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Science Fiction hosts on local TV

K

kenb

I remember in the late 1960's watching FRIGHT NIGHT with host BARNABY. It was on KHJ TV 9 in L.A. He would play the old science fiction movies. He would mock the story lines and make comments before the commercial spots ran. I know there was another "chic" with long hair and skimpy clothes that did same thing later on and was syndicated... In Las Vegas, we had Count Cool Rider. His show ended when the station he was on was sold. How about your area???
 
Boy, this looks to be a long thread here ... I would guess practically every TV market had something like that prior to the late 1970s or so. Get ready for the deluge, folks.
 
I'm old enough to remember the last local kiddie-show host in the San Francisco area- 'Captain Cosmic', on KTVU channel 2, circa 1978:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwMQt9LUP5I&feature=search
The show mainly ran reruns of badly-dubbed Japanese sci-fi, like 'Ultraman', 'Spectreman', and animated shows like 'Star Blazers', 'Captain Scarlet', and 'Thunderbirds' and other Gerry Anderson 'puppet' shows(from the UK)
The real identity of 'Captain Cosmic' was Bob Wilkins, longtime weatherman at channel 2, who also hosted 'Creature Features', a very successful late-night showcase for schlocky horror films. The above clip ends with a plug for his website, for anyone interested in a bit of local TV history.
 
In the mid-60's in Columbus, Georgia we had a daily afternoon horror movie with a monster host. The show was targeted to kids, but didn't seem to last very long. I guess they ran out of movies or got tired of showing the same ones over and over. Don't recall what the monster man called himself.
 
gregg75 said:
In the mid-60's in Columbus, Georgia we had a daily afternoon horror movie with a monster host. The show was targeted to kids, but didn't seem to last very long. I guess they ran out of movies or got tired of showing the same ones over and over. Don't recall what the monster man called himself.
Click to expand...

It was V man "Peace to the Universe. He was the late Jim Carlilse who was a jack of all trades at the station and late became host of live Columbus wrestling with Fred Ward.
 
Cleveland/Northeast Ohio

WJW-TV-8 (WJKW 1977-85)
Pete "Mad Daddy" Myers-1958 (Briefly)
Ernie "Ghoulardi" Anderson 1963-66 Became "The Voice" Of ABC
Hoolihan (Weatherman Bob Wells) and "Big Chuck" Schodowski 1966-79
Big Chuck and "Lil John" Rinaldi 1979-2007

(Dating from Ghoulardi-The longest continuous show run of its kind in the US-44 years)

WOIO-19
Frank and Drac (1980's)

WKBF/WCLQ-61 (different licenses)

The Ghoul (Ron Sweed) 1970-75, Early 1980's

WBNX-55
The Ghoul (Sweed) 1998-2004

WOAC-67-Canton
Cool Ghoul -1980's (Cavender-see below)
Son Of Ghoul (Kevin Scarpino) 1985-1996

WAOH-29
Son Of Ghoul (Scarpino) 1996-present

WJAN-17-Canton
Cool Ghoul (George Cavender) 1971-77  (Cincinnati's "Cool Ghoul" Dick Hoene, gave permission to Cavender to play Cool Ghoul In Canton)

WUAB-43
Count AluCard/Sir Graves Ghastly-(Lawson Deming) 1970-71
Superhost (Marty Sullivan (1969-89)
 
Beginning in the Summer of 1961, WCPO-TV, Channel 9, in Cincinnati featured "Shock Theatre" on Friday nights after the 11 P.M. news. However, the hosts of the movies - which were basically late 1930's and early 1940's wolfman-type of films - were The Bargain City Kid and Willie Thall who dressed as cowboy want-to-be's. They also did the commercials live for Rink's Bargain City stores. The duo would show the merchandise (such as clothing, glassware, etc.) that was selling that weekend for what were deemed as very low prices and then toss it right toward the camera. In beginning this late-night program that year, much publicity was done on the station and Frankenstein starring Boris Karloff was the featured film. At the first commercial break in the movie, the TV camera showed a large hand on a leg. The hand was shown to move up the leg until it stopped and scratched.
 
And Chicago still has Svengoolie! Initially started in 1970 on WFLD-32 (now FOX Chicago), the original Sven (Jerry Bishop) carried on until 1973. The show returned to WFLD in 1979, this time with the 'Son of Svengoolie' (Rich Koz) which carried on until 1986 when WFLD became a FOX affiliate.

Independent WCIU brought back Koz, this time as 'Svengoolie', in 1994 and it's been an institution ever since. Rich Koz (as Sven) still delivers the goods, introducing B-grade sci-fi and horror movies every Saturday night on WCIU. To give you an idea, this week's feature is Mothra....
 
aside from the obvious answer (Chilly Billy Cardille on Chiller Theater, WIIC-TV)
Pittsburgh had a guy calling himself Scorpio hosting Saturday Afternoon sci-fi
and horror movies on WPGH-53 in the late 70's.
 
Limp73 said:
Sammy Terry WTTV Bloomington/Indianapolis
Click to expand...

Before Sammy Terry, there was Selwin on WISH-TV. He hosted horror films, as well as some Tarzan-type movies in the late '50s and early '60s. Unfortunately, I was way too young to remember seeing him (or being allowed to!) at the time.
 
BRNout said:
And Chicago still has Svengoolie! Initially started in 1970 on WFLD-32 (now FOX Chicago), the original Sven (Jerry Bishop) carried on until 1973. The show returned to WFLD in 1979, this time with the 'Son of Svengoolie' (Rich Koz) which carried on until 1986 when WFLD became a FOX affiliate.

Independent WCIU brought back Koz, this time as 'Svengoolie', in 1994 and it's been an institution ever since. Rich Koz (as Sven) still delivers the goods, introducing B-grade sci-fi and horror movies every Saturday night on WCIU. To give you an idea, this week's feature is Mothra....
Click to expand...

Back in the late '50s, WBKB Chicago had Shock Theater, starring "Marvin" and his wife "Dear" (who never showed her face on-camera while in character), played by Channel 7 kid-show host Terry Bennett and his wife Joy, along with a studio band called The Deadbeats. A couple of old shows have surfaced and are on YouTube.

It was somewhat controversial due to the Bennetts' hosting both a kid show and a monster movie program - some people didn't like that. But that wasn't what killed it; the ABC network took back the time in 1959 so that they could show The Fight of the Week.

Also in Chicago, WGN-TV had Creature Features in the early-mid '70s, while WSNS-TV had the Monster Rally Movie, which IIRC, was on Sunday afternoons in the late '70s, before ON-TV took over most of the station's time. The Svengoolies had nothing to worry about in either case.
 
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