Tales of the Frightened

Who in the Halloween community doesn't love Boris Karloff? His career as a horror movie icon continues to inspire many haunters in their prop building, and his voice inspires us to shivers!

Take his radio series, "Tales of the Frightened." These were little five-minute stories of horror, eventually made into compilations on LP. Some of you may have been lucky enough to have these as kids, although I, myself, missed them. (I was able to pick up an album at a vintage record store, however!) Yes, the stories are simple and cheesy by today's standards, but his voice enveloped you and made you part of the fright!

You can listen to one via YouTube here, or you can listen to a bunch of them and get some more interesting history at the Internet Archive, under audio Boris Karloff Tales of the Frightened.

In case you haven't noticed, I absolutely love these old albums that allow us to sit and listen to a story, to imagine the settings and characters. It allows us, in this frenetic age, to be still for a little bit, and to focus on one thing.

And, of course, to be frightened!