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by admin on Mar.15, 2009, under By Kris Straub
NetNostalgia Forum - Television (local)
Skyshale033
Subject: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Does anyone remember this kid’s show? It was called Candle Cove and I must have been 6 or 7. I never found reference to it anywhere so I think it was on a local station around 1971 or 1972. I lived in Ironton at the time. I don’t remember which station, but I do remember it was on at a weird time, like 4:00 PM.
mike_painter65
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
it seems really familiar to me…..i grew up outside of ashland and was 9 yrs old in 72. candle cove…was it about pirates? i remember a pirate marionete at the mouth of a cave talking to a little girl
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
YES! Okay I’m not crazy! I remember Pirate Percy. I was always kind of scared of him. He looked like he was built from parts of other dolls, real low-budget. His head was an old porcelain baby doll, looked like an antique that didn’t belong on the body. I don’t remember what station this was! I don’t think it was WTSF though.
Jaren_2005
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Sorry to ressurect this old thread but I know exactly what show you mean, Skyshale. I think Candle Cove ran for only a couple months in ‘71, not ‘72. I was 12 and I watched it a few times with my brother. It was channel 58, whatever station that was. My mom would let me switch to it after the news. Let me see what I remember.
It took place in Candle cove, and it was about a little girl who imagined herself to be friends with pirates. The pirate ship was called the Laughingstock, and Pirate Percy wasn’t a very good pirate because he got scared too easily. And there was calliope music constantly playing. Don’t remember the girl’s name. Janice or Jade or something. Think it was Janice.
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Thank you Jaren!!! Memories flooded back when you mentioned the Laughingstock and channel 58. I remember the bow of the ship was a wooden smiling face, with the lower jaw submerged. It looked like it was swallowing the sea and it had that awful Ed Wynn voice and laugh. I especially remember how jarring it was when they switched from the wooden/plastic model, to the foam puppet version of the head that talked.
mike_painter65
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
ha ha i remember now too. [IMG]ichorfalls.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_wink.gif[/IMG] do you remember this part skyshale: “you have…to go…INSIDE.”
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Ugh mike, I got a chill reading that. Yes I remember. That’s what the ship always told Percy when there was a spooky place he had to go in, like a cave or a dark room where the treasure was. And the camera would push in on Laughingstock’s face with each pause. YOU HAVE… TO GO… INSIDE. With his two eyes askew and that flopping foam jaw and the fishing line that opened and closed it. Ugh. It just looked so cheap and awful.
You guys remember the villain? He had a face that was just a handlebar mustache above really tall, narrow teeth.
kevin_hart
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
i honestly, honestly thought the villain was pirate percy. i was about 5 when this show was on. nightmare fuel.
Jaren_2005
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
That wasn’t the villain, the puppet with the mustache. That was the villain’s sidekick, Horace Horrible. He had a monocle too, but it was on top of the mustache. I used to think that meant he had only one eye.
But yeah, the villain was another marionette. The Skin-Taker. I can’t believe what they let us watch back then.
kevin_hart
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
jesus h. christ, the skin taker. what kind of a kids show were we watching? i seriously could not look at the screen when the skin taker showed up. he just descended out of nowhere on his strings, just a dirty skeleton wearing that brown top hat and cape. and his glass eyes that were too big for his skull. christ almighty.
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Wasn’t his top hat and cloak all sewn up crazily? Was that supposed to be children’s skin??
mike_painter65
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
yeah i think so. rememer his mouth didn’t open and close, his jaw just slid back and foth. i remember the little girl said “why does your mouth move like that” and the skin-taker didn’t look at the girl but at the camera and said “TO GRIND YOUR SKIN”
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
I’m so relieved that other people remember this terrible show!
I used to have this awful memory, a bad dream I had where the opening jingle ended, the show faded in from black, and all the characters were there, but the camera was just cutting to each of their faces, and they were just screaming, and the puppets and marionettes were flailing spastically, and just all screaming, screaming. The girl was just moaning and crying like she had been through hours of this. I woke up many times from that nightmare. I used to wet the bed when I had it.
kevin_hart
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
i don’t think that was a dream. i remember that. i remember that was an episode.
Skyshale033
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
No no no, not possible. There was no plot or anything, I mean literally just standing in place crying and screaming for the whole show.
kevin_hart
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
maybe i’m manufacturing the memory because you said that, but i swear to god i remember seeing what you described. they just screamed.
Jaren_2005
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
Oh God. Yes. The little girl, Janice, I remember seeing her shake. And the Skin-Taker screaming through his gnashing teeth, his jaw careening so wildly I thought it would come off its wire hinges. I turned it off and it was the last time I watched. I ran to tell my brother and we didn’t have the courage to turn it back on.
mike_painter65
Subject: Re: Candle Cove local kid’s show?
i visited my mom today at the nursing home. i asked her about when i was littel in the early 70s, when i was 8 or 9 and if she remebered a kid’s show, candle cove. she said she was suprised i could remember that and i asked why, and she said “because i used to think it was so strange that you said ‘i’m gona go watch candle cove now mom’ and then you would tune the tv to static and juts watch dead air for 30 minutes. you had a big imagination with your little pirate show.”
