HOME MOVIES: 1940s

Genre: home movie

Year Published: 1940’

Format: 16mm

Description: This 16mm, silent, color home movie depicts activities of the late 1940’s or early 1950s at and around Roosevelt Roads Naval Station, a United States Navy base in the town of Ceiba, Puerto Rico. The site operates today as José Aponte de la Torre Airport. The propeller of a transport airplane flying above the clouds (0:08). A blanket of cloud cover and the view along the plane’s wing with the U.S. star insignia (0:28). A U.S. Navy blimp sits grounded at Roosevelt Roads airfield with 1940s automobiles in the foreground. A nearby hangar (0:33). Three Marines in service dress khaki uniforms march in lock step (0:53). A U.S. flag is raised (1:04). A car parked beneath a palm tree. A sign, "Keep Off the Grass" (1:18). Parked cars and men in "dixie cup" hats (1:26). Sign: "Marine Barracks. Naval Operating Base. Roosevelt Roads. Puerto Rico" (1:30). Sailors look out from a boat observation deck. Rope is tossed to a sailor in another boat. (2:02). A serviceman in a cadet cap speaks and gestures. An officer stands with hands on hips with the wake of the boat behind him (2:27). Palm trees shade a dozen tents in a sunny tropical camp (2:55). Horses and wagons (3:15). A shirtless young man in dog tags and a cadet’s hat approaches. Others dump mess trays into trash cans (3:22). A mess tent (3:37). Bumpy first-person P.O.V. footage of dirt roads in Puerto Rico overlooking water. The camera crashes through plants in a wild ride, ending at rippling water (3:45). Steering a small boat (4:30). Working on a motor with a belt (4:36). Building a campfire and drinking from a coconut shell (4:52). Climbing up along a curved palm tree, mugging (5:21). Tossing an empty coconut, looking in the hole of another (5:37). A handheld first-person walk down dirt roads and through rugged terrain with lots of scrub (5:50). Driving while smoking a cigarette. Another man rides standing in the open back of a tracked vehicle (6:02). Their continuous track armored car or small Landing Vehicle Tracked (LVT) in full view (6:19). Off-roading and skidding across the dirt (6:27). The driver jumps into the car and speeds away (6:50). A hillside view and a neighborhood of houses (7:03). A seated man in khakis strikes a pose, an officer follows suit (7:26). Aging parapets and exposed brick (7:30). Local boys laugh and prod a Navy officer, reaching out (7:45). A beach on the coastline. Naval landing craft approach the shore from the sea (8:00). Underexposed amphibious vehicles and tanks are visible. (8:29). A hand-painted sign: "United States Marine Corps" and logo and 180-degree turnaround (8:50). Exterior of housing and trees with autumnal colors (9:00). Men in a distant park field (9:28). Tanning beside a blue in-ground swimming pool (9:37). More housing (10:18). View from a car. Docks, shoreline, parked cars, whitecap breakers, children hanging off the back of a speeding vehicle (10:42). A Red Cross flag flies from a nicely painted two story building. Nearby Puerto Rican architecture (11:01). "Muebleria (Furniture Store) ‘La Paloma" and Droguería Central Inc., Locals look on (11:17). A man in a bright white shirt and grey trousers with his hands on his hips addresses the camera (11:37). A large structure with stone fences. A child on a bicycle pedals out of frame (11:50). Drone in D by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-... Artist: http://incompetech.com/

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