I didn’t know there was an It’s a Wonderful Life Museum in Seneca Falls, NY. But, of course, there had to be.
On September 5, after breakfast at the hotel, my wife and daughter went for a walk while I desperately tried to whittle down my email. Then we drove down to the waterfront, walked through the Seneca Falls Museum and Tourism Center, and looked for a place to have lunch.
After the meal – good food, slow service – I went to the IAWL Museum, eventually joined by the rest of the family. As I have noted multiple times in this blog, I dismissed the film for years until my wife insisted I see it. It’s surprisingly good. My family has even seen a Radio Theater retelling.
My good friend Steve Bissette wrote a great review back in 2008. It ends:
“We may love A Christmas Carol, but we know the Scrooges, the Potters and the Geckos of the world would laugh at the ghosts of Christmas past, present and yet to come. They laugh at them and spit on us every chance they get.
“That, I’m sorry to say, is part of why It’s a Wonderful Life continues to bring tears to our eyes today.”
Cole Haddon noted, and I quoted, regarding a pivotal scene: “George wasn’t supposed to cry, but Stewart couldn’t help himself. That’s because the actor was a broken man himself, not unlike the character he was playing…”
History
As for the museum itself, it had a lot of memorabilia, some of it signed by Karolyn Grimes, who played little Zuzu Bailey. Seneca Falls ISN’T Bedford Falls, but there IS a connection that is more than coincidence, which is why Grimes comes to town regularly.
Among the interesting pieces are a couple of photos of Donna Reed with actor Dick Van Dyke advocating in 1968 that the US should have a Secretary of Peace. The description of Lillian Randolph indicated that she took some grief for playing the maid Annie, though it had not bothered me.
Some time after Todd Karns played Harry Bailey, he became a noteworthy painter. A fan letter to Jimmy Stewart from Don Collins, one of the twin boys who played baby Pete, is displayed.
The crew had a picnic after wrapping the film in August 1948, with all the actors and production folks. It’s hard to see, but Jimmy Stewart appears wearing a hat in both the back row left and back row right.
Just a few doors away is a shop where I bought a replica of the Globe Theatre Program for the movie premiere. The shop owner was a really interesting dude who had lived in several states, but moved from NYC to Seneca Falls shortly after 9/11.
Ice cream
Before we headed back to Albany, our daughter wanted us to stop at an ice cream shop. As it turns out, it was about 40 minutes away in Penn Yan. We went through Geneva, which we recognized because our daughter had visited Hobart and William Smith Colleges.
The line at the Spotted Duck was a bit long, but the service was rather robust. The three of us shared an eight-flavor flight, then we looked at the ducks, some of whom were spotted.
On the ride home, the youngest of us saw 28 deer; I think I saw 8. The bad weather seemed to miss us; we drove through a section of the highway where it HAD rained, but not when we were there.
What a full couple of days.
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Author: Roger
I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.
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