Halloween is here! I’ll have one final 2026 Halloween post later today, but here’s a look at the Halloweenish Covers for Marvel’s Simon Garth Zombie in their 1970s series Tales of the Zombie.
TALES OF THE ZOMBIE Vol 1 #1 (July 1973)
Title: Altar of the Damned
Comment: The first Silver Age appearance of the Marvel Comics horror character Simon Garth, a brutal, merciless coffee plantation owner who was killed and brought back to life as a zombie by his Haitian workers.
Garth was not your typical mindless zombie wanting to feed on human beings all the time. His stories provided insight into the still-functioning mind of the man trapped in this horrific fate as he battled assorted supernatural menaces, some drawn from VooDoo lore, others created by Marvel.
Simon Garth could be used against his will at times by people in possession of the Amulet of Damballah which controlled him. Continue reading
Gaston Leroux’s The Bloody Automaton (1923) and The Machine to Kill (1924) were a lengthy serialized story later published as one novel. Many book sites list 1930s dates for these works, but that was just when they were finally translated into English. 
MARVEL SPOTLIGHT Vol 1 #5 (August 1972) 
CANON ALBERIC’S SCRAPBOOK – Written by Montague Rhodes James, and I’m shocked that I still encounter people today who are not familiar with him and his works. Anyway, that made me decide to examine his first supernatural horror story. 
The story features Dennistoun, a Cambridge Scholar who takes a vacation on the Continent so he can tour, photograph and sketch old cathedrals in France. Dennistoun bicycles to the town of St.-Bertrand-de-Comminges near Toulouse to cover its cathedral. 
AVENGERS Vol 1 #57 (Oct 1968) 
The Vision initially helps Ultron, but his logical android mind lets him reject his creator’s commands. He turns against Ultron, saves the Avengers and seemingly destroys Ultron, but obviously he’ll return as Ultron-6. 
ABSOLUTE EVIL (1918) – This longish short story was written by Julian Hawthorne, son of Nathaniel. The tale features Julian’s tragically overlooked supernatural adventuress Martha Klemm. 
MARVEL MYSTERY COMICS Vol 1 #28 (Feb 1942) 
SPIDER-MAN Vol 1 #68 (Jan 1969) 
That evening the students mount a protest about the way some of them are being thrown out of their housing to make room for the arriving archeologists. The Kingpin and his thugs take advantage of the protest as it rages out of control to break in and steal the priceless tablet.
PETER RUGG, THE MISSING MAN (1824) – This short story was written by author William Austin. A ghostly post-chaise horsedrawn carriage is often sighted and/or encountered up and down the East Coast. The carriage is pursued by a supernatural storm and is driven by a man named Peter Rugg with his daughter Jenny as his passenger. 
