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Show To Fill Coliseum With Creature Features
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Published: March 16, 2008
ST. PETERSBURG - What do you get when a family of sock monkeys follows the "Creature From the Black Lagoon" into the St. Petersburg Coliseum?
Why, the Baby Boomers Antiques & Collectibles Show, of course.
Gary Moss will lecture on monster and horror movie collectibles at 1 p.m. Saturday, and will discuss the iconic Gill-Man from the "Creature From the Black Lagoon," a 1954 3-D classic that had underwater scenes filmed at Wakulla Springs State Park south of Tallahassee.
The "Sock Monkey Saga" lecture at 1:45 p.m. by Sandy Crouse will precede a sock monkey social. (Sock monkey owners are invited to socialize as well.)
"Sock monkey owners talk to their sock monkeys like friends," says Crouse, 57. "They have character because their button eyes are very expressive. It's like they come alive and bring love into your heart. It's a product of imagination for sure, but they are very real for a lot of us."
Crouse seated her "family" of 10 sock monkeys, including the very special Mr. and Mrs. Hound and Captain, in the front seat of her van on a recent trip here from her home in Cincinnati.
She made Captain for a 94-year-old friend, Francis Alves, who talked baseball, weather and current events with the sock monkey. When Alves died, Crouse adopted the Captain. She says she uses him to navigate on long drives.
Mrs. Hound was her first sock monkey, given to her 34 years ago by a boyfriend at Christmas. She loved it and was hooked.
Classic sock monkeys are made of speckled brown cotton socks with red heels that become the mouths. Older ones, from as far back as the 1920s, are stuffed with sawdust or cotton. Nylon stockings, cotton batting, shredded foam rubber and polyester fiber are used now.
"I have a sock monkey orphanage," says Crouse, who has worked in art galleries and antique shops. "Everyone gives me their decrepit sock monkeys, and I give them makeovers. I'll stitch them up and give them whole new personalities."
Crouse says the red-heel mouths provide for wide smiles.
"They just come alive when they smile," she says. After a pause, she adds, "I'm not really nuts."
But she will be wearing pajamas made from sock monkey fabric and sock monkey socks and slippers to the lecture.
Moss will not be wearing a Creature costume, but he will sell posters, books, cards and toys connected to his lecture topic of monster and horror movies and TV shows.
"I was close friends with a guy whose father owned the local cinema in Plainfield, N.J.," Moss, 59, says. "I would get in free for the two monster movies they showed every Saturday. Scenes from some of those shows still freak me out to this day."
"Creature From the Black Lagoon" was among the monster movies that spawned collector cards.
"I think the Creature appealed to us because he was almost humanlike," Moss said. "He was just trying to live his life in the Amazon, and people tried to kill and capture him. He was a persecuted figure like a lot of monsters, and the movie attracted a really big cult status."
Moss has given previous lectures on hippie artifacts and Aloha shirts at Pinellas County memorabilia shows. The retired optometrist and college professor from Massachusetts lives near Gainesville.
BABY BOOMER ANTIQUES & COLLECTIBLES SHOW
WHEN: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday
WHERE: St. Petersburg Coliseum, 535 Fourth Ave. N.
HOW MUCH: $6; $3 for children younger than 2; www.hulahula.biz; (727) 321-8454
Reporter Steve Kornacki can be reached at (813) 731-8170 or skornacki@tampatrib.com.
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