Sunday, July 21st, 1974

I found out that AIRPORT 1975 is scheduled for October 18th opening at the Valley. EARTHQUAKE will be at the Carousel and THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN at the Times at Christmas! 100 new screens are to be put up around the area in the next 3 years including 6 at Erlanger!

I went with Terry to see 99 AND 44/100 PERCENT DEAD and M*A*S*H together. It was great. I had already seen the latter. I gave him another model and he gave me my remaining comics although it turned out I already had three of them.

Over at his house, he's got a great Raquel Welch poster on his wall. I also snuck a peek at his dad's PENTHOUSE. Wasn't much really but a good bargain with about 200 pages for $1.25. I pay that much for only 75 pages in some I buy! Boy!

I missed the stupid bus and had to walk. I crossed the road to the unopened new bridge and found 4th Street. When I came within sight of the 4th street bridge, though, my chest hurt so I caught another bus there at the stoplight to take me across. I'm glad I did.

That mag had at least 50 pics of naked women--completely naked! But I truthfully feel I'd rather see pics of Linda fully clothed than any 100 naked women. Linda is lovely in every possible way. Wow!

NOTES: In retrospect, the movie was a thoroughly forgettable, somewhat campy crime flick starring future Dumbledore Richard Harris, notable mainly for introducing him to the woman he soon afterwards married, Ann Turkel.


As far as PENTHOUSE, you'll note that I was impressed by the 200 or so pages and yet only 50 or so pics of naked women. 


Somewhere I have a photo of Terry's Raquel poster, literally snapped with my camera on one of these visits. 


At the time, he was living in Bellevue, KY. I was in Covington. You can see by the blue line how far that walk was. I started walking from Terry's house (B). I caught a bus in Newport just before the bridge to Covington, then got off just on the other side of the bridge and was half a block from home. Luckily bus fare was only a quarter back then.

Saturday, July 20th, 1974

New books weren't supposed to be out today but they were. Including SPIDEY & THE ELECTRIC COMPANY. I got one book with lots of stuff on Lovely Linda! Also I finally got that Donny and Marie album and the song COME SATURDAY MORNING. Hadn't heard that in years until yesterday. It was one of the ones Debbie and I had heard on the radio the night we babysat for her friend's baby. Oh, how this one reminds me of her.

I may go see a double feature tomorrow with Terry. Probably not, though.

Doug came up and I helped him try to start a scrapbook like mine. He stayed 'til after 10 but we didn't get too much done. Maybe he'll come back.

I saw an episode of STAR TREK that I had never seen before.

I got a new Wonder Bread card--Clark Kent.

Mom stayed up to watch MISS UNIVERSE.

NOTES: Seems so odd to see how COME SATURDAY MORNING reminds me of Debbie here. Not only doesn't it do so anymore but I can;t recall that it ever did. At this point, I knew it only from AM radio. A couple of years later, I would finally catch THE STERILE CUCKOO, the movie that it comes from. It's still a lovely song.


As long as Doug and I had been friends, another thing he simply never did was come over to the house. Nor did I go to his except during the school year when I'd walk the extra block past the school to his house and then walk back to the school with him. Seeing as how we really only lived about 4 1/2 blocks apart, that just seems strange to me now. 

Friday, July 19th, 1974

I got up to see I DREAM OF JEANNIE at 6:30AM like I also did on Tues and Thurs. There was a bad storm just after Mom left for work.

Doug called about school this evening.

I wrote a short story with 200 more titles in it! It was fun and I hope to do more like that.

Somebody took 2 of the 3 cans I put out last night and now today we're out of bags. I broke my work record though. Previously 35 minutes, it's now 27!

I finally saw SILENT RUNNING on TV.

Looked up Debbie's phone number. Maybe I'll call her on Monday.

NOTES: SILENT RUNNING was a not quite successful attempt at a serious sci-fi movie saved by a partly solo performance by the great Bruce Dern. 


I DREAM OF JEANNIE was, of course, the classic sixties sitcom with Barbara Eden and Larry Hagman. I'm definitely more a BEWITCHED guy myself but I've had my Jeannie periods, too!


And HEY! 15 year old me! That Debbie thing is over, dude! Ya'll were just kids! Move on! 

