THE LOG OF THE “TRADER HORN" EXPEDITION.

Northland Age, Volume III, Issue 32, 19 August 1931, Page 7

THE LOG OF THE “TRADER HORN" EXPEDITION.

(By W.S. Van Dyke)

(Editor's note: In to-day’s issue vie commence the publication of the diary of Mr. tV, S. Van Dyke, who took a lull motion picture company into the heart of Africa to make the film version of the famous book "Trader Horn" for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Mr. Van Dyke's diary was published in the “New York Times” aud in leading English journal'-. As the story unfolds amazing adventures with lions, leopards, pylhous and oilier jungle denizens, and natives aroused ta fanatical frenzy by their witch doctors are told. The st ry will continue in weekly instalments until its conclusion.). On board the i>.S. “Usaramo”, April 18. —When 1 was told in Hollywood a couple of mouths ago that 1 had been selected lo cad a Metro Goidwy 11-Mayer movie expedition into Africa to 111 dee a film veisioii ol “Trader 11 m”, it occurred to me dial su .1 an cnteipUsc was a 111 .tut Olgcll lul Itlid-ci. IUCiU.£.U& of any great picture is a romance in itselt, but one which is by necessity too much involved in technical details to be altogether intelligible to the layman. But here, in the instance ot “Trader Horn”, a new modus operandi would be employed. It would be simply a matter of reincarnating such of ihe details of the trader’s life as we had chosen lor our story. We would go to the shores he described, risk with the fevers, the animals, the hostile native tribes. In each detail we would endeavour to live again the life of the old man who “traded” up and down half the rivers of Africa. And the fact that a camera would follow us as we went seemed lo me to detract nothing from the realism of the situation, and to add little to its complexity. That, as 1 say, was two months ago. That was before I saw as I do now the vast preparation such an expedition requires. In point of time we were to make almost the longest journey possible under modern travelling conditions. To go from Hollywood to Mombasa, the East Coast key city to the African interior, is a matter of some 12,000 miles reading from West to East. By taking the other route, across the Pacific, the journey is but a few miles longer. After considering baggage facilities and calculating the total elapsed time in each case, it was decided that by going through New York, Paris, Genoa and Port Said we would

reach our destination more rapidly and with better handling of our equipment. I probably will never know whether or not we were correct,

Aside from the actual distance we were to travel, there was this matter of equipment. On every hand we were advised that to take more than a ton of kit into Africa was sheer foolishness. And yet, by our closest figuring, we were unable to reduce the

weight of our grim necessities to less than 80 or 90 tons. Our generator —the machine which would supply us light in the jungle —weighed 10 tons, the sound apparatus 5 tons; to say nothing of the camera paraphernalia, the high-power lamps, arc lights, laboratory equipment and the thousand-and-one smaller arti les which were essential to the filming of anything other than the simplest newsreel subjects.

It was when I surveyed this list of equipage that I first realised the magnitude of my assignment. For the first time in the history of movies I was to take a studio picture in the African jungle. It

was mv diTy, virtually, to trans. port the facilities of a Hollywood studio 12,000 miles to a spot in the wilds of British East Africa and there to make a coherent story, employing American actors for the princip d parts, and trusting to the n itural hunger of the animals and natives and a Winchester 40 to supply the thrills. And all I had to do was to restore to life the experiences encountered by an adventurous fellow who did nothing better than barter goods with a lot of natives, and proceed to tell the world about it. But as he went, let me add in fairness to myself, he was r< quired to pack no electrical generators, no Sound devices. The fact that the sun could not pern tr ite the jungle was to him a sure ase from the tropical heat rather than a condition which must 1) * rectified by use of pondetous arc lights and reflectors. Of < burse, consistent with the ire 1 i inconsistency of the m :s mind, the morel considered the impossibility of the expedition, the more I became convinced that I would ! ke to go and prove it possible. I went. We entrained from Hollywood on March 18. There were fifteen of us in all. Harry Carey, who had been selected to play the part ol the “Trader”; Edwin a Booth to be “Nina T”, the White Goddess; Duncan Ronaldo, cast as “Little Peru”; three camera men, two electricians, two technical experts, a script clerk, a carpenter, a white hunter, a laboratory man and myself. (Continuing)