Dates
- Cover date
- March-April 1953
- On sale
- January 28, 1953
- Pages
- 36
Editions and covers
- Original editionSource ↗
Creators
Stories
- Ray Bradbury · 1 pages
- Pipe Down! · The Witch's Cauldron! · 8 pages
A young woman marries an old man with a penchant for pipe smoking and poetry for his money and quickly grows tired of him, then she meets a young man and they plot to push him down the stairs as though it were accidental. After he dies, she buys a monkey as a pet that was born the same day her husband was killed. Howard wants to get married immediately but Lila says to wait a year....but when Howard starts finding clues to Lila possibly having an affiar, and she denies it, he murders her and is arrested. Meanwhile, the monkey settles back in the easy chair with a pipe and a book of poetry.
- Bedtime Gory! · The Vault of Horror! · 7 pages
A woman buys a stretch rack for her husband when he reveals that he killed her wealthy father so as to appear it was an accident, and then married her for her money and not for love. But she gets the better of him in revenge.
- Decision! · 1 pages
A convict escapes from prison and decides to hide from the guards by diving into a swamp. It turns out it was quicksand.
- Pot-Shot! · The Old Witch's Grim Fairy Tale! · 6 pages
This grim fairy tale relates the story of a prince who gets the king to pay him a yearly allowance of what he weighs in gold. In order to be as heavy as can be, he swallows lead shot to get his already fat frame close to almost 500 pounds. As he urges the carriage faster and faster to arrive at his new castle, the brakes are thrown suddenly and the shot explodes out of him.
- The Black Ferris! · The Crypt of Terror · 7 pages
Two boys witness a Ferris wheel at a creepy carnival that can make time go forwards or backwards for the rider depending on which way the wheel spins. A man tries to take advantage of this by riding the wheel backwards 24 times until he is a 10 year boy and then posing as an orphan in order to find and steal a kindly old woman's money who has taken him in. He plans to then ride the wheel forwards 24 times so no one will ever find the culprit. The boys tell the woman, but are not believed, so they wait until the man is on the Ferris wheel and sends it into the future....with amazing results.
Reprinted in
Haunt of Fear (1985), The Vault of Horror (1990), Haunt of Fear (1991), Haunt of Fear (1994), The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library (2012), Ray Bradbury Comics (1993), The X-Files Comics Digest (1995), Home to Stay! The Complete EC Ray Bradbury Stories (2022)