“Back There” is almost the same story as in Serling’s teleplay, but Gibson suggests “ghostly forces” were at work sending Peter Corrigan back in time to 1865 Washington to witness Lincoln’s assassination- and instead of discovering the handkerchief with the initials “J.W.B.” stitched into it (as Russell Johnson did at the end of the TV version), Corrigan discovers in his possession, while in a taxi, an unused ticket to Ford’s Theater for the April 14, 1865 performance of “Our American Cousin”..the one Lincoln attended when he was shot {“a one of a kind collector’s item”, Gibson notes}. Corrigan tears it up and lets the pieces flutter into the Potomac….

In the case of “Judgment Night”, it’s basically the same as it unfolded in the original TV episode, but Gibson added an epilogue, twenty years later (1962): apparently, in his retelling, the SOLE survivor of the “S.S. Queen Of Glasgow” was Barbara Stanley [played by Deidre Owens in the episode], who’s cruising on a luxury liner passing the area where the “Queen Of Glasgow” and the German U-boat that sunk it both perished. A man stands next to her on deck, agreeing it was a shame the “Queen Of Glasgow” went down, and muses on the fate of the German sub with Captain Lanser and his crew. Then, Ms. Stanley wonders how HE could have known about the fate of the sub if there were no survivors…? The man, who identified himself to Ms. Stanley as Lt. Mueller [who warned Lanser his U-boat and the crew were cursed because they sunk the boat, and that they'd relive the sinking of the "Queen Of Glasgow" again and again, into eternity]…vanishes!

Keep in mind that these stories were, as noted on the cover, “especially written for young people”. So they couldn’t be truly frightening, or as “intriguing” as the TV series. And, there had to be some “historical background” mentioned for the kids’ edification {the half-finished Washington Monument in 1865 is mentioned in “Back There”; Serling wouldn’t have thought of adding this piece of “historic trivia” in his teleplay}. So, if you’re looking for the “Twilight Zone” experience, you won’t find much of it in this book.