Check this update, please

For more material on child film actors of the Thirties, Forties, and Fifties, please go to boysofsummersrun.blogspot.com

We’re featuring the same information and photographs, but the older stuff will be archived here. Claude Jarman, Jr., continues as our featured honoree plus other young stars that were once household names.  In addition, we’ll be posting updates on The Boys of Summers Run, number three in the Summers Run Series, following Summers Run: An American Boyhood and Return to Summers Run.

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Libraries, the heartbeat of Small Town America

Both books in our Summers Run series have been donated to libraries in the Bitterroot Valley, Montana: The Missoula Public Library, the North Valley Library, and the Bitterroot Public Library in Hamilton.

Books have been donated to public libraries in Meadville, Titusville, Springboro, Cambridge Springs, Cochranton, Washington, Williamsport, and Lock Haven, all in Pennsylvania.

It’s been our pleasure to do this, in this day of limited resources and budgetary restraints.

Patronize your local libraries: there’s more going on there than just books. These are not the dull, stereotypically dry and dusty halls of yesterday. They are alive and lively institutions of learning, entertainment, and imaginative, worthwhile stimulation. . . . Jim Cotton

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The Jarman Family

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Claude Jarman, Jr. with sister, Mildred Anne

It’s thought this pleasant scene is from the premiere of The Yearling. However, it may be the Academy Awards  of 1947 when Claude was presented an Oscar for the Best Juvenile performance.

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Just Under 100,000

words, my next novel in the Summers Run series. The publisher is in a bit of a dilemma in categorizing this one. Is it a:

Young Adult

Young Adult Coming-of-Age

A Literary Work

An Intergenerational Novel

Or should it be classified as General Fiction/Baseball?

The issue arises because Return To Summers Run involves all the above. It should be available later this month or early June through online retailers, from the publisher, or through your local bookstore. It’s being published as a softcover and e-book.

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After The Yearling?

This artful angle shot of Claude Jarman, Jr. was likely snapped during or slightly after principal photography on The Yearling was finished. The motion picture was released in the spring of 1947 nationwide after its Los Angeles and New York City premieres.

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Claude Jarman, Jr. and father

somewhere on the studio lot, it would appear. The Jarman family located temporarily in Los Angeles after Claude passed his screen test for the part of Jody Baxter in The Yearling. His selection by director Clarence Brown is a story only Hollywood could write. Brown surveyed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of candidates in school rooms all across the South, looking for a boy with both the charisma and intelligence to carry a large portion of this movie. He posed as a building inspector once securing permission of the school’s principal, while looking for a boy that caught his eye as having potential. Imagine such a masquerade today!

Claude was summoned to the principal’s office for his first interview with the understanding he would alert his folks of Brown’s interest and to expect a visit to the home. Reportedly, Claude forgot the meeting and went to the Boy Scouts that evening instead.

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New blog, updates

The website and blogs associated with this blog are available for your viewing. The main website anchor can be found at www.alongcountryroads.com  Blogs are now My Corner of Pennsylvania, http://mycornerofpa.blogspot.com and My Side of Montana, http://mysideofmontana.blogspot.com and our new effort, A Feel Good Novel at afeelgoodnovel.blogspot.com

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The Yearling’s Publicity

 

Jody and The Yearling plus Claude Jarman, Jr. were often profiled in the screen and popular magazines of the era, during the film’s general release in 1947.

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Planting “tobaccy” in The Yearling

 

 

The family hopes for better fortunes were riding on planting tobacco seedlings for a much-needed cash crop. Here are Claude Jarman, Jr. and Gregory Peck as Penny Baxter, “Pa,” discussing what a successful crop might mean to them and “Ma” Baxter.  Below, Jody tells Ma as played by Jane Wyman, “twert Flag, Ma,” when the tender crop is destroyed by the logical suspect, Flag, Jody’s pet fawn.

 

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