I typically shy away from doing R.I.P posts. I just really do not know what to say that will do justice to the person’s life. The net right now is inundated with obits and tributes to these two extraordinary people who passed away recently within about a week of one another. They both have had such a impact on a certain area of my life I felt the need to say a little something. No mini-bios or anything like that. Maybe another day. For now just let me express my sadness at their deaths, though both did live long and adventure filled lives of the type the rest of us mere mortals can only dream of.

When I started the Uranium Cafe I had in mind a sort of Famous Monsters of Filmland styles site. Sometimes I veered off and did some posts that pandered to things a little too perversely sexual or gory and in my mind I would think “would Forry do this type of thing for FMF?” I am not against that sort of things and so that is one reason I set up a new site that will focus on gore and more overt sexual themes, since it is not the direction I want the Cafe to go to forever. I always felt FMF was tasteful and well written with loads of editorial insights and humor. Forrest J. Ackerman was always polite in his assessments of films and actors. I can hardly recall him panning a film, even when a film deserved nothing more than to be blasted to bits he had favorable things to say. I once had volumes of FMF and spent my nights reading and rereading the articles and looking at the B/W pictures. When the magazine was revived later it was still a head above the competition. A hard working and kind man who is surely missed by many people who wished they could have shaken his hand.

I think like a lot of people I learned about Bettie Page through the art work of the late Dave Stevens. I was pulled into his painstakingly drawn pen and ink images and when I realized the Betty character was based on a real person I did some research (before i knew what the Internet even was) and soon became slightly obsessed with the woman. I also knew her from the painting by Olivia de Barardinis which used to be in the pages of Club magazine of all places. Of course I only looked at Club for “research” purposes. Luckily Bettie items were popular in Seattle where I lived for ten years and in little time I had a nice little collection of items that I often took out and went through. Sadly, all the things I once owned are long gone. And not to sound too philosophical or stoic, but the feelings and impressions I have inside will never be gone. She had a special charm and charisma. Even in her darker stuff she did for Irving Klaw she had that special gitl next door quality that was equally suited for a Playboy Playmate, which she was as well.

I think one task that blogs like this one and others have is to keep the memory of such great people alive and vibrant for future recorders and archivists. You can certainly expect to hear more about them in the future herea the Cafe. I just got in issues 1 to 10 of Famous Monsters of Filmland and am editing portions for a special post to Forry. I have a tribute to Bettie here already and you can search for it in the search box as I do not want to advertise my own blog in a remembrance post. They are tricky things for me and I hope I gave some due respect to two of my special influences in life. See you later Forry and Bettie.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 17th, 2008 at 2:17 am and is filed under Movie Makers, Actors, Artists, Musicians and Personas, Pin Up Girls-Cheese Cake-Femme Fatales . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.