David J. Skal, R.I.P.

Above, David J. Skal.

Nothing like waking up to shocking news.

Horror film historian David J. Skal was killed on New Years Day in an automobile accident in Glendale. He was 71.

It was a head-on collision caused by an alleged drunk driver. ABC 7 News has a surveillance video of the accident.

Although we were Facebook friends, I mainly knew him through his featurettes in Universal Pictures' horror movies DVDs. 

It was this post from Don Glut of a few hours ago that gave me the news:

By now most of you who knew David J. Skal -- a scholar, historian and a friend -- was killed tragically in an auto collision. I directed David once in a cameo scene in a short film THE VAMPIRE HUNTERS CLUB. But I'll always remember a magical moment I had with him. We were in a recording studio up at Universal. At the time he was working on a restoration of FRANKENSTEIN and knew that I had an audio tape made from the original sound discs that included Colin Clive's later-censored line, "In the name of God, now I know what it feels like to be God."  He wanted to restore that line into the film, a place that had been a jump cut since it was removed decades ago by the censors.  The tape, which I had since the late 1960s, had to be played from the beginning;  we couldn't skip ahead to that line. David and I were sitting on a couch. I watched him as the tape played from the beginning ... and the growing look of anticipation on his face as the soundtrack progressed ... and the final look of near-ecstasy as he finally heard, for the first time in his life, those legendary lines. I'll never forget that moment!  Ironically, the accident occurred on January 1st -- the anniversary of the first publication of Mary Shelley's classic novel FRANKENSTEIN. To see and hear the scene as restored by David, click ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqF28KiD-Hc

This is a big loss to the horror movie fan family. 

UPDATE (2/14.24):

David Skal’s partner, Robert Postawko, who was in the car with Mr. Skal when Mr. Skal was killed in a traffic accident, died on Feb. 6 from the injuries he had sustained. He had been expected to survive despite the seriousness of his injuries.