Imagine this. The year is 1930. TV is yet to become a thing, Oklahoma has been a state for only 23 years and Ponca City’s Pioneer Woman Statue is unveiled and is on display on April 22, 1930. For the longest time, it was hard for the people of Ponca City to see a visual showing of the statue’s unveiling. That was until two years ago when a film was discovered at the Pioneer Woman Museum facility and has since been digitized. Keith Fagan, who is a historical entrepreneur with the Oklahoma Historical Society, was part of the team that discovered the original film. Fagan said that the footage has never been released to the public in its nearly 90 years of existence, and the museum was waiting for the right time to showcase the film.
Fagan said that the letters on the film read as “Willl Rogers and Pioneer Woman unveiling” and knew that they had to look at it. The silent film is less than 10 minutes long and is played on a loop in the exhibit. It features prominent and iconic 1920s and ’30s humorist Will Rogers and his speech he gave at the ceremony. The film also showed a glimpse into what the world was like at that time. a total of 44,000 people(which is more than the 2019 current population of Ponca City of around 25,000) could be seen along with close-ups of some of the attendees.
Fagan said that many aspects of the footage are fascinating, including a woman in men’s attire who is seen in the film for a few frames. In the footage, no one was batting an eye at her. The exhibit also features all 12 of the designs submitted for the statue that were voted upon by 14 cities, including Ponca City. Fagan said that the design Bryant Baker was the overwhelming public favorite, being chosen by 11 of the 14 cities allowed to vote. Fagan also noted that while it’s well-known what the other cities voted for, all of which where much larger than Ponca City, no one knows which model was chose by the future home of the statute.
The film serves as a time capsule that captures some of the natural fanfare surrounding E. W. Marland’s commissioned Pioneer Woman Statue. Fagan said the country was not as far removed from the early pioneers commemorated by the work. Fagan also believes that some of the older men seen in the crowd in the film were likely a part of the land rush that opened this area to settlers.
People can also be seen in other footage at that time swimming in Wentz Pool and a football game that was believed to have been somewhere in Kansas.
The Pioneer Woman Museum is open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday.
