As promised, here is my second installment of issues of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine. I covered the basic history of the magazine in my original post, so I'm simply going to copy and paste it below to save myself some time. Directly below you will find the link to my original post, which contains issues 1-10, and issues 11-20 can be found at the bottom of this post.
Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 1-10 (1958-1961)
Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 1-10 (1958-1961)
Since the scans of horror comics/magazines "Creepy", "Eerie" and "Tales From The Crypt" proved to be much more popular than I ever anticipated that they would be, and many of you have been requested for me to share more, I thought I would share another popular horror magazine that made its debut in the 1950s. Several years before the first issues of "Creepy" and "Eerie" hit the stand, Warren Publishing found a hit on its hands in the form of "Famous Monsters of Filmland", which made it's debut in 1958. It was the first magazine to cater to the fans of horror films. The following scans come courtesy of the scanning duo of "Teachbug & Sprout." As with the previous scans of horror comics and magazines from the 1950s, some of these are reprints, while others original issues. I didn't go through and label each file to distinguish between the originals and the reprints, but it is easy to differentiate between the two based on the condition of the pages. I plan to post the first 30 issues of FM before the Nightmare Before Christmas event ends. I will make 3 posts, with each one containing 10 issues. Below you will find an excerpt from Wikipedia's very informative article on Famous Monsters of Filmland:
"Famous Monsters of Filmland is a genre-specific film magazine started in 1958 by publisher James Warren and editor Forrest J Ackerman. Famous Monsters of Filmland (which quickly became known to fans as simply FM was originally conceived as a one-shot publication by James Warren and editor Forrest J Ackerman (1916-2008), with no discernible future, published in the wake of the widespread success of the package of old horror movies syndicated to American television in 1957. But the first issue, published in February 1958, was so successful that it required a second printing to fulfill public demand. Its future as part of American culture was immediately obvious to both men. The success prompted spinoff magazines such as Spacemen, Famous Westerns of Filmland, Screen Thrills Illustrated, Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella.
FM offered brief articles, well-illustrated with publicity stills and graphic artwork, on horror movies from the silent era to the current date of publication, their stars and filmmakers. Warren and Ackerman decided to aim the text at late pre-adolescents and young teenagers.
In the pages of FM, Forrest J Ackerman promoted the memory of Lon Chaney, Sr., whose silent works were mostly beyond the accessibility of fans for most of the magazine's life, but were a great influence on his own childhood. He also introduced film fans to science fiction fandom through direct references, first-person experiences, and adoption of fandom terms and customs. The magazine regularly published photos from King Kong (1933), including one from the film's infamous "spider pit sequence", featured in Issue #108 (1974) which, until Ackerman discovered a photo of a spider in the cavern setting, had never been proven definitively to have actually been filmed.
FM's peak years were from its first issues through the late 1960s, when the disappearance of the older films from television and the decline of talent in the imaginative film industry left it with a dearth of subject matter acceptable to both editor and fan. Warren and Ackerman created a jump in issue numbering from issue 69, which was printed in September of 1970, to issue 80 in October of 1970. They did this (according to the editorial in issue 80) because it brought them closer to issue 100, justifying the numerical jump because of the publishing of ten issues of the short-lived companion magazine 'Monster World' as issues that 'would have been' Famous Monsters issues. During the '70s, the magazine came to rely heavily on reprints of articles from the '60s. In the early 1980s, the magazine folded after Warren became ill and unable to carry on as publisher, and Ackerman resigned as editor in the face of the increasing disorganization within the captainless Warren Publishing Company. The magazine stopped publication in 1983 after a run of 191 issues.
The magazine directly inspired the creation of many other similar publications in the ensuing years, including Castle of Frankenstein, Cinefantastique, Fangoria, The Monster Times, and Video Watchdog. In addition, hundreds, if not thousands, of FM-influenced horror, fantasy and science fiction movie-related fanzines have been produced, some of which have continued to publish for decades, such as Midnight Marquee and Little Shoppe of Horrors. - Wikipedia"
Download: Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 11-15 (1961-1962)
Download Size: 165MB
Download: Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 16-20 (1962)
Download Size: 139MB
"Famous Monsters of Filmland is a genre-specific film magazine started in 1958 by publisher James Warren and editor Forrest J Ackerman. Famous Monsters of Filmland (which quickly became known to fans as simply FM was originally conceived as a one-shot publication by James Warren and editor Forrest J Ackerman (1916-2008), with no discernible future, published in the wake of the widespread success of the package of old horror movies syndicated to American television in 1957. But the first issue, published in February 1958, was so successful that it required a second printing to fulfill public demand. Its future as part of American culture was immediately obvious to both men. The success prompted spinoff magazines such as Spacemen, Famous Westerns of Filmland, Screen Thrills Illustrated, Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella.
FM offered brief articles, well-illustrated with publicity stills and graphic artwork, on horror movies from the silent era to the current date of publication, their stars and filmmakers. Warren and Ackerman decided to aim the text at late pre-adolescents and young teenagers.
In the pages of FM, Forrest J Ackerman promoted the memory of Lon Chaney, Sr., whose silent works were mostly beyond the accessibility of fans for most of the magazine's life, but were a great influence on his own childhood. He also introduced film fans to science fiction fandom through direct references, first-person experiences, and adoption of fandom terms and customs. The magazine regularly published photos from King Kong (1933), including one from the film's infamous "spider pit sequence", featured in Issue #108 (1974) which, until Ackerman discovered a photo of a spider in the cavern setting, had never been proven definitively to have actually been filmed.
FM's peak years were from its first issues through the late 1960s, when the disappearance of the older films from television and the decline of talent in the imaginative film industry left it with a dearth of subject matter acceptable to both editor and fan. Warren and Ackerman created a jump in issue numbering from issue 69, which was printed in September of 1970, to issue 80 in October of 1970. They did this (according to the editorial in issue 80) because it brought them closer to issue 100, justifying the numerical jump because of the publishing of ten issues of the short-lived companion magazine 'Monster World' as issues that 'would have been' Famous Monsters issues. During the '70s, the magazine came to rely heavily on reprints of articles from the '60s. In the early 1980s, the magazine folded after Warren became ill and unable to carry on as publisher, and Ackerman resigned as editor in the face of the increasing disorganization within the captainless Warren Publishing Company. The magazine stopped publication in 1983 after a run of 191 issues.
The magazine directly inspired the creation of many other similar publications in the ensuing years, including Castle of Frankenstein, Cinefantastique, Fangoria, The Monster Times, and Video Watchdog. In addition, hundreds, if not thousands, of FM-influenced horror, fantasy and science fiction movie-related fanzines have been produced, some of which have continued to publish for decades, such as Midnight Marquee and Little Shoppe of Horrors. - Wikipedia"
Publisher: Warren Publishing
Schedule: Monthly
Publication Date: 1958-1983
Number of Issues: 191
E-book Format: .cbr & .cbz
Schedule: Monthly
Publication Date: 1958-1983
Number of Issues: 191
E-book Format: .cbr & .cbz
Download: Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 11-15 (1961-1962)
Download Size: 165MB
Download: Famous Monsters of Filmland - Issues 16-20 (1962)
Download Size: 139MB
Wow. Thanks for this. Feeling like a kid again.
ReplyDeletehad problems with issue 12--it looked like a flawed file and gave what looked like a partial selection of pages from issue 13.
ReplyDeleteyes, actually the supposed issue 12 is a flawed set of issue 13, a duplicate. could you repost 12? great stuff, FM was a wonderful magazine!
ReplyDelete