A BUCKET FULL O' SHOCK MONSTER

The Oriental Trading Company has been in business since 1932. The company's website provides their history:

Oriental Trading Company has one simple mission: to make life more fun. For individuals, nonprofits, churches and schools, our budget-friendly buys provide countless reasons to share smiles while making all of life's moments more special.

With more than 60,000 unique products, we're the nation's largest direct retailer of value-priced party supplies, toys and crafts as well as a leading provider of fundraising products. Whether you're a mom hosting a birthday bash that's a smash, a Sunday School teacher shopping for cool crafts or a business owner looking for unique rewards to recognize your team, we've got thousands upon thousands of ways to create good times galore.

Our history with fun is one that spans for the better part of the last century. Founded in 1932 in Omaha, Nebraska by Japanese American, Harry Watanabe, Oriental Trading was one of the nation's first wholesale providers of novelties and gifts. Harry's naming of the company reflected the geographic area and trading routes of the business. By the 1950's, we were a major supplier to the carnival trade and expanded immensely in the succeeding decades through catalogs, direct marketing and eventually the Internet. Our website launched in 1999, introducing us as an online retailer to an ever-growing number of customers.

Not surprising, they carry a full range of Halloween products, including this: the Shock Monster Halloween candy bucket from Trick or Treat Studios.

Product Description:

Enter the Chamber of Horrors to find classic characters that became Halloween icons decades ago! Our Shock Monster Candy Bucket is 9" tall and brings the Shock Monster to life in retro style. This candy pail features painted details and a flexible plastic handle making it perfect for trick or treating. Also great as a creative vase, or for holding chips or candy at your next Halloween party! Sculpted by Justin Mabry. TM & ©Trick Or Treat Studios.

Retail price: $19.99

SHOCK MONSTER!

Coming this May from Trick or Treat Studios is a nifty-looking Shock Monster action figure. It's got 20 -- count 'em 20 -- points of articulation and stands about as high as one of your Aurora monster models.

The Shock Monster, of course, was made legendary when it was designed by Keith Ward and released by Topstone way back in the 1950's. It was sold in scads of comics and monster magazines over the years with several different versions made during the time.

Pre-order from MONSTERS IN MOTION using the link from "Sites I Like" on the right sidebar of this page.

Chamber of Horrors Shock Monster 8 Inch Retro Style Figure:

Retail price: $39.99

We are proud to present the Chamber of Horrors - Shock Monster - Retro Style 8" Figure.

Our new line of retro figures are a must-have for collectors! Carefully designed to honor the vintage cloth figures of the 1970s, these updated versions feature dynamically articulated bodies, intricate sculptures, and detailed paint applications. With 20 points of articulation, they combine nostalgic charm with modern craftsmanship—perfect for display or play!

I dug deep into the vaults of the Mysterious Mansion and resurrected this video I posted in 2012 to YouTube of me wearing my brand new Don Post Shock Monster mask!

TOPSTONE TUESDAY: SHOCK MONSTER GIF

Don Glut's I WAS A TEENAGE MONSTER MOVIE MAKER DVD includes a clip of him in a Shock Monster mask.

[Image source: TUMBLR]

TOPSTONE TUESDAY: A SPECIAL MESSAGE FROM THE SHOCK MONSTER

TOPSTONE TUESDAY: SHOCK MONSTER!

The "Horror Monster" mask by Topstone that became "Shock Monster" is one of the indelible icons of the Monster Craze that swept America in the 1960's. It's hideous trademark visage, instantly recognizable by the mop of electrified hair, decayed skin, and popped-out eyeball, looks like someone got their head run over by a truck and was buried without the benefit of a mortician's craft and exhumed a few years later.

The Shock Monster mask gained its greatest notoriety from it's ubiquitous advertising in FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND magazine. Thousands of kids saw this and other spooky Halloween masks for sale all year long, and I'm sure hundreds, if not thousands, ordered them through FM's mail order department, Captain Company. 

Here are a few examples of the Shock Monster as it has evolved over the years. Images can be viewed all over the web, from sources such as eBay, TUMBLR, the Halloween Mask Association and the Universal Monster Army.

SHOCK MONSTER EEE! BOOK NOW ON SALE

Look what's bubbling over in the cauldron here at the Mysterious Mansion -- the MONSTER MAGAZINE WORLD 2011 BLOG BOOK!

Not quite a Year Book, and not exactly a Fear Book -- it's an EEE! BOOK -- and it's all yours for just 99 cents and a few mouse clicks. That's right -- a measly 99 cents!

So what do you get for your hard-earned almost-a-buck, you may ask? Just check out these features:

• Over 600 jam-packed monster-size pages!
• Comes with every Blog post from 2011, in chronological order!
• A vast storehouse of knowledge from some of the most brilliant minds and scholarly scholars in the known (and unknown) monsterverse!
• The complete and unedited text is accompanied by all the scans, photos and illustrations from the original post!
• Includes a Table of Contents with hyperlinks to each post title so you can easily search for and read any post without scrolling through screen after screen to find what you're looking for!
• All in a convenient downloadable PDF format to read on your computer, tablet, or any other device that can read PDF files, whenever you want!

