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Sam Rubin 1918-2009
 Samuel K. Rubin, who hosted Cinecon 1, passed away, on June 26, 2009. His funeral was held in Indiana, PA on Wednesday, July 1, 2009, at the Bence-Mihalcik funeral home, followed by graveside services at Oakland Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to Beth Israel Synagogue, S. 5th and Washington Streets, Indiana, PA 15701; Penn's Woods Council, BSA, memorial fund, 201 W. High Street, Ste. 1, Ebensberg, PA 15931, or a charity of the donor's choice. A donation toward film preservation at one of the archives would certainly be a fitting choice.
As the publisher and editor of The 8mm Collector (which later morphed into The 8mm and 16mm Collector, The Classic Film Collector and is now known as Classic Images), Samuel K. Rubin served as the leading figure in legitimizing the hobby of film collecting and in promoting a general appreciation for classic films. Through the years Classic Images has published the work of many well-known film historians, including William K. Everson, Eve Golden, Kalton C. Lahue, George Katchmer, Richard Roberts, and many others. Sam also published the first articles ever written by Robert S. Birchard and Leonard Maltin.
In 1964 Sam Rubin suggested that a club might be formed among film collectors. This suggestion was taken up by 8mm Collector subscriber Tom Seller, who organized The Society for Cinephiles, Ltd. (The "Ltd." was an acknowledgment that the interest of these particular Cinephiles was limited to the appreciation of silent films). Sam Rubin agreed to host the first meeting of this organization over Labor Day weekend in 1965 at the Holiday Inn in Indiana, PA. A wordsmith who delighted in awful puns (not unlike Famous Monsters of Filmland editor Forrest J. Ackerman) and plays on words, Sam came up with the name Cinecon for this first confab--an amalgam of the words Cinema Convention. Now celebrating its 45th year, the Cinecon Classic Film Festival, as it is now known, still attracts serious film fans from around the world.
Sam Rubin published his reminiscences about his years as
a film collector and magazine publisher in the book Moving Pictures and Classic Images: Memories of Forty Years in the Vintage Film Hobby, which was published by McFarland and Co. in 2004.
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