Centron camera
Creator: Mitchell Camera Corporation
Date: between 1935 and 1940
Black metal 16mm movie camera mounted on a wheeled wooden tripod. Centron Corporation, in Lawrence, Kansas, used this motion-picture camera to produce educational and industrial films. When Centron was founded in 1947 it was located in downtown Lawrence, but a new facility was built in 1955. After the company closed in the 1980s, the University of Kansas acquired the building and this camera. The building became Oldfather Theatre, home to University of Kansas film school.

Gordon Parks
Date: 1968
This photograph illustrates Kansas born photographer, musician, writer and film director Gordon Parks (1912-2006) directing the 1968 film "The Learning Tree". Born in Fort Scott, Kansas, Parks spent much of his youth with relatives in St. Paul, Minnesota where he began establishing himself capturing high fashion and social political movements including the deaths of Malcom X and Martin Luther King Jr.

John Clifford video interview on experiences in World War II (transcript)
Creator: Clifford, John
Date: August 28, 2007
John Clifford was inducted into the United States Army in 1941 and served until 1946. Clifford wanted to be a writer before being drafted into the Army in 1941 and pursued various efforts related to writing--before, during, and after the war. He was stationed at Fort Monmouth, Ne Jersey, as a clerk and at Camp Crowder, Missouri. He met his wife to be at a USO dance in Joplin, Missouri. He served in hospitals in New Guinea and the Philippines. Interviewed by Pattie Johnston on Aug 28, 2007, Clifford talked about military experiences in the Second World War. He was born in Sprinfield, Illinois, November 19, 1918. After the war, he attended Emporia State Teachers College on the G.I. Bill. After a couple of different jobs, he joined the staff of Centron Films in Lawrence and worked there for 23 years. The 2005 Kansas Legislature passed a bill funding the WWII Veterans Oral History grant program. This transcript is from one of the community institutions receiving grants. The transcript of the interview is presented here; the original video copy of the interview is available through the Watkins Community Museum of History (Lawrence) and through the Kansas State Historical Society.

Martin and Osa Johnson
Date: 1935
An informal portrait of Kansas explorers, authors, and naturalists, Martin Johnson, 1884-1937, and Osa Johnson, 1894-1953, posed by their airplane with native people in Borneo.

Martin and Osa Johnson
Date: 1935
An informal portrait of Kansas naturalists and explorers, Martin Johnson, 1884-1937, and Osa Johnson, 1894-1953, posed on their airplane with two companions, and a half dozen native people on an unidentified shore in Borneo.