Part II: Lights, Camera ... Easton!!

I threw an incomplete pass on my column of this past Monday.  In case you didn’t catch it – so to speak – it was about Easton’s connection to the Silver Screen and TV movies.  One of the reasons I wrote the column is because this is the lead-up week to the Academy Awards on Sunday.

I had some glaring omissions.  Well, they were glaring to me. 

One omission – curiously enough – was an Easton connection to Tinseltown which I had given major play in a previous – the one about Father Patrick Peyton , C.S.C. (Congregation of the Holy Cross), a great man who spent considerable time teaching and ministering at – a Holy Cross Fathers college – and whose mortal remains are located at the Holy Cross Fathers Cemetery on the Stonehill campus.

Father Peyton promoted the importance of family prayer and in praying the Rosary; he is known as the “Rosary Priest.”  Father Peyton led rosary rallies around the world, including one that drew two million people in Sao Paulo in Brazil, and one in Manila in the Philippines that was attended by one and half million people.

Miracles have been attributed to Father Peyton –and the Catholic Church has started the process through which those claimed miracles, and the life of Father Peyton, will be evaluated for the purposes of establishing whether Father Peyton will be canonized a saint.    

The worldwide headquarters for s, the international ministries that Father Peyton founded is located at Stonehill College.  An arm of Holy Cross Family Ministries (HCFM) is Family Theater Productions that Father Peyton launched in 1947.

The biggest stars in motion pictures and other areas of entertainment have helped, and continue to help, Family Theater Productions as it advanced/advances the mission of HCFM to serve “Jesus Christ and His Church throughout the world by promoting and supporting spiritual well-being of the family.”

Here is an excerpt from my previous column in which I talked about Father Peyton and his work with Family Theater Productions:     

Father Peyton was a pioneer in using media to preach.  Family Theater Productions started with radio programs, and branched out into film and television and billboards.   Big names in entertainment appeared on the radio, film, and TV programs and helped Father Peyton impress the importance of praying the Rosary, and of families praying together. 

Entertainers with whom Father Peyton worked, and who helped to communicate his gospel,  include Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Frank Sinatra, Raymond Burr, William Shatner, Shirley Temple, Grace Kelly, Gregory Peck, Helen Hayes, Charlton Heston, Jimmy Stewart, Loretta Young, Natale Wood, Gene Kelly, Bing Crosby, Jack Benny, Danny Thomas, Rosalind Russell, Ricardo Montalban, Jimmy Durante, Don Ameche, and Maureen O’Sullivan. George Lucas earned his first film credit, as an assistant cameraman, working for Family Theater Productions.  James Dean’s first film role?  You got it; it was a Family Theater Productions movie.

In the more than 60 years that Family Theater Productions has operated, it has, as detailed in its literature, "produced more than 600 radio and TV programs featuring hundreds of celebrities, with more than 10,000 broadcasts worldwide."

Family Theater Productions is as busy as ever.   Those working recently on Family Theater Productions include Jim Caviezel, Ann Blyth, Bob Newhart, Sean Astin, and Regis Philbin. 

In Part I of this column, I mentioned Blanche Ames (1878-1969), who lived in the mansion at Borderland, which became Borderland State Park.  Blanche Ames was married to Oakes Ames, a Harvard University botany professor.   Blanche and Oakes had four children:  Pauline, Oliver, Amyas, and Evelyn. 

Pauline married diplomat and lawyer Francis T. P. Plimpton.  They had four children: George, Francis, Jr., Oakes, and Sarah.

George Plimpton (1927 - 2003) became a world famous writer.  While he was a student at Harvard University, he would often come to Easton on the weekends to spend time with his grandparents at their Borderland estate.

Plimpton co-founded the Paris Review literary magazine; he wrote for several other magazines and wrote popular books that focused on sports and sports experiences. 

As explained in Ames Family Papers, which are included in the Five College Archives & Manuscript Collections –  "Plimpton came into his own as a writer after publishing the widely acclaimed books Out of My League (1961) and Paper Lion (1966), based on his experiences as a temporary guest member of professional baseball and football teams, respectively. He successfully pursued this unique form of participatory journalism by entering a match against boxing champion, Archie Moore; playing percussion for Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic; swinging from a trapeze in a circus's big tent; and playing golf in a pro tournament, bridge with professionals, and tennis with Poncho Gonzales."

George Plimpton also acted in a lot of movies.  His role as psychologist Dr. Henry Lipkin in Good Will Hunting (which won the Academy Award for "Best Original Screenplay") was a hoot, and well played.  Other movies in which Plimpton acted include, The Detective, Rio Lobo, Reds, Volunteers, The Bonfire of the Vanities, Little Man Tate, L.A. Story, Just Cause, Nixon, The Last Days of Disco, Just Visiting, Factory Girl, and Soul Power.

In later years, after he had achieved wide-spread and high-level renown, Plimpton would give walking tours of North Easton.   Easton historian emeritus, Ed Hands, former chair of the history department, has taken over for George Plimpton as the provider of walking tours of "The Village." 

The 1939 Paramount Pictures big screen film, Union Pacific, which was about the building of the portion of the Transcontinental Railroad that crossed the American west, included as one of its characters Easton's very own, Oakes Ames, played by Willard Robertson. 

The legendary Cecille B. DeMille produced and directed the movie.

Yes, yes, I know, the Ames family shows up a lot in my columns.  But, heck, I offer no apologies here.  My job is to tie my columns to Easton.  And I go where the story is. 

Back to Union Pacific (the movie title taken from the company of the same name that was charted by Congress in 1862 to build a large portion of the railroad) and the role of Oakes Ames in the completion of the railroad.  

Early in 1865, Oakes Ames had been hand picked by President Abraham Lincoln to get the epic Transcontinental Railroad project – a foundation of American greatness – back on track after it been floundering. 

Pres.  Lincoln said to Oakes Ames, "Ames, you take hold of this.  The road must be built, and you are the man to do it. Take hold of it yourself. By building the Union Pacific, you will be the remembered man of your generation." 

Oakes Ames and many other power players, including his brother, Oliver, did take hold of the construction of the railroad.  Their methods became controversial – but they were also effective. 

The "road" that "must be built" got built.  

That "road" was a linchpin in the emergence of this republic as a world player.