The Trail to Lone Pine

The Trail to Lone Pine. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Line On Agriculture.

If you have ever watched an old cowboy movie you have more than likely seen the area surrounding Lone Pine, California and the Alabama Hills. Robert Sigman is the Director of the Lone Pine Film History Museum.

SIGMAN: The town of course has had a history of film making since the early 20’s. The earliest large film or sound picture The Roundup with Fatty Arkbuckle was 1920. Kerry Powell and Ray Powell lived here for many years, big fans of movies and so 24 years ago this year they decided to have a film festival.

Just about every western star imaginable has been to and a part of the festival which will be Columbus Day weekend.

SIGMAN: We screen probably 20 some films over the weekend. Sometimes we’ll have a star or celebrity come up, we’ll show the movie and we’ll have a panel afterwards and they’ll talk about their movies and everything is geared towards film making.

But of course the big star is the uniqueness of the area itself.

SIGMAN: You know if you look at the pictures, the geological formation of the rocks is one of the most unusual in the world. All the dirt is gone from them so I think that’s what the producers and directors saw as an opportunity to capture that, this unique landscape. You’ve got canyons and just incredible landscapes that they were able to make these westerns.

And filming around Lone Pine continues today. We’ll talk more tomorrow with Bob Sigman about the Lone Pine Film Festival.

That’s today’s Line On Agriculture. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.