KID'S STUFF

Record albums were an ideal baby-sitter in the 50s and 60s. They provided hours of listening pleasure for the tots, and blessed relief for the parents. Today, sadly, many of these vinyl artifacts have fallen victim to the many hours of love and abuse they received from their original owners. Answers to questions like "Will a record still play after I color it with my crayons?" have rendered the vinyl oftentimes unplayable. Still, even the album cover art can bring back many memories of Saturday mornings and sick days from school.
*sigh*

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Mister Ed
I think I read somewhere that the creator of this show had a dream about talking animals. He took this to be a message from God that he should produce a TV show about a talking horse. I know the show was a huge hit, but as a kid, it really irritated me. I was always annoyed that Wilbur would follow the advice of Mr Ed, though it led to trouble. I'd scream "Don't listen to him Wilbur" and my folks thought it was funny. To me it was like torture!!!
One cool thing on this record is a nifty little tune called "The Pretty Little Filly with a Pony Tail"

Astroboy
Astroboy was a TV show near and dear to my heart (If you don't believe me, visit my Astroboy webpage)
When my family first moved from Seattle, Wash to Greensboro, NC, my only companion was the television. Happily I discovered that my fave program, Astroboy, was shown on local TV. Years later when I saw some episodes as an adult, I was really impressed with the show's dreamlike quality. This record has the soundtrack of one complete episode, "The Three Magicians".

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click the image for a larger view Super Car
Mr Ed may have annoyed me, but Super Car always creeped out my younger brother, Ronald. The puppets with their bulging eyeballs were just too much for him. To this day he can't watch it without feeling queasy. I loved it, though. The British studio that made Super Car later made Fireball XL5 and Thunderbirds

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
Each birthday, me or my brothers could pick out a movie that the whole family would see. On my 6th, my choice was "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians". I wanted to see it because the comic book of the movie had a robot in it. Here's the record WITH the comic!! What more can one ask for? One thing worth mention is that the role of the young martian girl in the film was played by Pia Zadora.

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click the image for a larger view Flash Gordon
I don't know if the scan really does this record justice, but the cover is a beautiful illustration by Al WIlliamson. Al was one of the best cartoonists working for EC Comics (The publishers of Mad Magazine and Tales from the Crypt) in the 1950s. I've been told that he's so proud of the original illustration that it is framed and hanging in his living room.