Thursday, July 18th, 1974

Terry decided to give me only some of the comics he owes me. I think I've talked him into giving me the rest but won't know until tomorrow. BOY!

Still been kissing the Linda poster and now the SEVENTEEN cover, too! So beautiful.

Nick Clooney cut off new episodes of TEMPERATURE'S RISING for the next seven weeks! Starting tonight! BOY!

We were late getting to work because some of those dumbSocial Security people stayed until 8:15! I didn't get back 'til after 9:30. That was okay, though, since there wasn't anything good on until 10.

NOTES: Nick Clooney, of course, is George's dad and literally a living legend of Cincinnati television. I've been privileged to meet and get to know this handsome, humble, talented man and his equally talented and absolutely lovely wife Nina quite a number of times in the years since. Have no idea what type of show he had at that point that was pre-empting one of my favorite sitcoms. 


Actually though, TEMPERATURE'S RISING was, at that point, called THE NEW TEMPERATURE'S RISING and was not the show it had been in Season 1. At the beginning of the 2nd season, they had taken a wonderful, silly sitcom spotlighting the great Cleavon Little with James Whitmore as straight man and trashed everything but the setting and Cleavon. Even then, though, they toned down his character significantly and put him opposite Paul Lynde. Now Lynde was nobody's straight man (pun intended) and even William Asher, who had used him with great success on BEWITCHED, had no clue on how to use him here. 


The series had actually been taken off in January and starting this night the network was running off the final 7 unaired episodes during the summer.

Wednesday, July 17th, 1974

I was very, very tired this morning. I drifted off into dreamland off and on for most of an hour after Mom left.

When Terry got off work, I went with him over the river. I got all the new mags plus an issue of FF I needed. Got a kung-fu mag plus a mag with a (bad) parody of my current favorite flick.

This morning I read through my Shang-Chi collection.

Later i learned that ABC was rerunning WONDER WOMAN and the previously-cut-off-by-dumb-old-channel-12 MEN OF THE DRAGON as a double feature. I hope they don't cut it off again!

Speaking of channel 12, I got channel 12 on the radio! Weird! I managed to hear HOGAN'S HEROES while I was at work tonight!

Terry bought my "men." All of 'em! For three bucks and five or six comics which I don't get 'til tomorrow anyway. Og, well. I didn't want 'em anymore anyway.

NOTES: My "men" would have been my action figures--Captain Action, Mike Hazard, Johnny West and the like. Comics I didn't outgrow but those I did. We had spent large parts of the preceding six years carting our "men" between houses and playing with them. As I understand it, Terry still has them in 2012!


MEN OF THE DRAGON was a made for TV martial arts movie that I don't really recall anymore at all. 


Shang-Chi, on the other hand, was the star of the single best-written Marvel comic from around this point 'til pretty much the end of the decade. Started out by Steve Englehart but Doug Moench made the book his own. I went on a radio talk show around 1980 and they asked me who I thought the best writer in comics was and I answered without hesitation, "Doug Moench." He's now a FB friend. 


Shang-Chi seems doubtful to be reprinted in its entirety as the character was the son of Fu Manchu, not only a licensed property to which Marvel no longer has any rights to but now a controversial example of political incorrectness toward Asians. Too bad. It really was great stuff when Moench made it essentially a James Bond martial arts epic movie on paper with the help of artists like Paul Gulacy, Mike Zeck and Gene Day.

Tuesday, July 16th, 1974

A very cool day. Well, not a VERY cool day but pretty cool.

I stirred up old memories on a trip I took from King Kwik to Horn's to Scroggins to Woolworth's. I walked up Bakewell past the house where we lived more than ten years ago now. It's still there and not very different. Didn't buy many books at any of the stops but the nostalgia was fun.

On the way, I also mailed Linda's letter. Hopefully that will provoke future memories.

Tried to work on my story but just couldn't get into it, not even to Simon and Garfunkel.  Oh, well.

When we went in to work, there were two people in there as well as two dogs tied up and waiting outside. I did about half my work, then asked Mom to do the other half after hers. Then I left so I didn't disturb them. Too bad really as I'm sure I would've beaten my 35 minute record.

I've decided definitely what I'm saving up for. To meet Linda. I asked her where in my letter and if she answers I can afford to go almost anywhere. If that doesn't work out, I may have to use it for school. Boy!

