For whatever the reasons, although I'm certain it had quite a lot to do with satisfying a destiny that lurked far into the future waiting for my arrival, I left Alexander Film Company and Colorado Springs, CO in 1961. Next final destination, a return to New York City, with a planned, but temporary lay-over in Philadelphia, PA.

For whatever the reasons, although I'm certain it had quite a lot to do with satisfying a destiny that lurked far into the future waiting for my arrival, my so-called temporary lay-over in Philadelphia, PA extended into a 37 year lay-over and to this day finds me still in Pennsylvania. But not in Philadelphia. Fortunately.

Although a lot of new memories have piled up in the past 37 years, the memories of time well spent and loved at Alexander Film Company, although perhaps slightly dimmed, are still vivid enough, and hopefully accurate enough, for yet another re-telling to those still interested in such things.

As the years pushed me further into whatever, I often thought about AFCO and the fine people I worked with there and what had become of it all. But time took it's toll, as it often does. As letters and phone calls became fewer and far between, and like the dodo bird, travelling in ever diminishing circles until it eventually disappears into itself, contacts were seemingly lost for all time. And along with that, AFCO etc., slipped quietly, albeit sadly, into yesteryear and became a thing of the past, and that, as they say, was that.

Ah! But they also say, "You can't hold a good memory down!" Or is it "... a good man .." Oh, well, whatever. Suddenly, the memories poured forth all over again! What caused this tidal wave of recollection and interest? Three major events:

1. A visit to Colorado Springs in 1997 with my blushing bride, Monica.
2. Another trip to Colorado Springs (with same bride - still blushing) in 1998.
3. The serendipitous discovery of Tim Reed's Drive-In Theatre Workshop.

It was during the 1997 trip that a happy contact was made with a former AFCO film director that I worked with 'way back then. He informed us that AFCO, as we once knew it, no longer existed. The huge, 18 acre lot had been parcelled off and sold to smaller and different businesses. Although there was a local outfit called Alexander Film and Video Company, it had nothing to do with the original. Or so it was thought. Unfortunately, it was almost time to return to Pennsylvania, so further exploration and investigation would have to wait. An attempt was made to locate the old AFCO location, but it proved fruitless. Too many things and landmarks had changed over the years.

But the 1998 trip to the Springs was a success! First of all, we found Alexander Film and Video. A wonderful company! We met the owners, Andy and Regina. We were warmly welcomed and given super treatment by them. The company is not in the film production business, but deals mainly with transfers of film to tape and duplication services. Not only does the original AFCO logo represent this company, but the "feel" of AFCO was even present, although on a smaller scale. And surprise! There along the wall as you enter into the main lobby, a museum of memorabilia painstakingly salvaged from the original Alexander Film Company. We also now had the time to look for the old AFCO lot. Thanks to Andy, we were pointed in the right direction and we finally found it!

It took awhile for the initial shock of what we saw to wear off. In all honesty, I never expected it to look as I remembered it, but I also never expected it to look the way it did. Like a war zone! One ruined building after an another. Wood rotted ... windows all broken and blown out ... wreckage and debris and weeds everywhere! I just could not believe my own eyes.

We looked around for someone we could ask for permission to enter the property and to look around. To our good fortune, we met Arnie, one of the workmen. I explained that I worked for AFCO about 37 years ago and if possible, we'd like to just take a look here and there for old time's sake. I think at first I may have been viewed with a bit of suspicion, but the more I spoke about the past, the more I felt I was finally being believed. So we not only received permission, but Arnie totally extended himself, and after fetching a flashlight (there was no electricity) took us on a great tour thru most of the buildings.

It was so bitter-sweet seeing what had become of a once bustling business. We wandered around taking many photos of what was remaining. On Tim Reed's website, Drive-In Theatre Workshop, he has a provided a link, Intermission Films, that provides a concise history of Alexander Film Co. along with some wonderful photos, in particular, an aerial view of almost the entire AFCO lot with it's main building in full view. Needless to say, things no longer look like they do in that photo.

The main building, located at 3200 N. Nevada Ave., was torn down years ago and the space is now occupied by Colorado Springs National Bank. Looking to the left of the photo, past the 3 sound stages, is an area now occupied by a Super K-Mart and studios of KKTV Television station. Directly behind the main building you'll see a structure with a center building and 4 buildings at each compass point. I believe one of those buildings contained my area as well as sound and film editing, a screening room for dailies, the lab managers office, recording and sound mixing (before mixing was moved to a building all its own), the re-recording area and a few other related rooms.

Still on the structure directly behind the main building. As I recall, the largest of the 4 buildings surrounding the center one, that is, the building sticking out right behind the main one in the photo at right, was like a great day room inside. A meeting hall. It had a piano inside. I'd go there when I was writing music. It also was the place where the hams at Easter and the turkeys at Christmas were given to each and every employee. When IATSE arrived on the scene, the meetings and voting was held in that place.

If you look at the area of the photo in the upper right corner you'll see three Quonset huts and some other buildings. This is the area Monica and I first wandered into to last month when we visited the lot. Those Quonsets are still there and the buildings nearby. But they have all been pretty much gutted out and there are messes galore in all of them. Stuff was everywhere. I picked up some carbons for the old projectors, some rolls of 35mm and 16mm magnetic film stock ... some rolls of 35mm and 16mm leader .., a couple of audio tapes in their boxes for a commercial ... a floor plan of some of the area (a great plan!) and schematic of a 35mm film path threading. Great stuff! I wish I had taken some more ... Arnie told me to help myself. He showed me the 1/4" Presto tape recorder he was able to salvage. And it still works!

