It’s Wine Walk Time!

Come visit us at the Wine Walk on Delaware, this Saturday the 21st from 5p to 8p, featuring local wine, musicians, artists, and more! Tickets are $15 and are good for wine sampling at all participating Delaware Street businesses. A portion of proceeds will benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

Here’s how it works: 

Purchase your Wine Walk tickets at The Farmhouse (300 Delaware), our favorite farm-to-table eatery, or Cafe al Dente (412 Delaware), our favorite place for pizza and a beer. $15 gets you a Somerset Ridge Winery stemless glass, a wristband, and a map of Delaware’s wine stops.

This month’s Wine Walk features:

wine from Somerset Ridge Winery

the musical stylings of  Eric Houser and friends (on Cafe al Dente’s patio)

a vintage Mustang car show

a variety of local artists — photographers, painters, jewelry makers and more!

the Wide Awakers

Who’s invited:
This event is open to everyone, so bring your friends and family for a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon.  However, it is not recommended to bring small children, as this event is for a  21+ crowd, in which alcohol is being served.

Commemorating the Battle of Shiloh with a New Film

It’s the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Shiloh, one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War. We’ve been working with the Civil War Trust to produce a new interactive animated map of Shiloh’s battle, which debuted last Friday, bringing the fight to life in 17 minutes of High-Definition film and 3D animation.

As it turns out, everyone’s talking about Shiloh lately. After all, it was a pretty important battle. Author Winston Groom (most notably, of Forrest Gump, and most recently of a non-fiction work entitled Shiloh 1862), penned this opinion piece for the New York Times, which stylistically explains Shiloh’s significance to the war as a whole.

Chicago Tribune writer Stephan Benzkofer summarized Shiloh’s fight and aftermath, recalling the heavy cost of the North’s victory. The Trib has been commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Civil War throughout the Sesquicentennial by reprinting news stories from notable battles. USA Today featured Shiloh National Military Park as an exciting 2012 travel destination. This publicity for Shiloh is great news for our friends at the Civil War Trust, who have just launched a fundraising campaign to preserve 491 acres of Shiloh’s battlefield, with the intent to save the land from commercial development.

A few interesting facts about the Battle of Shiloh:

• Nearly 24,000 men fell killed or wounded at Shiloh, more casualties than in all previous American wars combined.
• Shiloh’s Confederate General Albert Sydney Johnston, killed in action 150 years ago today, was the highest-ranking officer to die in battle during the Civil War.
•  Shiloh boasted one of the largest naval engagements ever waged by an American army, employing 174 steamboats transporting troops via the Tennessee River

Just in case, here’s a little more background on the Battle of Shiloh and its historical importance!

150th Shiloh!

Shane and Ed just returned from a whirlwind weekend in Tennessee, where they toured the Shiloh National Military Park and met with members of the Blue Gray Alliance. The BGA is sponsoring the mega-important 150th Anniversary of Shiloh event, which takes place this March. WAF is gearing up for our part of it, which will include five days of shooting at the event itself, where we’ll be the official film crew (i.e., the only one allowed on the battlefield).

This is as good a time as any for our big announcement:

Wide Awake Films will release a brand new documentary about the Battle of Shiloh in June 2012! Now, you may say, “WAF already has a Shiloh film.” But this one will be new and improved, featuring amazing new graphics and animated maps (by Keith), as well as new footage in glorious High-Definition (by our Viper Filmstream Camera). Should you feel sad for the old Shiloh film, not to worry. We’re re-releasing it, along with five other never-before-seen-on-DVD WAF films as “The Wide Awake Films Classic Collection,” also available this June. So get ready.

A few items of note about this year’s Shiloh reenactment:

Reenacting just got a little more authentic. For this event, and this event only, reenactors can travel to Shiloh by rail and by boat, in true 1860s-style. A historic locomotive, the 844, provided by special arrangement with Union Pacific Railroad, will carry reenactors (including WAF’s Jeff and Brian) in thirteen passenger cars, stopping in Omaha, Kansas City, Jefferson City, St. Louis, and Memphis on its way to the battle site. This marks the first time in 150 years that troops in period attire will be transported by rail from the far west to the battle lands of Tennessee. But that isn’t all. Reenactors dressed as the 15^th Iowa Infantry (including our own Shane Seley) will arrive by paddle wheel boat via the Tennessee River, just as that unit did in April of 1862.

Of course, our pal Bob Szabo, wet-plate collodion photographer of National Geographic, Jack Daniels’ and Parade Magazine fame, will be providing live photography demonstrations and generally being a bad-ass, like usual. Visitors to the event can also check out a full-scale replica of the Confederate warship the C.S.S. Hunley, which, incidentally, was the first submarine ever to sink an enemy ship in combat. (It’s even been in the news lately! Way to be contemporary, Hunley.) They’re telling us that this is the last traveling appearance of the Hunley, and we believe them, so it’s now or never, folks. Unless you want to visit it at its home in South Carolina, which you’re welcome to do.  Lastly, the 150th Shiloh will feature a thriving, yet fictional, civilian town, which has even gone so far as to name a mayor. The town will hustle and bustle with living historians in period clothing, scurrying away from nearby invading soldiers. Sounds exciting.

In short, this is a Civil War geek’s dream. We’re all pretty psyched.

Here’s the skinny on the event, for those who’d like to attend: Tickets are available online at www.shiloh150.org! The event will be held adjacent to the Shiloh National Military Park in near Pickwick, Tennessee.

Christmas at WAF!

First Christmas in our new office! It looks so festive.

The USS Monitor Sails Again

Here’s a short segment we did as part of a 126-minute documentary on the history of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers. More snippets and news of the show coming soon!

The Sesquicentennial in Missouri

The Sesquicentennial is upon us and celebrations of the 150th Anniversary of the American Civil War are happening right on our home turf. So far this year, WAF filmed both the Battle of Wilson’s Creek Reenactment in Springfield and the Battle of Lexington in, um, Lexington. We just can’t get enough of this stuff, you know.

Some Amazing Projection Work!

Congrats to our friends at Bazillion Pictures and Substream Music on their amazing artistic spectacle! These guys put on a spectacular show at the opening for the Kauffman Center of the Performing Arts here in KC.

Opening Night Projections at Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts

 

Americans by Choice

We’ve been working with Jean Svadlenak of Svadlenak Museum Consulting since June on an exhibit film for the US District Court in honor of Kansas’ 150 years of statehood. The exhibit, entitled ”Americans by Choice,” presents the history of immigration in Kansas and includes incredible stories, from 1840s Irish immigrants to modern day Sudanese refugees. Our film features about 15 new Kansas citizens, who describe their reasons for naturalizing, their personal plights, and their pride as Americans. We’ve also produced a version of the film that will play at all naturalization ceremonies in Topeka, Wichita, and Kansas City, KS.

The exhibit  at US District Court in Kansas is now open to the public at 500 State Ave, 6th Floor, in KCK!

 

 

Two Weddings and a…Labor Day Weekend

Two weddings this weekend at WAF! Congrats to Jeff & Kate and Keith & Julie! Best wishes for all of you.

Aftermath: From the Civil War to Today

Interesting comments regarding a video Wide Awake Films produced for and in collaboration with Andy Talkov and the Virginia Historical Society, as part of their exhibit “An American Turning Point: The Civil War in Virginia.” If this all sounds familiar, that’s because “Aftermath” is one of three pieces we created for VHS’ traveling Sesquicentennial exhibit.

BTW – That’s not Jimi’s version of the “Star Spangled Banner” – it was done by our good friend, Cody West, an amazing musician and great fellow.