a DS Special and an introductory piece that recaps the events leading from Barnabas being released from the coffin to the point where WNBC left off. I think Frid narrated it, but it could have been the annoying woman from the special that kept calling the house CollinSwood.
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Is Cumberland short for Cumberland Hills or are they two different places?
Cumberland Hill is just a specific area of Cumberland, RI that's treated separately purely for census statistics purposes, but they're one and the same town.
According Issue Two WLVI 56 ran DS from April 5 '77-April 1 '78. WMUR 9 NH ran it from Sept 19 '78.
Apparently his mind played tricks on him because he's a year off on both. But then mind tricks happen to all of us. [lghy]
but it could have been the annoying woman from the special that kept calling the house CollinSwood.
Don't you love when they do that. Though I don't find it as bad as the time one of the hosts of CNN's Showbiz Today pronounced Anglique as Angelic. [snow_rolleyes]
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According Issue Two WLVI 56 ran DS from April 5 '77-April 1 '78. WMUR 9 NH ran it from Sept 19 '78.
Apparently his mind played tricks on him because he's a year off on both. But then mind tricks happen to all of us..
Actually, no, he got the dates right, which would be expected, since his zine was publishing this information as current news. I wrote them wrong here. I started my post and probably had the correct years, then a glitch occured and I lost the whole thing. In a rush, I tried to recompose it and got the years wrong.
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[whew] That restores my faith in him. ;) And quite possibly you could have been thinking the correct years but your fingers, with a mind of their own, typed the wrong years. Trust me, it happens - more times than I care to remember. [lghy]
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This either proves I have NO LIFE, that I dread working so much that I'll jump on any excuse to avoid the stack of work I brought home, or both! In any event. I just made a spread sheet that tells me when rerun ep 234 SHOULD have aired on WMUR Manchester. Don't ask why I care, I have no other answer than to say that I am obsessed. If anyone but me cares, it's Aug 10 1978. It actually aired on Aug 28 of that year. It was scheduled to go off on Sep 15th, but projecting forward from the 28th, they'd have left off with Vickie literally hanging. I think it's likely though, that they probably yanked the show on the first of September, the Friday before Labor Day. As a kid, I think I recall that being the day they premiered some of the new syndicated shows. That was not the case in the previous year with DS though, as Arsenault recorded in his zine it started on the 19th. Ok..I have no life, I admit that freely........
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Yep, MB, I also used to watch DS on channel 58 Vineyard Haven/Hyannis and used to tape the episodes. I remember at one point during the Quentin's Ghost storyline there was a threat of cancellation because Channel 58 was running promos urging people to write in to save Dark Shadows. They showed images of Quentin and Ezra Braithewaite while the voiceover announcer asked "What is Quentin's secret? And who is this man?" I think I might even still have the commercial on tape somewhere. I got a petition going and managed to get a few hundred signatures on there!
Anyway, I'm very glad they didn't cancel it! Channel 58 played the series all the way into 1970 Parallel Time - the end of the available syndicated episodes.
~Penny~
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I was never able to pick up DS on the Martha's Vineyard station. Oddly enough, I would, on occasion get it from New Jersey Network! NJN stations were 200 or so miles away, but on very cool summer days or very warm winter days, I'd be able to pull the signal in, often with a very good picture quality. One time I was watching Doctor Who and was preparing to call WGBH Channel 2 out of Boston. I was upset because they were showing the wrong episode of Doctor Who. The call letters for the station came up. Channel 2 out of FLORIDA had overpowered the Boston station! I should note that WGBH was a fringe station for us. It was snowy and fraught with ghosts. Still, that was a very bizarre day, one of those excetionally cool days we sometimes got in August.
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When I reminisce about watching DS I think about getting the 1840 flashback, which at the time seemed so foreign! I love the episodes they meshed together and I can quote a lot of lines from it. I had of course read about 1840 but this was before it was released completely. So that is one of my main memories. My first memory of the original was the episode where Barney kills Jason which I found to be so very creepy in all it's black and white glory!
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ds also ran around 1981 in atlantic city, nj at a tv station i worked at called wwac tv53. we were the last to air the 1st 2inch syndicated tapes that worldvision created. this included the famous outake with grayson hall and jerry lacy where the director yelled "cut' and grayson asks "why?" and cameras start panning all over the place. this is included in the mpi blooper dvd and the vhs tape because i recorded and saved it and gave it to jim pierson. it was later corrected and removed when wnyc in nyc aired it. wwac was the 1st station to go beyond the 1st 260 syndicated episodes. we showed about 300 episodes ending in the middle of the dream curse storyline. we probly would have shown the whole series but alas it wasnt meant to be. the station had financial problems and went off the air leaving atlantic city with no more ds and me with no job!
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Does anyone know the story behind Lara's footage playing the twins? Why was this saved? Was it on the episode reel?