Sadly, this is the final post here on Lost in Light. We extend great thanks to all of our contributors and supporters as we draw this project to a close. The site will remain live and searchable as an archive of all the great home movies and creative projects that have been offered here.

With this last film, we present another gem from the great collector of film ephemera, Nolan Pelletier. He includes with this film some amazing slides collected from the same estate sale that offered up this eclectic home movie:

This film came from the Estate of this man. He was definitely a hunter. Half the slides I found were of his latest blood covered hunting kills or his hunting buddies. Mixed in with the rest of the slides was this picture. One of these things is not like the other.

I highly recommend browsing Nolan’s Flickr stream, the owls go, which includes wonderful still images as well as selections of the hours of home movies we transferred from his collection, which make fantastic use of Flickr’s video feature.

This week, some great shots of huge turtles, a snoozing alligator, Mt. Rushmore, and vistas of the Grand Canyon. All from our contributor Ashima, who adds this:

My mama had a hard time remembering the year, but she thinks it is 1977. I do clearly remembering waking up that alligator in my little brown suit. I didn’t want to get mud on it! We took this trip from Chicago to California and these were some stops along the way. I think the trading post at the end of the video is the Hubbell Trading Post, a national historic site. Honestly, I have no idea where the turtle and alligator were located. I asked my mama and she cannot remember either. BUT, doesn’t that guy look like Steve Irwin only skinnier? I doubt it was him…

The Hubbell Trading Post is the oldest operating trading post in the Navajo Nation of the U.S., located in Northeastern Arizona.

For high-resolution footage of this film and more, click the “MPEG-2″ link above to access the Internet Archive.

Our short hiatus ended up being a bit longer than anticipated, but Lost in Light is back in action. In this second year of the project, we are striving to present films in their original form as much possible, so we’ve decided to present silent films as silent, without our editorial addition of music, and with minimal editing on our part. We return with this wonderful film from the early 1950s U.S. Gulf Coast.Susan S., one of the children in the film, provides this background:

My parents were living around the Gulf Coast area-Galveston, Texas City, Sabine. I think that the sawfish is on the beach in Galveston. I remember my Dad telling us about the things that the fishing boats would drag up that was caught in their nets. Anytime it was something big , a crowd would be gathered around taking pictures. Once it was a huge whale that had beached itself. I am the topless brunette so it’s about 1951. Mother is the beauty getting into the car. About New Orleans, Mother doesn’t remember but I think there are some things in the film that you can’t see in New Orleans anymore – will need to do a little research!

If you have observations about parts of New Orleans depicted in this film that don’t exist anymore, please leave them in the comments. Certainly the city has changed overwhelmingly since this film was taken – makes me appreciate films like this all the more.

Interestingly, sawfish are now an endangered species and international trade is banned.

As always, a complete, high-resolution version of this film is available for download at the Internet Archive. Click “MPEG-2″ above for the link.

Paul shares some details in an email to Casey:

These pictures were taken at the St. Louis Zoo in the summer of 1954. I was either stationed in Ft. Leonard Wood, Missouri, or had just been separated from the service and had a civilian job on the post for the summer before heading for Norman, OK for law school. Grandmother and I took your mother in a buggy and went through the zoo. The chimp act was spectacular, and was well publicized at the time. We had a great day at the zoo. Your mother was only a few months old, so I don’t think she cared much one way or the other about the chimps. The chimps acted as though they were really enjoying showing off for the people in the audience.

View a high-resolution version of this film and others from Casey’s collection at the Internet Archive. See the MPEG-2 link above.

Music: Edgar Mallaran, “The Carnival Clown Balloon Popper” from the Podsafe Music Network.

This week’s film comes from a truly amazing collection of footage, submitted to us by Mack Lundy in Williamsburg, Virginia. This excerpt takes us to Rhodesia, 1952, for a glimpse at a hunt: climbing trees to search for game, scenes of the hunting camp and grass gazebos, the hunters with their prey, skinning an elephant, a zebra, and a cape buffalo. The footage was shot by Mack’s father, Mack A. Lundy, Jr.

Mack fills us in:

How did my father, an Air force TSgt, happen to be on safari In Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) in 1952? He was a crewman assigned to the Air Attache in the American Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa where we lived for four years. We being my mother, brother, and me. The staffs of the embassy and Air Attache were small and socially not much distinction was made as to rank. There were quite a few perks to being associated with the diplomatic corps. I have the actual game licence issued to my father showing all the fees were waived. It was an exciting event for a boy from south-west Virginia only seven years out of a German POW camp. His hometown newspaper printed a story about his safari. He went on other hunting and fishing trips in Africa but later in life, he regreted the trophy game he killed and never really hunted again after we returned to the U.S. He preferred to use a camera to record wildlife. Some of the trophies taken during this safari have survived fifty years of moving and I have the lever-action rifle he used for smaller game.

The unedited Internet Archive version of this film includes the safari as well as footage from Queen Elizabeth National Park in Uganda, complete with elephants, hyenas, hippo, cape buffalo, and other scenes of wild Africa.

Music: Ephat Mujuru, “The Lion (Shumba)” from Journey of the Spirit

Sometimes these things are easier said than done and anticipated strategies go out the door when said goat doesn’t take kindly to your technique. Persistence pays off in the end and mankind maintains its rightful place slightly above goat in the hierarchy of the animal kingdom.

The unedited Internet Archive version of this home movie features thirty minutes of footage from Yellowstone National Park, the Continental Divide, extended rodeo footage, and parade footage. (available shortly)

The full reel is available as a high quality download at the Internet Archive, and includes images of kids with horses, camping, climbing trees, a snowy winter, a young woman in a high school graduation robe, and other wonderful scenes of everyday life.

Music: “Colt” by Savage Kong

Other footage uploaded to the Internet Archive in this batch includes zoo animals, a kid and a dog in a red wagon, a kid with a bike wheel, a family at a lake, a snow day, a science experiment, a dog in the snow, and boating fun. Enjoy.