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West Virginia, The State Beautiful

Date produced: 1929

Filmmaker(s):

Ottis Rymer Snodgrass

Description:

"West Virginia, the State Beautiful is organized as a series of scenic vignettes taken during an auto trip eastward on Route 60, known as the Midland Trail .... This route, first proposed by George Washington in 1783, had been upgraded for automobiles in the 1920s and is portrayed here as a source of civic pride. Rev. Snodgrass probably screened his 75-minute travel documentary for church and civic groups. The five excerpts included here begin with the start of the tour in the border town of Kenova, whose name is laid out in an intertitle (“KEN. O. VA.”) to drive home its derivation from the first letters of the states the town touches: Kentucky, Ohio, and (West) Virginia. In Huntington, Route 60 runs down busy Fifth Avenue and past the International Nickel Company, opened six years earlier and rightly labeled in the titles as the world’s largest nickel alloy plant. Farther east in the higher Appalachians are glimpses of sheer “LOVER’S LEAP” cliffs (before the Hawks Nest Dam was built in the 1930s) and lumber-industry trains geared for the steep hills. Rev. Snodgrass closes with a homemade sing-along slide for the state song, “The West Virginia Hills.”" —Scott Simmon


Westward Whoa

Date produced: 1948

Filmmaker(s):

Fred Strauss

Description:

"Edited footage of western scenery on a road trip to Yellowstone Park. Includes scenes of camping and numerous landscapes, Mount Rushmore and the various grounds of Yellowstone with their hot springs and geysers." Chicago Film Archives


What God Hath Wrought

Date produced: 1951

Filmmaker(s):

Leo J. Heffernan

Description:

"Leo J. Heffernan's 'What God Hath Whrought" pictures some of the wonders of Nature, with emphasis on the mighty Niagara Falls. His color photography is excellent." American Cinematographer, May 1952, 224.

"While motoring through Zion National Park, Leo J. Heffernan photographed the mountains, trees and canyons as they passed by his camera. The resulting picture, What God Hath Wrought, filmed almost entirely from his moving car, has an amazing three-dimensional effect. Changes in depth and perspective give the viewer a strong sense of participation, a true feeling that he is actually on the spot. For, traveling along the main highways, where so many tourists drive each year, Mr. Heffernan shows us this usually static subject from a tourist's level — but with new and refreshing viewpoints." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 341.


Why Whales?

Date produced: 1992

Filmmaker(s):

Robbins Barstow

Description:

"In October 1992, Connecticut Folksinger Donald Sineti visited Heidelberg, Germany, with global whale advocate Dr. Robbins Barstow, to sing for whales in a German-American cultural exchange program. Enjoy song concerts in castles, campus, city streets, and countryside." Archive.org


Wonders of Our Inland Sea

Date produced: 1955

Filmmaker(s):

L. Clyde Anderson

Description:

"Views from ground of Salt Lake City skyline, Antelope Island, the train causeway, a passenger train, the salt flats, salt crystallization on rocks, brine shrimp, auto racing on the salt flats, seagulls (with sound), sail boating, swimmers at Saltair, Sunset Beach, the marina, water skiers, boat painting, and the Utah State Capitol building." University of Utah Marriott Library.


Total Pages: 12