2013 Tour Of Locations From MARTIN Part 2

September 20, 2013

Let me set the scene. It's early in the morning. I'm in Pittsburgh to attend the local Horror Realm convention as a vendor there. I have to be at the con to set up hours before it opens, so I start my journey to Braddock, PA at about 8am and I must leave the area around noon to go to the convention and do my set up. I arrive in Braddock around 9am. It's a bright sunny day and it's perfect for taking photos, I hear that the weather in Pittsburgh can be quite dreary at times, but I got lucky today, it's beautiful. I had researched many of the locations featured in the movie MARTIN for the past year or so, so I was ready to visit some cool spots. I even found the house that the adulterous woman lived in, no fan had found that location before me, so I was excited to start this journey. Shall we begin Part 2?

My next stop was the Giant Eagle grocery store that you see in the movie. It is seen several times. It is now the Braddock Family Health Center.


















My next stop was Stambolis Poultry Market a few blocks away. In the movie, it was directly across the street from Cuda's store and you can see Martin and Cuda walk out of it at one point.

The following stop turned out to be pretty interesting. I even met up with uber Romero fan Matt Blazi at this point. We met at the footbridge location. As soon as I got there I noticed that the bridge was all wrong and that even though many fans have come to the area and visited this bridge, it was the wrong one, not the one in the movie. I made a whole post about this earlier this week. Check it out for the full story:
http://martinthereisnomagic.blogspot.com/2015/06/for-many-years-fans-of-martin-have-come.html

Something is not right...this footbridge does not match the footbridge in the movie....

Matt Blazi arrives.

To be continued.....

2013 Tour Of Locations From MARTIN Part 1

September 20, 2013

Let me set the scene. It's early in the morning. I'm in Pittsburgh to attend the local Horror Realm convention as a vendor there. I have to be at the con to set up hours before it opens, so I start my journey to Braddock, PA at about 8am and I must leave the area around noon to go to the convention and do my set up. I arrive in Braddock around 9am. It's a bright sunny day and it's perfect for taking photos, I hear that the weather in Pittsburgh can be quite dreary at times, but I got lucky today, it's beautiful. I had researched many of the locations featured in the movie MARTIN for the past year or so, so I was ready to visit some cool spots. I even found the house that the adulterous woman lived in, no fan had found that location before me, so I was excited to start this journey. Shall we begin?

The first place I visited was the alley and playground seen in the movie.

In the movie Cuda goes out walking and Martin stalks him in full Dracula makeup and costume. Cuda thinks that Martin is a vampire, so Martin does this to taunt him and make a point.

The playground was changed drastically, there was new equipment, but it was grown over and locked up. Here is the view into it from the alley.

This is the front of the playground with locked gate.

My next stop was Cuda's house where Martin stays for the length of the movie.

To be continued.....

A MARTIN location REVEALED!

For many years, fans of MARTIN have come to Braddock, PA in search of the film locations from the movie. Some are hard to find because of changes in the last 40 years, but others are easy to find.

Fans found a footbridge in town and have always thought that it is the one that you see Martin walk over when he goes to deliver meat.

Many people have been there and taken pictures on it. As you will see though, I visited the area for the first time in 2013, but I immediately noticed that things were off when I looked at the still frames I had from the movie.

Nothing matched what you see in the movie. The bridge looked a different shape.

The surrounding neighborhood houses that led up to the bridge were different.

The background view that you see behind Martin was different from what you see on the bridge that is in Braddock.

When I looked at everything I realized that it was the wrong bridge. Sure things could have changed, but could every house and every view have been changed? I don't think so. I think all the fans in the past that had come to Braddock were on the wrong bridge. Before I had come to Braddock, I had done my research to find all these locations and from looking at Google's satellite views and maps, I could find no other footbridge in Braddock, nor a similar footbridge anywhere in the area. After I realized this, I left and went to other locations and I figured that I would look into it later. That night I decided to look around the internet for more info on the footbridge in Braddock. I looked around but did not find much new, but then I stumbled on a website about Pittsburgh Bridges. This website actually listed all the bridges that had ever been built in the Pittsburgh area, even ones that had been removed. Then I hit the jackpot, I found out that there used to be another footbridge in Braddock and that it was only two blocks away from the site of the bridge that is still existing in Braddock. The bridge was removed at some point because it was falling apart and dangerous. So I decided that I would visit that spot to see if that was the bridge location that you see in the movie. I was not able to get there until several days later when it was almost nightfall. But, when I got there, I knew immediately that I had the right place.

I saw that there were ruins in the brush from the original bridge and then I started to match things up. Houses to the right of the bridge matched the shots in the movie.

Then to the left of the bridge was a wall that had surrounded a building, it was still there, although the building was removed and a parking lot was built there.

Then I looked up and saw that the telephone poles that you see next to the bridge in the movie were still there in the exact same positions.

It was so cool to find the actual location of the bridge that you see Martin cross in the movie even though the bridge was long gone. The mystery of the bridge was solved. Now every MARTIN fan can visit the real bridge location that you see in the movie. I wanted to return during the day to get some daylight shots, but I was not able to return until a year and a half later.

I hope you enjoyed this adventure. I did. Happy location hunting my friends.