Imagine unearthing something strange from a cold basement. In October, that short description might conjure up a spooky image, although archival work at the University of Georgia Special Collections Libraries is more enlightening than eerie.
This Halloween season, an event combines the archives with the melodrama during a special screening of a B-horror classic film, along with archival images from the genre preserved within UGA’s Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection, the nation’s third largest publicly accessible media library.
On Thursday, Oct. 19, the outdoor screening on the Special Collections front lawn features the 1959 flick “The Killer Shrews,” along with archival footage of “Dr. Speculo’s Tales from 6 Feet Under,” a Georgia television show from the early 1990s.
"All of us at BMAC love Halloween, and we are so excited to host this event as a fun way to showcase our archival collection while celebrating our favorite spooky season with the rest of the Athens community,” said Nina Guzman, an audiovisual technician who helped to organize the event.
UGA students and members of the community are invited to enjoy free popcorn beginning at 6:30 p.m. before the screening starts at 7 p.m. Picnic blankets and lawn chairs are encouraged, although the screening will be moved inside in the event of rain.
Archivists send their thanks to the film historians at Film Masters, who provided a high resolution restored copy of the film for the screening.
For more information about the Special Collections Libraries, located on the University of Georgia campus, visit libs.uga.edu/scl.