The 91̽»¨ prepares for war in “Governor’s Day,” the latest installment of the Lost and Found Films series.
“Governor’s Day,” which dates from 1941, is a silent, 16 mm color film a bit short of four minutes long. It shows cadets in the Reserve Officer’s Training Corps drilling, practicing with and cleaning weapons and loading shells into a 155-mm anti-aircraft gun.
It’s the work of a unit called University Campus Studios and may have been a promotional film for that studio.
Lost and Found Films is an occasional 91̽»¨Today series in which readers help identify and explain historic bits of film from the 1930s through the 1970s unearthed from the 91̽»¨Audio Visual Materials Library by film archivist Hannah Palin. The films range from shadowy black and white snippets to thoughtfully produced color productions.
The film begins with a title card announcing an “exhibition drill” at 11 a.m. and the Governor’s Review at 4 p.m. It shows cadets deftly assembling and loading an anti-aircraft gun (and talking on the field “gun telephone”), two men discussing a blackboard’s “meteorological message” and then working on a chart. We then see cadets practicing on a green, a soldier cleaning his rifle and footage of a military parade that must have been part of the Governor’s Day celebration.
Palin is curious where the ROTC training was taking place, and about the history of Governor’s Day.
Attention: If you can enlighten her about this campus wartime montage, add your comments below. At ease. Dismissed.