Bump for pics... Found out that construction of the whole place was completed in 1900 even. It had it's own hydro power station and dam, along with it's own railroad system and at one point the company that ran it owned 3/4 of the town. This place was practically a mini city all to itself, and it's still a pretty impressive place.
This is the back row of buildings where I was driving in the story, the river is about 40 feet after the trees on the right.
This is from the opposite end of the back side. The row of buildings are a good 1/4 mile long.
This is the door that was open. Never saw it open before, and I never saw it open again.
This is the clock tower at the opposite end of the mills. That maintainance guys won't even go up there anymore and it's pretty much sealed off. The last guy who tried to wind the clock fell down a bunch of stairs when the winding key broke off, severely injuring him.
This is one of the entrances to the underground tunnels that run throughout the mills- literally a staircase that descends into the ground. No lighs or electricity down there either- Very creepy. The water tables are very close to the tunnels, so in wet times they will flood out periodically, and a few years ago there were detectives that came into our shop asking questions about the labyrinth- apparently there was a convicted murderer that worked in the next building over and they literally asked "Are there any good places to hide a body in here?" We laughed and said "if somebody hid it here, your chances of finding it are slim to none" they never found anything so hopefully that means there's no corpses down there. Not sure if they ever went in the tunnels tho, as they're very unsafe so who really knows. I bet slenderman hides out down there and swims out to the river from them to get little NSers tho...
So yeah, look at the pics and then read the story again. It should help put you in my state of creeped-outedness. Sorry the pics took so long.
It's funny you say that... After I talked to the maintainance guys who basically said "holy shit yeah, this place has got some serious history and some spooky shit still going down"" I got curious and started digging into some of the history of the mills... Turns out the first construction began in the 1820s, and the mills were so dangerous that there were several fires which destroyed various mill buildings, also there were fatal typhoid outbreaks in the tenements housing the mill workers as the conditions were so shitty (literally), and also Mill 8 (where the clock tower is) was ground zero for child labor laws as there were so many children working in deplorable conditions and getting f'ed up or even killed. Even before there were mills there it was known as a dangerous area as the indians of the area were confirmed to have killed and captured whites and it was rumored they had sacrificed captured women at a cliff area now popular for summer cliff jumping (called "facing rocks" at the time, now known as "Indian Leap") into the river according to historical accounts, as it is believed the indians thought it was a place where evil spirits lived. (the water is super deep at the cliffs, and directly at the exit of the old mill generator plant)
The wierd part though? Couldn't find any death stats for anything besides the typhoid outbreak at the mills. NOTHING. No news stories about construction deaths, accidents, tragedies, anyone killed in any of the fires or accidents at work, nothing. I guess I'll have to go to the libraby if I want to learn more- they have a large amount of info there, as it's the reference location for any pic I've found online, which is somewhat limited.
Oh, and bump for some more pics. This was an old water wheel house location right near my shop. The door and foundation ring are all that remain besides the floor and some unidentifiable internal structure. The mills used to be run by mechanical waterwheels before electricity and this is how they stand now. You can see the portals that extend down into the tunnels and river/ water wheels, all obviously out of commission for about a century. VERY creepy. VERY deep.
What used to be the entrance to a wheelhouse
The holes in the floor...
That descend into the dark water and the tunnels below. VERY deep and murky. If you fell in, it's debateable whether or not you'd be able to get out again, and that's if you didn't hit the cross structures below falling in, then hitting water... F that. My hair stood up just taking the pics imagining being trapped down there...
And here they meet the river.
I'm going to ask the maintainance guys if they can let me/come with me into the tunels to take some pics soon. I'm all kinds of jacked up now that I learned a bunch of stuff about the mills and my curiosity is pegged. Also, I'm going to try to get my ass into a couple key spots like the clock tower, the building where I saw the shadowy figure and the old boiler room soon. I'd like to document their condition and stuff like that before anything else changes with the new construction planned, and I'm getting all kinds of amped to poke around where I probably shouldn't be and take pics. I've been snooping for like a week and I've already found all kinds of cool shit written on walls by former workers- names, dates, drawings, maps, etc. some of it dated way before 1900. So yeah, this place has some cool secrets and I'm trying to find some of them now. I'll keep you posted. If you want the OLD SCHOOL pics, let me know, I should be able to post them but it's kind of a pain in the ass so let me know if you really want to see them.
Looks like me and the homeslice Shane will be doing some first-rate snooping tomorrow with a really nice camera. Right after I posted that^ I walked out of the office and one of the mainance guys was in the shop reading the meter. He agreed to give us a full tour tomorrow- clock tower, tunnells, boiler room, and tower 11, which the 4th floor of has been SWORN UP AND DOWN to be haunted by everyone who ever worked there. Of the several dozen people who used to be there, almost all of them report seeing white figures staring at them. I told him I want to go to the creepiest/oldest parts of the mills, and I want to hear any scary stories he's heard over the years, so this should get really fkn good.
I took the day off for it, and I'm psyched.