Mom told me this morning and, since, I've seen it on TV and in the papers. A Florida newswoman referred to the "blood and guts policy" of her TV station and then announced an "attempted suicide."She then pulled a gun from her handbag and aimed it at her head and fired. ON THE AIR! She died later. Apparently she was expecting only to critically wound herself but not fatally. The whole thing including a report of the incident was in the script she had written earlier.  Wow. What will happen next?

Saw a good TV movie starring Carrie Snodgress and another with a title I couldn't resist--LINDA.

I blew kisses at my Linda poster at least 50 times today. Now I know I'm crazy...about her!

NOTES: What is it about teenagers that so many are fascinated by suicide even if they'd never actually so it tehmselves. I know I was. This story really hit me. If I knew the story in more depth, I'd long since forgotten but I looked it up online. There's a long and detailed Wikipedia page on the reporter, one Christine Chubbuck, and seen here is a clipping from that time.


The house where I lived on Bakewell has long since become a parking lot as has the house where I lived on Fourth Street and the house where I lived on Greenup Street. The house where I lived in 1974 is still there, however, and looks exactly the same. David and I walked down by it while waiting for Rene at the Unemployment Office last week.


As far as wanting to travel to meet Linda, I have a hard time remembering a time when I actually HAD a savings, let enough one that could take me almost anywhere. But I did. As much as I was spending on comic books and movies, remember that they were all less expensive back then. I was getting money for working and still getting a sort of allowance, too, and I managed to save quite a bit. Held onto it until I bought my first VCR in 1980. Haven't really been able to save anything since, darn it!

Monday, July 15th, 1974

IT.

It rained hard early this afternoon. I spent all that time writing my new letter to Linda. Oh, it was wonderful. Just the writing while the rain poured! Going to mail it tomorrow. Have to write my pen-pal letter, too.

This summer may turn out great, yet!

I watched a movie on TV that was written by William Peter Blatty.

At the SS office, they threw out some old issues of THE WASHINGTON POST. Unfortunately the movie sections were missing.

NOTES: Been going through a writer's block lately but that's still how I feel about writing. I'd still rather do it than eat.


Blatty had a long career as a screenwriter and his old films were apparently being trotted out to cash in on his EXORCIST success that year.

Sunday, July 14th, 1974

Debbie's birthday. No card or anything from me this year. Oh, well. It's been almost 5 years since she moved.

Basically a bad day although I discovered that my crush on Linda is bigger than ever. I intend to write her again tomorrow.

I heard the Beatles Top 20 hits on WSAI tonight.

NOTES: WSAI AM had been the big Cincinnati Beatles station during the early days of Beatlemania and more or less carried that reputation with it for years afterwards. DJ Dusty Rhodes was their biggest booster but he was by that point on another station. Oddly enough, he's still around. Although he became a successful politician over the years, he has almost always maintained a presence on the air locally.  


Since my first ever Beatles record was the single of THE LONG AND WINDING ROAD in 1970--their very last release before the breakup--I spent most of the seventies trying to get hold of all their music--released and unreleased. By this point in 2012, I honestly think I've at least heard 90% of everything they ever did when someone had a tape recorder on. As McCartney once put it when asked his opinion of the heavily bootlegged material, there was a REASON they didn't release it. What they DID put out was the GOOD stuff.


As far as Debbie, it would be another couple of years (!) before I finally quit carrying the torch (after seeing her one last time. Check my 1976 Journal for that story). Would most likely have happened much sooner if I had ever had another girlfriend to replace her but that just never happened so I pined away from time to time when I wasn't busy fantasizing romantically about Linda Blair.


Come to think of it, today would be Debbie's birthday yet again. Wherever she is, I hope if she remembers me at all that she realizes I was just a poor, lovesick schoolboy. Happy birthday, Debbie.

Saturday, July 13th, 1974

Doug bought the Bruce Lee book and another one from me. Then we caught the bus for the long ride out to Tri-County and saw HERBIE RIDES AGAIN. I think it may be Stefanie's best movie!

At the Shopping Center, we saw a karate demonstration with the star of a new movie. Not much. Stopping at Fountain on the way back, I got the new SPEC with great stuff on Linda! Even a poster. I put it on my wall naturally.

