Thrills and Chills Issue #4

(Click on any images to view monster-size.)

Well, the month-long celebration of Halloween, the Monster Kid national holiday, is underway. It's a lot of fun this year as various blogs take part in the Halloween Countdown, and I'm happy to be a part of it. Today we look back at Issue #4 of the Scholastic kid's magazine "Thrills and Chills," published in 1994. (We looked at Issue #2 in a recent posting.) The awesome cover is a great rendition of an inspired idea. We horror fans would certainly flock to see such a sightseeing thrill!

Each issue had movie recommendations for the month of October, and the spotlight some classics each time. I saw "The Deadly Mantis" when about 11 years old in 1969 on the Saturday afternoon "Creature Feature" which I watched each week faithfully. I saw a lot of the classics there for the first time.

On the back of each issue was a creepily illustrated epitaph from a real headstone... although I'm sure only the epitaph was accurate and that the tombstone didn't resemble the one drawn.

As a bonus today, we look at a fun book that took the "Where's Waldo?" concept and applied it to Halloween. I bought this in 1992, and the densely-packed book entertained me and my then-young daughter for hours on end, as we picked out items in the scenes for the other to find. Try it yourself with the sample page! You could get lost in that cemetery...

And just in case this seems a trifle juvenile to you, for the grown-up kids out there, here is an ad from around 1985 for Elvira's new videos... it makes the "look and find" game more fun and even easier!