PT-109 Large Group of 65 Photos From the Movie Set. Released in 1963

Set of 60 black and white photos 4.75" x 3.5" and 5 faded color photos 3.5" x 3.5" which came from the movie set during the making of PT-109. The photos show dates along the top edge ranging from Aug, Sept, Oct, and Nov 1962, a full year before the release of the movie. The scenes vary from depicting the boat, to the actors holding guns, to people running on the sand amid palm trees, to the actors having their make-up applied, to scenes of the explosions and more. All the photos are in near fine or fine condition with the 5 color photos have the typical color fading.  From the collection of Ronald Hoskins, assassinologist.

In the summer of 1962 Warner Brothers filmed the movie PT 109, the saga of Jack Kennedy as a PT skipper in WWII, starring Oscar-winner Cliff Robertson. Much of the action took place at Little Palm Island –  then called Sheriff’s or Munson Island and owned by John Spottswood, who was County Sheriff at that time. To create a village look, Warner Brothers built many shacks and planted palm trees. Other action was filmed around Newfound Harbor and the smaller islands like Picnic and Bird. The old dredged harbor on the west side of Ramrod Key, near US 1, was the logistics base for the film crew. This harbor and Little Palm were owned by the Spottswood family, who facilitated the filming in many ways. Local boatmen piloted PT 109 during all the action except when there were close-ups of Cliff Robertson at the helm. John Spottswood, dressed in Navy garb, piloted one of the other PT boats.

Little Palm Island, now among the ten top resorts in the world, was described in a PT 109 filming report in Newsweek in 1962 as “a palm covered, gnat ridden, mosquito infested, eight-acre sand dab, broiling under the sun amidst the tepid, shark infested waters of the Florida coast .”  But for the film crew, Newsweek reported : “The discomfort of the location is nothing compared to the deadly dullness of the yellow-backed 134 page script marked ‘3d Rev. Final. PT 109. June 15, 1962’.” Because PT 109 was filmed during Kennedy’s administration, cooperation from the Navy in furnishing ships for the movie was easy – a destroyer from Key West participated along with three air-sea rescue boats converted to PTs.  But Warner Brothers found it necessary to publicize locally that the destroyer and other ships were here for the movie, not for another Bay of Pigs type invasion. The movie was released in 1963, five months before Kennedy was assassinated. BBECA owns a video tape of PT 109 which is available to members.

Cliff Sawyer was 15 in 1962 when Warner Brothers rounded up members of his “Graveyard Boys” in Key West to work for $11 a day from June until September. Cliff was selected for several roles, which meant he had to take a Greyhound bus at 5:30am every day to get from Key West to the crew base on Ramrod, and then catch the special boat to Little Palm. Cliff was the first paddle in the canoe scenes when “natives” rescued Kennedy and his crew from an imaginary South Pacific island (Little Palm). When asked to take a role as a Japanese sailor because they were short on ethnic Japanese, he said, “But I’m a black.” The director said, “It doesn’t matter, in uniform at that distance no one will know.” Cliff Robertson didn’t call Sawyer “Cliff,” he called him “Namesake” and told him that even movie stars “put their pants on one leg at a time.”

A great set of behind the scene photos.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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