Kanab: A Small Utah Town Where a Ton Of Westerns Were Filmed
They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
Small wonder then that the entertainment industry found little Kanab, Utah, during the silent-film era. Nestled near the Arizona/Utah border in the midst of the Grand Canyon, Lake Powell and four national parks, Kanab’s breathtaking red rock bluffs, glorious canyons and sandy plains passed handily for the Wild West frontier, high mountain country or the Arabian desert in a way that leaped off the screen even before filmmakers could capture those sights in color.
How did Hollywood first come to Kanab?
Hollywood first came to Kanab (say kuh-NAB) via The Deadwood Coach, which starred Tom Mix and his faithful “wonder horse” Tony. But the town’s true benefactors were Gronway, Chauncey and Whit Parry, transportation and lodging entrepreneurs who first parlayed their talents into a gig shuttling Deadwood’s actors, filmmakers and equipment.
20th Century-Fox Film Corp./courtesy Everett Collection
Chauncey saw myriad opportunities, not only for his family, but for the area as a whole and, in the summer of 1931, opened Parry Lodge — still in operation — which was manned by the brothers and their sister Kartryn. A trained pilot, Chauncey next set to work amassing a collection of aerial photos of the area’s natural wonders to tempt filmmakers, along with his ability to provide affordable lodging, plus animals, catering, transportation and local residents to serve as carpenters, extras and crew. “They went to Hollywood and camped out on people’s doorsteps until they would talk to them,” says Kanab’s current film commissioner Kelly Stowell. “They were known for taking care of people. A lady in town who used to work for Whit Parry said that if the movie company said, ‘Scrape that paint off the wall,’ then you did it — but you charged them for it!”
Kane County Office of Tourism
“It was a good deal,” chuckles Brent Chamberlain, executive director of Western Legends Round-Up, Kanab’s annual homage to Wild West culture and the town’s Hollywood ties. “They found that it was a very favorable place because if you needed 100 mounted Indians or cowboys or both as extras, they were here in the local residents. There’s a story about one production that was going to pay a little extra money if an Indian got ‘shot’ and fell off his horse. So, they went out there and fired up the camera, and all the Indians fell off their horses in unison looking for those extra couple bucks. That wasn’t what they had planned, of course.”
What Western movies and shows filmed in Kanab?
Everett Collection
With such agreeable accommodations, the industry showed up in droves and just kept coming, bringing a veritable who’s who of Hollywood’s most famous would-be cowboys and cowgirls — from John Wayne and Joel McCrea to Roy Rogers and Dale Evans to Jack Nicholson and Gregory Peck — to deliver Wild West adventure to film buffs and TV fans alike (see sidebar). Eventually, director William A. Wellman would christen Kanab “Little Hollywood,” a nickname that lingers today. And as the Great Depression tightened its grip on America, the film industry was often Kanab’s largest employer, causing one colorful local to claim that the effort “kept the kids from eating the putty out of the windows.” Despite its proudly conservative Mormon population, Kanab returned the favor. Its teetotaler residents opened saloons and eateries to keep their city slicker visitors entertained in Hollywood style.
While filming 1962’s Sergeants 3, Frank Sinatra and his Rat Pack costars bought the local high-school football team new uniforms and equipment and even showed up at homecoming. Local resident Allan Supernaw, who began working at the Parry when he was just 11, told the Salt Lake Tribune that one of his jobs was to rouse a hungover Sammy Davis Jr. with multiple aspirin and a hair of the dog.
Everett Collection
The Oscar-winning Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid shot in nearby Grafton in fall 1968, but Kanab’s affection for its costar Robert Redford didn’t last long. In April 1976, when the conservation minded actor — who returned to Kanab for 1972’s Jeremiah Johnson — vocally opposed the construction of a massive power plant in the economically challenged area, more than 500 residents showed up to watch a Redford effigy burn. 1975 also saw the Kanab area serve as battleground for Clint Eastwood and director Philip Kaufman’s skirmish over control of The Outlaw Josey Wales (of course, Eastwood — the film’s star — won the figurative shootout).
Though Westerns fell out of favor with filmgoers throughout the ’70s, TV series like Gunsmoke, Lassie and How the West Was Won kept Little Hollywood in business. In recent years, Stowell welcomed the cast and crew of John Carter (2012), Johnny Depp’s The Lone Ranger reboot (2013), Gravity (2013) and Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014) — but Wild West nostalgia still owns these here parts via the town’s Little Hollywood Museum, the Little Hollywood Shootout short film competition (that, of course, begins at high noon) and the annual Western Legends Round-Up, which sees the likes of Barry Corbin, Mariette Hartley (Death Valley Days, Gunsmoke, Bonanza), Don Collier (Gunsmoke, Death Valley Days), Bruce Boxleitner (How the West Was Won) and even the offspring of Joel McCrea and Roy Rogers and Dale Evans rubbing elbows with costumed fans.
Movies
The Big Trail (1930)
The Lone Ranger (1938)
Stagecoach (1939)
Union Pacific (1939)
Brigham Young (1940)
Western Union (1941)
Billy the Kid (1941)
Buffalo Bill (1944)
Black Bart (1948)
Fort Apache (1948)
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)
Sierra (1950)
Pony Express (1953)
Jubal (1956)
Trooper Hook (1957)
The Proud Rebel (1958)
Duel at Diablo (1966)
El Dorado (1967)
Bandolero! (1968)
Mackenna’s Gold (1969)
Maverick (1994)
TV Shows
The Lone Ranger (1949-57)
Death Valley Days (1952-70)
Have Gun – Will Travel (1957-63)
Wagon Train (1957-65)
Daniel Boone (1964-70)
F Troop (1965-67)
This is just a partial list, for a more detailed one click here. Now tell us have you ever been to Kanab?
TV Westerns of the 50's & 60's
September 2021
’50s and ’60s TV Westerns roundup, celebrating the shows and stars of their golden age.
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