We got back downtown about 8 and home by 8:30.

My LB scrapbook is getting overcrowded. I've decided to dedicate my next one (which I may need as early as next week) to her, also. I need to write her again, too.

Stayed up late to watch STAR TREK.

NOTES: Doug and I were best friends in 5th, 6th and 7th grades, simultaneous with Terry, but for some reason, he and I never went to movies together. In fact, I think this may have been the only one we saw together. We actually caught an early afternoon matinee but, as with before, the multiple buses made it an all-day trip. Especially since the buses had an abbreviated schedule on Sundays. Nowadays, if my son, now 15 as I was then, were to be gone for hours and hours and take multiple buses, I'd freak out all day!

Friday, July 12th, 1974

IT.

Saw Clint Eastwood on with Dinah Shore.

I got a letter from Dynapubs about FLASHBACK.

I made out a list of books to try to sell to someone. Not OBS.

I watched HERBIE DAY AT DISNEYLAND celebrating the Disney premiere of the new movie I hope to be seeing tomorrow. I hope to go with Doug but if not, maybe Terry.

I also watched Marlo's first special and William Friedkin's first film on TV.

NOTES: HERBIE DAY AT DISNEYLAND was shameless, blatant promotion but they really made  a big deal out of it. As you can see, it even had its own publicity stills!


EXORCIST director Friedkin's first theatrical feature as a director was GOOD TIMES, a surreal 1967 vehicle for Sonny and Cher. Not as bad as its reputation and, in a way, a preview of their style of humor as seen just a few years later on their hit variety series. 


FLASHBACK was a series of facsimile reprints of classic Golden Age comic books that featured full color covers and murky, black and white scans of the original color pages for the interiors. They weren't great but they were all we had at the time when it came to reading complete comics from the forties without paying a lot.

Thursday, July 11th, 1974

I got some new books including the long-awaited PLANET OF THE APES. I got one old book at OBS. They had very few, probably because Terry cleaned them out yesterday.

We went out to the Zoo today. I took my camera but I don't think I got any good shots.

I think I saw Jim Scott downtown this afternoon!

I didn't finish work 'til after 9 o'clock.

I'm thinking of starting a fan club for that girl at The Madison since she looks so much like Linda Blair!

It's too late for me to send Debbie a birthday card now. Guess that just shows that she really is completely out of my life now. I'm growing older.

NOTES: Jim Scott was my favorite DJ on WSAI AM. Had been since I first discovered radio in 1969. It's not that small of a town and I went through a period where I hung around with radio folks and yet it would be 34 years before i would casually run into Jim Scott again and that was at the Airport. I didn't say anything to him because someone else had recognized him and was monopolizing his time. I didn't want to ruin his moment.


Jim has weathered the changes in radio and still holds forth with a successful (if long unlistenable) show today in the Cincinnati market..

Wednesday, July 10th, 1974

The day after. It's still hard to believe. My stomach caused me to lose some sleep. I got up at about 4:30 in the morning.

Mom had to go to work for a few hours today.

I had to help George again and I'm getting tired of it.

The man came and fixed our window.

It rained all day and temperatures were up, ruining our plans to go to the Zoo. Probably tomorrow.

I think I'll have to write Linda again soon. Next week.

I've been drinking too many soft drinks again lately. I really am going to have to cut down.

Saturday is Debbie's birthday. I should send her a  card.

Terry called and said he got about $1.20 worth of old comics. Just called to brag I think. I've been involved in other things lately like movies and Linda but I hope I can get really involved in fandom and build a great collection.

NOTES: I never did get involved in comics fandom very much. My natural shyness, I suppose. Over time, I did make my mark though, winning the COMICS INTERVIEW 100 Trivia Quiz in 1991 and, with the coming of the Web, becoming acquainted with many of the folks who WERE actually heavily involved in fandom in the seventies. 


I wish I HAD cut back on Cokes. From time to time I did but not really. Never for very long. Today, alone, I believe I've had four. They've screwed up my weight, my teeth and other aspects of my health over the years. I should still cut back more but I've given up so much in recent years...Sigh...

