How Did You First Find Out About DS, Way Back When?

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Hey, gang,

I was attempting to remember when and how I first learned about Dark Shadows back in the glorious mid 1960s, and I believe  that I might have seen an article about the show in either a newspaper or magazine like "TV Guide" or "Time Magazine".  However, I do remember reading an article about Dark Shadows, and specifically Jonathan Frid's vampiric character of Barnabas Collins, in one of my favorite magazines as a "young and callow fellow," the one and only,  "Famous Monsters of Filmland"!

Yes, the late, great Forrest J. Ackerman, publisher and editor of "Famous Monsters of Filmland" was one of my heroes as a kid. I recall that my friends and I were huge fans of all of the great horror films of the 1930s and 1940s, featuring such cinematic giants as Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney, Jr. and John Caradine.  And, what better place to read about these great actors (and their memorable Universal Film Studio films) than in "Famous Monsters of Filmland" every month?

In addition to all of the Universal Film Studio horror stars, Mr. Ackerman published articles on some of the great British horror film stars, including Peter Cushing and Sir Christopher Lee (whom we all saw in the recent "Dark Shadows" film with Johnny Depp as Barnabas Collins). 

Of course, Mr. Ackerman published articles on all of the great sci-fi films of the 1950s and 1960s, including: "The Thing From Another World," "The Day The Earth Stood Still," and "Plan 9 from Outer Space" (just kidding!).     

I recall one time when Mr. Ackerman appeared with host Tom Snyder on
The Tomorrow Show," and Mr. Ackerman wore one of Bela Lugosi's capes (which the first, great "vampire" had given to Mr. Ackerman) and such film memorabilia as the actual alien "arm," which the sled dogs bit off in Howard Hawks' sci-fi thriller, "The Thing From Another World."

Anyway, after reading Mr. Ackerman's glowing article about "Dark Shadows," I just had to check the new television show out, and I now "blame" the late Mr. Ackerman for getting me hooked for life on the supernatural goings-on in the mythical fishing village of Collinsport, Maine.

Can you remember what first brought your attention to "Dark Shadows" back during the halcyon days of the 1960s?

Bob 

[Gothick]

Of course I remember.  It was our babysitter.  Her name was Judy and it was the last summer we had a babysitter, as far as I recall.  (Child supervision standards were a lot less highly regimented in the Sixties.)

She loved the show and regaled us with stories of Barnabas and Angelique. She even drew a chalk picture of Angelique on a small blackboard we had in our finished basement.  I still remember how fascinated I was by it even though the thought of her powers terrorized me.

The first episode I saw featured Professor Stokes and I was intrigued.  In the second episode, Cassandra was casting spells, poisoning Liz and finally exorcised by the ghost of Trask.  After that, it was utter addictive frenzy all the way.

Ah, the summer of '68...

G.

[Josette]

I was a junior in college.  I think it was during the Leviathan storyline.  Two of my friends were big fans.  One had watched since 1897 and the other from the beginning.  The one who had watched from the beginning also had the better memory, so she told both of us about the earlier parts and helped the other fill me in on 1897. 

At that time it wasn’t the regular station that was showing it in my home area, but an independent UHF station.  I don’t know if they had had it from the beginning or had only recently started to show it, but when I went back for summer vacation, I was able to keep watching it.  The next season ended up being the final season.

That fall the first movie came out.  Another girl was also a big fan, and I went home with her that weekend and we went to the movie.  She was just a “Dark Shadows” friend of ours.  We all watched it together and seemed to be good friends, but once the show ended, none of us ended up continuing the friendship with her!

[David]

channel hopping by accident in 1967, the episode where Barnabas terrified Julia in Collinwood a few days before 1795. I was 11 years old and it scared the hell out of me--hooked ever since.

[Bob_the_Bartender]

I recall that I started to watch DS right after Vicky returned from 1795.  At the time, I was under the false impression that DS was being taped out in Los Angeles.  However, I was surprised to find out shortly thereafter, that the show was actually being taped right across the Hudson River in NYC!

One of my great regrets is that I never made the trip over to the Big Apple to see the DS actors as they entered and departed from the DS studios in Manhattan with the rest of the kids out there on the street.  (Oh, to have met both the great Bob O'Connell and the equally great Anita Bolster would have been one of the highlights of my then-young life!)

Thankfully, we first had the many PBS stations across the country to catch those DS episodes which many of us had missed during DS' original run.  And, of course, the then-Sci-Fi Channel aired the complete series to the absolute delight of DS fans around the world!!!

And, today, if you don't want to shell out the couple of hundred bucks it costs to buy the entire series on dvd, you can request the DS dvds at many public libraries across the USA.  (Somehow, I think someone as "slightly" parsimonious as Judith Collins-Trask would have approved mightily of that particular way of getting to watch DS for absolutely NOTHING!!!)

[MagnusTrask]

Judith would have been so pleased, she's have gotten Edward up in the middle of the night to watch...

