Silent screen legend has a new home in Gonzales

The city of Gonzales is known for its history and museums.  Now there is a new attraction to add to the list of tourist destinations.
“I have been a silent movie fanatic since I was about five years old,” said Keri Leigh, curator of the Douglas Fairbanks Museum, scheduled to open March 1 in Gonzales.  “I remember falling in love with actor Laun Chaney in The Hunchback of Notre Dam.”
Leigh recalls fencing with the boys in her neighborhood as a child, and watching the films of legendary actor Douglas Fairbanks.
“I used to reenact his stunt scenes from his movies when he played Robin Hood, Zorro and a pirate,” said Leigh.  “I grew up but I never fell out of love with silent movies.”
As a musician, Leigh toured the globe for several years, but in 1998 she decided to make a change.
“I was getting tired of life on the road living in a suitcase,” she said.  “It’s fun to do when you’re in your twenties, but I wanted to do something else.”
Silent films went through a revival in the 1990’s.  Old reels were turned into DVDs and cleaned up in the archives, so Leigh returned to her love of old films and the stars that made them shine and her life became engrossed in the world of Charlie Chaplain, Mary Pickford, Gloria Swanson and Douglas Fairbanks.  It was then that she decided to preserve their memory.
“I saw a growing interest in old films, with museums and libraries being dedicated to other stars, but then I thought, ‘What about Doug?’” said Leigh. “Doug, Mary and Charlie were known as the big three, and I wanted to make sure their contributions were not forgotten.”
In 1999 she held film screenings in Austin to raise money for the Douglas Fairbanks Museum.  With her former base player Greg Jackson, the live-in caretaker, they set up the museum in their home for two years, and eventually moved it into another building.  According to Leigh, that building was slated for demolition by the city for a hotel, so she and Jackson moved it back into their home.
But that was only a temporary solution.  In 2007 the home was flooded by rain water from a hurricane.
“We moved it upstairs and then into storage because of mold damage in the house,” said Leigh.
They were renting the house, and the owner sold it after flood damages were repaired.  Leigh said that’s when she realized that it may be time to take her friend’s advice and consider moving to Gonzales.  She admires the history of the city and its appreciation for the arts.
“This is one of the few small towns I’ve ever seen with two theaters - the Lynn and the Crystal - and I think we will fit right in,” said Leigh.
His real name was Douglas Elton Thomas Ullman Fairbanks, Sr., and he was raised in Denver, Colorado. Fairbanks was a serious stage actor, and according to Leigh that is exactly what Hollywood producers were looking for when silent films became popular.
“They wanted someone respectable to be on the screen to legitimize movies because it was mostly immigrants and lower income people who went to watch a film and get lost in another world for 20 minutes.  Boarding houses used to put up sheets and run the film reels,” said Leigh.  “The producers wanted to attract a higher class of audience.”
In fact, Leigh said the job of a film actor wasn’t really respectable at all in the beginning.
“There would be signs in businesses that said, ‘No dogs or actors allowed,’” she said.
The stage to screen theory paid off, and movies began to make huge profits.
“Doug was skeptical at first, but his attitude changed and he was taken by the technology of the movie camera and the freedom of film, he was no longer limited to the stage,” Leigh said.  “Movies made it possible for him to be famous all over the world, not just in New York City.”
His most popular leading lady was Mary Pickford, who he married in 1920, and together they ruled the film industry.  Leigh describes them as the first Hollywood power couple.
“Back then, a celebrity was usually a president or politician, but they were something different,” Leigh said.  “The crowds that came out to see them when they traveled were like Beatle-mania fans.  In one case, Doug had to carry Mary on his shoulders through the crowd.”
Fairbanks was truly a pioneer in the film industry. He earned enough money to start his own production company and was a founding member of United Artists. Fairbanks was also a founding member of The Motion Picture Academy and hosted the first Oscars Ceremony in 1929.
His first film was “Martyrs of the Alamo” in 1915, in which he plays five separate ccharacters  One of the few movies about the Texas stand-off against the Mexican Army which includes the town of Gonzales in the story.  Leigh hopes to show the film in Gonzales in the near future.
Fairbanks was part German and Jewish.  His family had moved to the United States in the 1800s.  Leigh said she often wonders how he felt during World War Two, when his family’s homeland and people were under siege from Hitler.  In fact, she said if she could ask Fairbanks one question it would be about that.
“I would ask him why he didn’t use his celebrity to make a difference and stand up against Hitler and what was happening,” Leigh said.  “He must have been terrified, but he had the power - if he had made just one film about what was happening, the right way, who knows what would have happened.”
She has written several books, including ‘Douglas Fairbanks:In his own words.’ She covets the treasures she has gathered through the years, and from film reels to books and photographs, Leigh, Jackson and museum mascot Jack the Cat are very excited to share the accomplishments of Fairbanks with visitors at the museum.
Leigh believes it will draw students and silent film fans from all over Texas and the country to Gonzales.
“I’m a steward of history and I feel like I work with him (Fairbanks). I want to make sure he is not forgotten.  He was always a hero, a crusader and a defender, and to this day his stunt work is looked at in awe,” said Leigh. “He was such a force of nature, and an all-American hero.”