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Topic: Help finding an issue - ’70s Archie comics? Post Reply | Post New Topic
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Shaun Barry
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 08 December 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 6828
Posted: 18 October 2020 at 5:44pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply


I'll try to make a long story short:

The Halloween season got me thinking about horror comics, and/or specific Halloween-centric issues of some of my favorite titles when I was a kid.  Started doing some random cover searches online, just for fun, when an old memory hit me...

Sometime in the late '70s, I recall going over to a friend-of-a-friend's house, who had a stack of comics of their own.  As was my nature back then, I was drawn to them like a moth to a flame, but one of their issues really made an impression:  It was a slightly older ARCHIE title of some kind, but the issue itself had some sort of supernatural bent to it.  Not sure if this was the only story in the issue, or perhaps 1 of 3, but it had something to do with Archie & the gang visiting some friends, but their neighborhood/countryside was haunted by ghosts of some kind, perhaps a teenaged girl...

I recall the gist of the story was that after doing some digging and mystery-solving, they realized the ghost(s) were either that of dead teenagers who had accidentally driven their car over a cliff; or maybe the girl had committed suicide by jumping from a cliff?  Or maybe there was a girl who was haunted by a spirit, and they saved her from jumping?  (Hard to say, my memory is understandably vague--this could have been in 1979!)  Either way, pretty spooky & somber stuff for an ARCHIE title, seemingly straightforward with no real humor or gags.

I've wondered about it for years, and can't seem to be able to track down where & when this appeared.  Could have been an early-/mid-'70s issue, or it could have even been late '60s.  Thought it might have been a mystery-centric ARCHIE title, but I can't seem to find any from that period, with an online search.

Maybe it was a Halloween-themed issue from one of their regular titles?  The problem of course is that there are so many to trudge through, I'm not sure where to start.  On the off-chance:  Are there any ARCHIE aficionados on the Forum who might have a clue what issue/title this story may have appeared in?  Thanks in advance!!


 


Edited by Shaun Barry on 18 October 2020 at 5:50pm
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Steve Coates
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 17 November 2014
Location: Canada
Posts: 733
Posted: 18 October 2020 at 7:16pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

Perhaps,
https://www.comics.org/issue/105707/#844705
https://www.comics.org/issue/225834/#1704791
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Tom Smart
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 06 July 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 2
Posted: 18 October 2020 at 11:39pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

It sounds like something that might have appeared in the Life With Archie title. Might it have been 'The Nightmare Nursery' story talked about in this blogspot: http://historiesofthingstocome.blogspot.com/2012/10/countdow n-to-halloween-3-comics-that.html
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Shaun Barry
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 08 December 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 6828
Posted: 19 October 2020 at 2:54pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply


Fantastic!!!  Thanks for the info, Steve, but it looks like Tom hit the bullseye... my memory over the years has of course made this story out to be even moodier than what's on the page (in terms of color, art & tone), but I'm 99% that's the one.  I'd forgotten about the teddy bear, and that the girl was Betty, but I knew there was a cliff in there somewhere!

Amusing to note that I wasn't the only one who was affected so deeply by the "Nightmare Nursery"... I could have easily been one of the readers the writer of the piece mentioned, if not the writer himself!

Thanks again, Tom... now I can finally add that one to my collection.  Odd to think that that was such a "holy grail" for me, for so long!





Edited by Shaun Barry on 19 October 2020 at 2:56pm
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