RGTV: Night of the Living Dead

Update Oct. 30, 9:59 p.m.
No count, yet. The walk wrapped up earlier in the hour and downtown is flooded with zombies. Sharon Evoy, executive director of the Downtown Alliance, says "it's pandemonium!" and thanks Meijer for its support of the event and associated food drive. Early estimates are that over 2,000 zombies flooded Rosa Parks Circle and counters are overwhelmed by the turn-out. Either way, looks like Grand Rapids is cooler than Pittsburgh.

Update/Correction: The original version of this article stated that the event was aimed at a placement in the Guiness Book of World Records. At the time of publication, that was true, but due to finanical considerations the organizers have opted not to seek a formal world record.

Update Oct. 31: Unofficial count from Rob Bliss is 3,400 zombies. This only represents individuals who signed in. The actual participation was likely closer to 4,000.

Stand up, eat brains and be counted. West Michigan will be celebrating a belated World Zombie Day tonight at Rosa Parks Circle in downtown Grand Rapids with a shot at the world record for “Largest Zombie Walk.”

The latest Rob Bliss Urban Experiment kicks off at 9 p.m. tonight with a potential cast of thousands. Rapid Growth will be on hand and will report the results on this page immediately after the event. Resident Vlogger Andy Dragt will also be filing a special zombie edition of RGTV tomorrow morning.

The current world record of 1,375 zombies was set in Pittsburgh this past Sunday, World Zombie Day. Arguably the world capital of zombie infestation, the city of Pittsburgh has set the record each of the past three years with its massive reenactments of the “Day of the Dead” zombie infestation at the Monroeville Mall. George A. Romero, the filmmaker that invented the “Living Dead” zombie genre, is a Pittsburgh native.

Rapid Growth’s Pittsburgh-based sister publication, Pop City, examined the city’s love affair with the brain-eating horde in a special report last week:

It’s a Zombie Fest
Pittsburghers of a certain age cherish memories of host Bill Cardille’s “Chiller Theatre” on Saturday night on Channel 11. Debuting in 1963, it ran for twenty years. Its late night ratings were so high that Pittsburgh was the only market in the country that didn't show Saturday Night Live during its first few seasons.

In 1968, at the apex of his popularity, Cardille appeared as a television reporter in George Romero’s locally filmed cult horror classic, Night of the Living Dead which earned a place in the Library of Congress’s Film Archives and further immortalized “Chilly Billy” as a horror film host.

Flash forward to the past few years when Saturday late night horror films have returned to local TV with WBGN TV Pittsburgh’s independently produced It’s Alive Show at 10:00 p.m. Mark Menold, aka Professor Emcee Square, and his Deathmobile band host the B movie fest. Ah, a Pittsburgh tradition continues.
 
Read the rest of the story here.

For more on West Michigan event organizer Rob Bliss, check out last week’s profile in Rapid Growth.

Photograph courtesy of Nick Certo