Backroads ILLINOIS REAL Grave of DOROTHY Of The WIZARD OF OZ & Roger Ebert Statue

well good day my friends it's your old pal Jordan the lion how are you all doing today I hope you said great I'm doing great today we are in the great state of Illinois and we are headed to the town of Bloomington fresh off the heels of going to the Judy Garland childhood home and Museum this is tied in pretty heavily so I thought this would be a great time to go don't worry our little buddies here my Toto here we go Evergreen memorial cemetery there's a very fascinating grave here a young girl who made quite an impression see there's a plaque here and a big Monument back here and it says Dorothy Louise Gage little Dorothy was born to Sophie jeel and Thomas C Gage 5 months later the family was devast ated by her death shortly after this Thomas and Sophie left Bloomington for Aberdine South Dakota Dorothy's Uncle El Frank balb named the main character for Dorothy in his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz to give small Comfort to his wife ma in 2017 it was decided that the tree had to come down Bill Baker taught not chainsaw carving was asked to take on the job of carving Dorothy Toto and the yellow brick road from the tree the stump was carved in June of 2018 into the beautiful tribute little Dorothy and how she forever affected children's literature now I'm a little confused because what I had read uh someone had posted online was they were saying that after the filming of The Wizard of Oz Munchkin actor Mickey Carroll retired from acting and moved to Missouri and started making Cemetery monuments and when he learned of the disrepair that Dorothy's grave was in that he had made a headstone so check this out this is amazing this wood carving is amazing but I believe the uh The Headstone over here was what they're talking about that Mickey made now this is a l elaborate for a 5-month-old didn't get to have you know any kind of life to be memorialized in a famous book like the wonderful Wizard of Oz and then of course movie that everyone loves a cult classic there she is there's Dorothy now when they say the El Road look at this look how elaborate this really is he put the yellow brick road down here and then there is Toto and Dorothy Gale so the real little girl's name was Dorothy Gage he changed it to Dorothy Gail the actual grave of Dorothy Gage is over here I don't want you to think that this is the the actual grave that was a an old tree that they decided to turn into a memorial for her but the actual grave is right over here in between two bushes by this tree so we definitely want to go and pay our respects also made into a silent movie which is also an interesting watch if you've never seen the silent movie version of The Wizard of Oz Dorothy Louise Gage June 11th 1898 to November 11th 1898 niece of Mr and Mrs L frank Bal namesake for Dorothy and The Wizard of Oz yeah I believe that makes sense that that would have been the one made by Mickey because obviously an original headstone that they would have had for would not have referred to her as the namesake for the mo so thought that was really interesting definitely worth stopping and visiting and right behind on the back side what we just looked at looks like this was the original daughter of Mr and Mrs TC [Music] Gage I had to be sad to move their life along move States and leave her behind leave her grave here you know that's got to be sad as a parent but we're going to head a little further into Illinois there's another statue that I want to stop and take a look [Music] at head over to the the town of champagne I believe that's what it's called so I made it to Champagne Illinois and I want to tell you a little bit about the history of this theater behind us and someone whose life was actually changed here this is the Virginia theater you can actually see AJ cochi Jim Koch's son is going to be here performing but there's a statue over here in a seat and I you know I think it's going to tell a the story that I want to tell so let's go and check it out you see this was uh this is the home of the University of Illinois and a man who was raised here in town in Urbana attended University of Illinois and became a famous film critic is sitting right here with his solar glasses on in a seat giving the thumbs up for which he's famous for Roger eert famed cisin Ebert inventors of the thumbs up thumbs down let's see what it says here Roger Joseph eert June 18th 1942 to April 4th 2013 renowned film critic co-star of the at the movies television series Jean cisal and Son of herbana Roger eert changed the way people thought about movies the University of Illinois graduate was the film critic for the Chicago Sun Times for 46 years he was the first journalist to win the p surprise for film criticism to be inducted as an honorary member of the Director's Guild of America to receive the American Society of cinematographers award and to have his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and at the Chicago Theater he also received the highest honor from the state of Illinois the order of Lincoln in 1998 he and his wife Chaz brought the eert filmfest to this hometown he said that empathy was one of the most important aspects of civilization that and that movies were a giant empathy machine he was a Visionary mentor and technologist and a loving husband and family man how very very cool of the town this says Virginia there's the V for the Virginia Theater so I found an interview where he was