Tuesday, July 9th, 1974

E-DAY! Mom and Dad did my work for me and Terry and I met his mother and off we went! We went into the theater and saw...THE EXORCIST. There was even a girl that resembled Linda working the concession stand!

The picture began. I was prepared to be scared some but...nothing. I'd sit through the picture a million times though to see the scenes of Linda before the possession! Oh, they were marvelous!

There were a LOT of people there! I doubt it'll make my number one spot for the year but it will definitely be in the Top Ten. Oh, I can't get over it! After six solid months of wanting it, I, Steven Paul Thompson, saw THE EXORCIST! At last!

I took a bath before I went and washed my hair like I was going to meet a girl. My girl! Linda!

The closest thing I got to a scare was a stomach ache from the Pepsi I drank.

On the way home, we ran into Doug's mother and sister.

The baby was here for another visit when I got home.

NOTES: I get a lot of praise for my honesty in posting this blog exactly as it happened but I have to say that nothing I've posted has embarrassed me...until this. Yeesh, I had it bad!

Monday, July 8th, 1974

Terry called early and said we'd surely get to see THE EXORCIST tonight. All the rest of the day I was joyful. Then at 5 when he was supposed to call and tell me what time he was picking me up, he called to say something had come up. I should have known.  Says now it'll probably be tomorrow. He'd better be right. I remain hopeful.

Mom gave me some strawberry incense that Phyllis had brought me last week. She'd forgotten about it. It was the first time I'd ever burned incense. At first, I couldn't smell a thing. Finally the smell came out after several hours. I got a headache.

NOTES: Well, what do you know? I skipped ahead and saw that it WAS Terry's mother who ended up taking us. In MY memory it was my own mother! But that's tomorrow's story...finally!


Apparently Phyllis presumed that all teenagers burned incense. It was a popular thing to do in the seventies, partially to disguise the smell of less legal items,  but I had never done it. If I recall correctly, since I had no incense burner, I stuck it in a Pepsi bottle! I did get it from time to time after that although never regularly.

Sunday, July 7th, 1974

Basically a bad day. We went out to Aunt Velma's and Aunt Rosie's but no one was home at either place. Coming back, we stopped at the Shopping Center where I got nothing but some candy.

I called Terry but the answer was no. From his Mom. A very definite no. I'm going to try to work something out even if I have to bluff my way in before the week's over.

I started collecting PEANUTS Sundays from THE ENQUIRER today.

NOTES: I collected PEANUTS Sundays and dailies for most of the rest of the decade. I still have three bound volumes of notebook pages with the strips taped in.

Saturday, July 6th, 1974

I didn't hear from terry today but I'm hoping to tomorrow. To see it!

I saw a good comedy movie with Sid Caesar and an old episode of OUTER LIMITS.

Picked up my last pictures and turned in a new batch for the drugstore to develop. I took those out of the patches. Next week, I hope we can go out to Aunt Velma's and I can show them around.

When their vacation is over, I'm going to finish and rewrite my story.

It's at this time of year that I miss Debbie most of all. I'd be at her house nearly every day and around her birthday I'd always go down to her house and leave a present at her door in a heart-shaped box. I always did. But not this year. Not for her or for anybody. Next year, either. Yeah, I'm crazy about Linda but I'll probably never hear from her (but I'm sure gonna keep tryin'!). If I can't get something going by January I may do my best to just quit trying.  I guess I don't really need a relationship. I just naturally want one. There should be a way to beat it, though, and if there is, I'll find it. In January. In the meantime, I'll try to make myself just forget the sexual aspect of the whole thing. I've never thought that way of any girl I've ever really known or liked anyway so I'll try not to think that of ANY girl to prevent it!

I'll probably go see HERBIE RIDES AGAIN out at the Princeton next week. Another long bus ride.

NOTES: Sid Caesar is, of course, one of the great early TV funny men but he never really starred in a  lot of movies and the ones he did weren't really very good. The one I saw today was most likely THE BUSY BODY, a 1967 comedy noted today mostly as the first film of Richard Pryor...who plays  a police detective yet!


Come January I was just going to "quit trying," eh? Hmmm...more like "quite HOPING." I really wasn't trying. Just hoping and moping. 

