The Child Molester (1964): The Highway Safety Foundation Beyond the Road
The school film that traumatized children everywhere. Warning: the footage of the victims at the end is real and seriously graphic. https://archive.org/details/CHILD
by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas
The following is a supplementary component of a larger research project I am currently working on about The Child Molester (1964) and the Highway Safety Foundation. The majority of this article is a summary of the events surrounding a series of shots at the end of the film, and this reconstruction would not have been possible without the gracious assistance of Bret Wood and Boyd Addlesperger (the Sherman Room Librarian at the Mansfield/Richland County Public Library). Bret Wood’s documentary Hell’s Highway – The True Story of Highway Safety Films (2003) is essential viewing for anyone interested in ephemeral or industrial films, exploitation cinema or screen histories more generally. A trailer can be viewed here, and it is available to purchase through Amazon.
The Child Molester is in the public domain, and as such can be seen in its entirety online (please note that there is extremely graphic imagery…
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S. K. Epperson 