I envy all of you for your distinct childhood memories.  It's all a blur to me, except my witnessing the 1970 destruction of Collinwoiod and seeing the tarp come down from the rafters and dump debris... and the final moments, last episode.

[DarkLady]

A lot of my high school classmates watched the show when it first aired, but at the time I was much too busy with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, etc. Many years later, a coworker-friend talked about how much she had enjoyed the show, so when it came on our local public TV station, I started watching. They showed only the episodes from the arrival of Barnabas to the one where Quentin snuffs out Laura's little smudge pot in the garden--i.e., in the middle of 1897--and I was so frustrated when they stopped! But then the old SciFi channel showed the whole series twice in a row, I think, and I was hooked!

[dom]

My sister's girlfriends were watching it in the living room and I happened by. My earliest memory is a shot of Laura's eyes filling the screen - you know, when she's looking into the fireplace. My next chance viewing was the episode when Vicki is trying to save David from burning with Laura at the fishing shack. I was 9 and couldn't look away, I'd never seen anything so dramatic. I do remember one flash of the werewolf Chris Jennings and being somewhat frightened. My final chance encounter came during a weekend stay at a babysitter's house - my father farmed me out to a coworker for the weekend. Her daughter was an avid fan and she asked/told me about the show. I knew of it but wasn't watching, but she put the bug in my ear and I started watching regularly, during the Petofi period. I was all gung ho from that point on - daily viewing, the teen mags, the MR books, games, post cards, etc. Stayed loyal into 1840 but dropped it at some point. When the show ended I hadn't a clue of who anyone was.

[MagnusTrask]

My sister's girlfriends were watching it in the living room and I happened by. 

...my father farmed me out to a coworker for the weekend.

Stayed loyal into 1840 but dropped it at some point. When the show ended I hadn't a clue of who anyone was.

My sister brought me into it, in the early Barnabas days.  She's said that the scariest thing that ever happened pre-Barnabas was someone putting a pen down on a table, and then finding it was gone... in 2011 I finally saw 1966 through Laura, and like it a lot.

Good line about your having been "farmed out"... I drifted away too toward the end, also because I had no idea who anyone was or why I was supposed to care about them.

DL, sounds as if your cut off point in 1897 is the same point where my viewing began for years... my tapes stopped just as Barnabas was about to trurn vampire, then started again with Laura's "smudge pot"... I still don't have the twelve or so ep's just before that.

[BangsnFangs]

I came across the show completely by chance at a local pop culture expo here in New Zealand.  Madman, an Australian DVD retailer better known for releasing animes, had a copy of DVD Collections 1 and 2 compiled into one volume.  I was at that point completely unaware of the Burton film that was released a mere few months later, or indeed the original series.  I picked it up completely on a whim for $20; the campy cover art must have attracted me to it.  That was on April 14th, 2012; the same date as Jonathan Frid's passing.

Over two years on I'm a certified DS tragic.  Buying the coffin box set effectively cleared out my savings (the cost of shipping and getting it through customs was unbelievable), but it was all worth it.  I polished off the series earlier this year, and invited some friends around to celebrate the event.  (But they were, understandably, totally and utterly confused by 1841PT: "Hey, isn't that guy supposed to be Barnabas?",  "Who's that Bramwell guy?", "What's the point of this storyline?".  However, I'm sure many seasoned fans ask the last question as well.)

Definitely keen to give the series another viewing, but with exams looming around the corner, unfortunately I have a lot of studying to get through before I can do so.   

[Uncle Roger]

I remember the commercials promoting the premiere of the show. Something like this: Two women have already fallen to their deaths from Widow's Hill. Legend says a third will fall. Fade out on a very pensive Alexandra Moltke. It was summer. I was thirteen. And more interested in playing outside.

I sampled the show just before 1795 began when I was home with some extended illness. I enjoyed it, especially the character that I thought was named Margie Evans. But it didn't hook me. When I recovered from whatever illness I had, I simply went back to my routine.

Things changed in 1968. I had outgrown the local kid TV shows and was looking for something different. I certainly found it. It was towards the end of the dream curse and there was a lot going on. It was the characters that initially engaged me, not the supernatural stuff.

Once hooked, I stayed hooked. The story became more and more complicated and sometimes quite frustrating. But I stayed until the end. I didn't mind the 1841pt story. It was kind of nice to have a story that didn't rely on so much back story. But I felt somewhat cheated. If the show was going to go off the air, I would have loved to have spent those last few weeks with the characters that I truly cared about.

[Josette]

BangsnFangs, how nice to learn of someone just discovering the series, especially independently of the movie, and all the way in New Zealand!!  Enjoy your second viewing when you get to it.

[MagnusTrask]

Yes b&f, very glad to hear that story, and yours, Uncle Roger.  The only thing I can add about myself is that I do have a flash of memory of running home from school to catch DS, especially necessary when we moved to Central Time...

[Uncle Roger]

I never had to run home from school to watch DS. School was let out at 2:30pm, which gave me plenty of time to get home. It was even easier in 1970/71 when we went on half days and I was home by 1pm.