Museum using Web to reach and serve

By FROM STAFF REPORTS

Posted: July 29, 2009 at 5:10 a.m.

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ROGERS — The Rogers Historical Museum is now reaching out to the public through two social networking sites. In addition to its own blog on the Museum Web site, the Museum is now on Facebook and Twitter. The Facebook page features "This Week in History" each Thursday and a "TGIFoto" each Friday, along with news about the Museum and event listings.

The Museum is also using the Web to make more resources available to the public. The photo and donation of the month archives on the Museum's Web site already make a wealth of information and dozens of images available to the public. Now two films made in Rogers, one filmed in 1912 and the other four decades later, are also available on the Web site, www.rogersarkansas.com/museum.

In and Around Rogers is a silent film produced by the Liberty Film Company. It features moving images of local residents going about their daily lives, participating in downtown activities, as well as working and living in area homes and buildings. The film even includes footage of the resorts of Monte Ne and Electric Springs.

Motion pictures of this era grew in popularity and many communities supported movie houses or theaters. Often, films of this type were made and shown to attract movie-goers with the potential of seeing themselves on the flickering movie screen. Sarah Fuller of Los Angeles, Calif., whose family operated movie theaters in Rogers during the early 20th century, donated this film to the University of Arkansas in the late 1970s. At that time, In and About Rogers became part of the collections of the Rogers Historical Museum as a community resource.

Four decades later the Chamber of Commerce commissioned a similar film, this one in colorwith sound. Like In and Around Rogers, America's Heartland offers a glimpse back at the Rogers area in an earlier time.

Hurbert Musteen, a well-known Rogers photographer, and Noel Boulware, executive director of the Rogers Chamber of Commerce, produced the film in 1954. Scenes from the movie highlight all that Rogers had to offer to prospective businesses, residents and vacationers, including thriving industrial activity, picturesque homes, modern schools and hospitals, and recreational facilities. This filmstrip was donated to the Museum by the Rogers Chamber several years ago.

Now the Museum is making both films available to the public through its Web site. Just go to Rogers Reels to explore this community as it was in the 1910s and 1950s. And if anyone recognizes any of the places andpeople in America's Heartland, please give the Museum a call at 621-1154 or e-mail director Gaye Bland at gbland@rogersark.org.

The next addition to the Web site will be mpg audio walking tour of historic downtown Rogers. Residents and visitors to the community will be able to download the tour to their cell phones or mpg players.

The Rogers Historical Museum is located at 322 S. SecondSt., corner of Second and Cherry in Rogers' historic downtown.

Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday, and admission is free. For more information, call 621-1154 or visit www.rogersarkansas.com/museum.

Community, Pages 3 on 07/29/2009

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