Video: For Old Movie Fans, ‘The Golden Era’ Is on Display

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TUPELO, Miss. (WCBI) — It was known as the Golden Age of movies…and many of us still remember those Saturday afternoons at the local theater when a movie cost a nickel or a dime. Now, a display at an area museum lets visitors elive those days or introduce a new generation to that Golden Age.

It was a time before television, when stars like Roy Rogers brought the crowds into movie theaters every weekend. As a kid living in West Point, Terry Swindol was always in the front row.

“They had two theaters in West Point, the Ritz and the Royal,” Swindol recalled.

As a hobby at an early age, he began collecting souvenirs associated with the movie stars of the day and he hasn’t stopped. Now, the best items from his collection are on display at Tupelo’s Oren Dunn Museum. It is called “Hollywood: The Golden Era.”

“This was the days of the studio system and the studios were competitive with one another. They had their own set of stars, each studio, and those were what I call the golden years. They really groomed their stars and made them perfect,” he said.

Through the years, Swindol worked as a teacher at local schools, and also is involved with the “Memphis Film Festival.” That’s where he met many of the screen legends and added to his collection.

At the Oren Dunn exhibit, visitors will see a silver bullet from Clayton Moore, who played “The Lone Ranger.” There’s an autograph from Lucille Ball, and a letter from Joan Crawford, who had made a trip to Tupelo.

“She was representing Pepsi Cola and she was here while they were opening the Pepsi plant and brought in, seems like everybody in Tupelo was down for that. I didn’t get to get her autograph, couldn’t get close enough to her, so I wrote her a letter later and she answered me,” Swindol said, recalling just some of the ways he built his extensive collection that includes autographs, posters, statues and other items.

His collection also features some stars who are more obscure.

“Estelita Rodriguez, the Cuban actress, but she was very popular, and Anna Mae Wong, the Asian actress. I was always impressed with the way she did her autographs, she would sign in English an Chinese.”

There is also a display for Hopalong Cassidy, who figured out a way to profit on his name long after his film stardom waned.

“He was fired in 1948 because of television and he bought from Paramount all of the films he made, and rights to the name so he put out the merchandise and he got five percent of every item sold and everywhere,” Swindol explained.

Swindol says the shelves at his home are bare, for now, but he hopes visitors to the Oren Dunn Museum will enjoy the exhibit and get a sense of a time when movies reflected the innocence of America.

The exhibit will be at the Oren Dunn City Museum through Oct. 25.