Friday, July 5th, 1974

Today I spent most of my afternoon in Cincinnati and I didn't get a thing except a 95 cent meal at McDonalds. Terry was there and says there's a good chance we'll see the movie this Sunday. I've heard that before but I'm hoping. I'm praying to finally see it!

IT.

I watched YELLOW SUBMARINE for the third time on TV tonight.

NOTES: By this point, I was pretty much just wanting to get seeing that #$$#!! movie over with! It didn't even occur to me that I had read so much about it that it couldn't possibly live up to its considerable hype by the time I finally got to it.


I generally credit 1968's YELLOW SUBMARINE as being the first movie I was allowed to see without my parents. I could be wrong but it was definitely one of the first. I enjoyed it so much that I insisted my parents come see it with me a week later! This was six years later when I saw it the third time. I got the DVD a few years back and have watched that who knows how many more times since.

Thursday, July 4th, 1974

I got up about 6 and listened to the radio then I went and read the newspaper. I went with Dad over to clean the office before 9.

Phyllis slept late.

Today is the 4th of July, America's 198th birthday. Seems a lot like any other day. Hope it's not like that in a couple of years.

We all went out to Kings Island and I think they, at least, had a grand time. My feet were so hurt when we got home I could hardly walk! I wore my white shoes. Mom got me a magic kit and a few souvenirs. It rained pretty badly this afternoon while we were there. We didn't have time for Lion Country Safari today. I got the first sunburn I've had in years on my arms. Tomorrow it's back to long-sleeved shirts.

Phyllis and Jim left about an hour after Midnight. I stayed up to watch Geraldo Rivera.

NOTES: This whole day feels like I'm reading about someone else. 


At the time, Geraldo was the hot, hip new face of journalism and he had a late night talk show called GOOD NIGHT AMERICA.

Wednesday, July 3rd, 1974

They left early and so arrived today. There are only two of them here--her and her husband. I'm sure glad of that.

I put 48 of my best pix into pages we got free with coupons.

The new Hammer Frankenstein movie hit the drive-ins today.

I haven't been able to get through to Terry all week. THE EXORCIST is still on, though. There's still time.

Because the SS people don't work tomorrow because of the holiday we didn't need to go over tonight.

Dad went to the doubleheader tonight. I stayed home and watched a Dick Van Dyke movie on TV.

NOTES: Looked up the kid that I was told Phyllis was trying to get us to take in. Looks like he has a long record of various minor issues going back about 30 years now. 


Here's the weirdest part. I do not for a second recall her husband being with her on that trip. In fact, as we hadn't been down South in a few years, I don't even recall meeting her husband.


I had developed a great fondness for Peter Cushing's films as Dr. Frankenstein from TV and was pleased to see they were still making them. It would be a few years before I would catch this one, though, when it, too, came to TV. The new monster of this film was played by an actor/stuntman named Dave Prowse. Later in the decade it would be Prowse inside the Darth Vader costume for much of STAR WARS. He would also be Christopher Reeve's personal trainer on SUPERMAN. About two decades later, my wife and I would meet him at a Con in Cincinnati.

Tuesday, July 2nd, 1974

I slept late again. We got our check in today.

Phyllis called again and said she was going to come and visit us. Boy! THIS could be terrible! Maybe not I guess. Hmmm...Maybe SHE could take me to see THE EXORCIST. She's got a lot of kids and she's sure to bring some. I hope not all!

I moved all my good stuff so they can't find it.

Had to help George again today.

I convinced Dad to take me to see THUNDERBOLT & LIGHTFOOT. It wasn't half as bad as Mom made it out to be.

I got DRACULA LIVES and TV GUIDE and found an old tape of The Carpenters that didn't work but does now!

Mom got a new vacuum but had to return it as something happened to it right away.

I have now seen 24 R-Rated films. Would love to make THE EXORCIST # 25. I doubt it will go off tomorrow.

IT.

NOTES: I wasn't privy to everything going on regarding my older cousin Phyllis from North Carolina but the gist of it seemed to be she was having some prescription drug-related issues and problems with her youngest kid or kids and was trying to convince my Mom to take her kids in the way my Mom had taken her in when she was a teenager. This, of course, would have been nightmarish to me. Luckily, there was apparently never any chance of it occurring. 


The top song of the day was ROCK THE BOAT by The Hues Corporation. Disco was rearing its ugly head.