basically telling that his father this theater had been around for a very long time his father actually saw the Marx Brothers perform here on the stage he said that he saw a lot of movies here and that this place was he believed in like saving beacons and he said this theater would cost a fortune to replace so yeah when this was kind of falling in disrepair he brought his Film Festival here it was a big hit and the city at the time the mayor of this city was a big proponent of films and helped get uh some money allocated to the theater so that they could refurbish it and make sure that it lasts a very long time it's a performance theater and Roger said that you know he just kind of when he grew up here this is the town that he would see Citizen Cane and all the foreign movies that he loved and he was a big proponent of all movies but he really loved black and white movies he would say that uh you know you live your life in color so watching a color movie is just watching Something Real when you watch something in black and white you really it really takes on a style and it takes away the color it makes you feel a character about it and he said you know when color was introduced a lot of the directors were still choosing to do black and white and so he wishes more more people would do that and he also said he thought that little bit of the decline of Cinema was that people were just getting a short attention span that movies and TV were made for people with a short attention span they didn't they couldn't handle a long scene he would talk about MTV being an example he said you know that most of the clips on there are like 5-second Clips so he felt like you know there was this there was an art to cinema he would grow up watching it here and then like it said in there he was actually the film critic for the Chicago Sun Times for 46 years the way that happened was he actually received a job for the Sun Times as a feature writer and then their film critic retired and they offered him the job so it was just a stroke of luck but he said that he always saw himself as a writer as like a uh a written critic more than TV he would say that you know even though people a lot of people knew him from seeing him on TV that was only 20% of most of the work that he did and uh you know I'm going to take this off cuz this is kind of silly at least for for now I think I'm going to see his eyes yeah he said that he uh he got into it to write he he was inspired by the film critic from Esquire and he liked the way he wrote confidently and so that was the way that he would get into it he would write that way then got a PBS show and was doing film reviews and he and Jean CIS became very famous together but he never really it was crazy when he would be asked are you guys friends are you enemies he would kind of say yes about both when Jean cisal diet of cancer Roger called him a brother but said often times they didn't agree on things and in a lot of ways but it was kind of crazy because Roger Ebert I mentioned said he always kind of saw himself as more of a written critic and three years after Jean cisal died of cancer Roger also was diagnosed with cancer and his was actually thyroid and gland so sadly they actually ended up removing having to remove his jaw and for the rest of his life he would end up continuing to be a Critic and write articles and everything but he had to do it on a typewriter that would speak for him he no longer could speak he no longer could eat um all of those were taken away from him the only way he could communicate was through this computer that would have a computer generated voice that would speak for him and then his wife Chaz actually would help him when he thought he was going to have to retire she said no no you know you can continue on and so he continued on as long as he absolutely humanly possibly could and and left a great legacy he continued the show after Jean passed away for a little while doing the eberton Roper I think everybody knows him primarily from the cisc and Ebert show it's so cool that the town did this for him has this statue because he loved this town he frequently came back his father was the electrician for the University that he attended and he said his father actually helped physically build the municipal stadium so his roots here in town went back very far and uh it's nice to see that he was able to help the theater survive and always here giving the thumbs up well my friends we're going to call it a day I hope you enjoyed our Vlog today exploring a little bit of central Illinois have a great night and goodbye [Music] cuz there's a great spot behind every shadow when you think I am insane and I think will be arranged to be married on the bom with the Kitt in your own baby don't be scared you should never be scared cuz a St hand in your pocket every ding your way everything is

Channel: Daze with Jordan the Lion

Views: 23,184

Keywords: travel vlogger, urbex, history, tourism, filming locations, travel, jacob the carpetbagger, daze with jordan the lion, jordan the lion, travel guide, vlog, vlogger, vlogging, lifestyle, wolters world, tourist, adam the woo, The daily woo, Graves, Cemetery, Dearly departed, Grimm life collective, Lamont at large, Hollywood graveyard, Famous graves, Celebrity homes, True crime, Biography, The wizard of oz, Dorothy gale, Siskel and ebert, At the movies, Roger ebert, Virginia theater

Id: aW8b2BNUd_Y

Length: 15min 1sec (901 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 23 2024