I'm sure you're asking by now: Wow! How do I get my copy of the MONSTER MAGAZINE WORLD 2011 BLOG BOOK? It's really easy! All you have to do is follow these simple steps:

• Click on the "ORDER NOW" link shown below and open the email assistant.
• Simply type in "Blog Book" in the subject line and send.
• I'll email you back an electronic invoice that describes your payment options (PayPal or credit card).
• Please be patient, folks -- I'm doing this low-tech, so it may take a little while for me to manually process your request.
• After you send your payment, I will email you a link with easy instructions on how to download your EEE! BOOK from the file host. That's it!

ORDER NOW!

By purchasing this EEE! BOOK you are also donating to the coffins . . . er, coffers of the Mysterious Mansion so that more monster stuff can be purchased for review and to be shared with readers of MONSTER MAGAZINE WORLD just like you!

 

But wait! That's not all -- 10% of all proceeds go to help support the Transylvanian Tourist Board (they are still in need of a new horse to pull the tour wagon)! 

IMPORTANT! Always use the latest version of Adobe Reader when viewing PDF files.

Thanks for supporting MONSTER MAGAZINE WORLD!

SHOCK MONSTER!

"Never trim a mask while wearing it." - Don Post

Few icons from the "Ghoulden Age" of the 60's Monster Craze has transfixed a generation of Monster Kids like the ubiquitous image of the "Shock Monster". Designed and created by Keith Ward, a popular ad man and children's book illustrator of the day, the Topstone  company unleashed an entire line of affordable costume masks that found sales traction in the back pages of magazines like FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND, and were quickly propelled into legendary status. If you could spare the allowance money, here were one or two dollar items that could turn you into a ghoul, a vampire, a witch -- even a "Gooney", a "Battered Pug" (deep-fried dog?), a "Spasm", or how about a "Ubangi"? When they announced their "over the top" mask line -- man, did they ever mean it!



A Topstone catalogue page.


While the image itself (drawn by Ward for the Topstone catalogue) was indelible, the Shock Monster went by a few different names, like "Horor Zombie", or just plain "Horror", depending on which 'zine or catalogue was selling it. The name seemed to eventually settle into Shock Monster, and that's what we know it by today.

The Shock Monster mask has been resurrected by industrious garage and pro sculptors who either couldn't find an original to own, or just couldn't afford one to begin with. Some versions aim for authenticity while some amplify some of the more outrageous details that the mask is famous for.

THE MONSTER TIMES Vol. 1. No. 6 (April 1972).

In 2011, Don Post Studios released their own version of the Shock Monster mask. Now, for about 25 bucks, you can have one of the better versions of this Monster Craze legend. It's also made from a lot more durable material than the original so it can remain proudly displayed on a shelf for years to come.

The mask is up for a Rondo Award in the "Best Toy, Model or Collectible" category. As soon as I heard about it, I was on the Amazon website buying one. The results are shown here. But -- be forwarned -- and prepare yourself to be shocked!

The mask arrived with the obligatory care and safety tag. What bummed me out was the statement that it should be worn by adults only. Who are they kidding? And to anybody silly enough to try, they also warn against swimming with it!

MONSTER MAIL ORDER: BEFORE CAPTAIN COMPANY (PART 3)

In FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND #4, the now-regularly appearing MONSTER MAIL ORDER department expanded to include more full page spreads, as well as two quater page ads, all shipped from the Philadelphia address. The products varied from the usual rubber masks and bats fare to more "sophisticated" (and more expensive) items, such as instruction manuals on hypnosis and the ever-present "he-man" full page ad that promised to turn excess flab into hardened fighting muscle. One could also acquire such useful implements as a "Mad Doctor Hypodermic Needle" and a "U.S. Army Type Time Bomb". The selection of 3D comics also expanded from one to three.

But wait! That's not all! Now you could get your very own film projector through  MONSTER MAIL ORDER, GENERAL PROMOTION CO., or as the coupon said for these, just plain FAMOUS MONSTERS. The choice of Lon Chaney as THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA film was in 50 or 100 foot reels in either 8mm or 16mm stock. Initially, you could only buy an 8mm projector through the magazine. In any event, now it was possible to watch the famous unmasking scene that we had all viewed numerous times as stills in FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND whenever and however many times we wanted ... all for a measly 12 bucks ... for both projector and film!

Also of note, appearing for the first time in FAMOUS MONSTERS was a new rubber monster mask. But this wasn't just any ol' rubber monster mask -- it was the SHOCK MONSTER mask! Made by the legendary Topstone Rubber Toys Co. Inc. in Bethel, Connecticut, it was listed as the HORROR MONSTER in their catalogue, but Warren's soon-to-become CAPTAIN COMPANY, as usual, pulled out all the stops on the hype, and elevated it to future cult status as the SHOCK MONSTER!