Arnie took us to the part of a building that once contained the processing lab. Except for several stained and rusted units on the wall that once displayed and recorded processing details such as temperature, the area was now empty. Just scraps of junk here and there on the dirt floor. AFCO did all their own processing and there was so much of it that the silver released from the film during processing was reclaimed.

I saw the old screening rooms, seats and screen intact ... projector still operating. They are restoring the room. I saw the mixing room I worked in. The screen is gone and there is a small airplane in there that someone is restoring. It was an old Alexander craft from the old days when Alexander was also in the aircraft business. The sound booth was still there which reminded me of some of the voice over announcers that were often around at that time. Wes Bradley, Paul ????? ... some local TV/radio personalities in those days. They came and did voice overs for us for a lot of the spots. There were others, such as Lou Crosby who did the v.o. for some automobile commercials. Also, we did a rather long promotional for Dodge in which Johnny Cash did the vocals, called "Wheels Keep A-Rollin' ". That was around 1960 or so. A feature film, "Anatomy Of A Psycho" was produced there before I left. Now there was a film that never quite made it to Mr. Maltin's list!

During that time, I also wrote a Sunday feature for the now long gone, Colorado Springs Free Press daily newspaper. So I knew Wes and that gang from my association with the paper. The piece was a review of music, theatre, jazz, films, local people, etc. In those days, a lot of "names" turned up in the Springs that performed at the many clubs that existed then, and I would do interviews for my column, "Horns Of Plenty"

I became friendly with John Lee, a fellow actor with the Colorado Springs Civic Players, who also was employed at AFCO. One day, in half-jest, half-seriousness I said to him: "Hey, John, why don't you see if you can get me a nice, cushy job at Alexander." He said, "What do you want to do?" I told him I want to write music but I'd do anything else. I couldn't believe it when about 2 days later, he told me he had arranged an interview for me! I found out at the interview that John was a VP! Ah, yes, not what you know but who you know.

But I was hiredl I was still in the Army Band at Fort Carson, but was given a part time job in the sound department to learn recording, mixing, editing and when the budget allowed, to write original music! What a break! When the budget didn't allow, I used the Capitol Film Music Library to put tracks together, but ah ... those times when the budget did allow! I couldn't believe I was actually writing music for real film projects! And when I was discharged from the service, I continued full time at AFCO. In 1960 some of the spots we did were submitted to the Venice Film Festival and I think we got some awards for them.

On the entries I'm named as Charles Speranza. That was a mistake. I did have the nickname of Charlie, and I guess whoever sent in the material, thought I was a Charles. Also the names Lew Tilley and Ralph Papin appear as the directors. I've lost track of Ralph, but Lew still lives in the Springs and I did see him on one of our visits. He's of course a bit older than I am ... well, back then pretty much all the folk I worked with were older ... 10 or more years! My boss then was Bob Price, but someone I spoke to thinks he has passed away. Bob Olds, we think, is in Denver somewhere.

This last trip, I had a great phone chat with someone I worked with in the sound department, Horace Dyer, a technician. Hopefully, we'll get together on our next trip. I also had a lengthy chat with Tom Kirk. Back then he was in charge of the huge maintenance department, but from what I understand, he also bought the company at one time. Prior to Alexander Film & Video taking over, the place was also owned by someone by the name of Hawks. And prior to that Bob Olds. And prior to that ...

AFCO was a great place to work during the time I was there. People were treated kindly and with respect and were really friendly towards one another. I guess starting in the late 60s and thereon, things started going downhill, from what I can learn. Yes, the drop in drive-ins, and TV accounted for the descent of AFCO, but also, so many different owners and changes in attitudes and the politics also contributed to its downhill slide. Sad.

So all these things were going on and I was still pretty much a young whippersnapper ... a 20 something pissant! Yeah, I loved working at AFCO and I really should have stayed there, but I really wanted so much to get back to NYC, but as I said, I never made it past Philly! Started to work there at Independence Film Company as Music Director and since it was a smaller place, took care of all of their sound work. It finally closed and I needed to find a job real fast.

Most of the film places had left Philly and I wasn't ready to take a chance in NY so I walked into Philadelphia National Bank, which became CoreStates Bank, which is now First Union and was given a job on the night shift as computer operator in 1965. After a year or so I transferred to the programming dept and stayed with it for almost 31 years! All the time there I kept thinking it was only "temporary" until I could get on my feet and get back to NY. Yeah ... real temporary!

Unfortunately, I no longer have anything from my time at AFCO. At one time I had artwork, animation cells, some photos, script scenarios, some music, tapes, several reels of film, etc., all the kind of things you'ld like to see! But over the years they seem to have gotten lost in the shuffle. Too many moves. Oh, well. I regret not holding onto that stuff and being more careful with it. I guess that's why I'm so greedy now and trying to get as much together of that great place as possible.

It's so sad when things just "get away". It was just so really careless on my part to lose all the stuff I had carried around for years and half way across the country. Photos ... tapes ... films ... scripts, etc., all lost somewhere. At least I was able to pick up a few things on this last trip before it was all gone.

Well, as I said, I miss being in that business. At least, thanks to technology, I continue my musical composition and arranging. After our trip to the Springs last year, I wrote a 29 minute orchestral piece called: "A Colorado Journey" which attempts to describe, musically, some of the places we visited there. Seven Falls, Garden of the Gods, Cliff Dwellers; Cave of the Winds, etc. A tone painting. Doing this stuff keeps me out of trouble and off the streets!

The Capitol Film Music Library was around for years and was used by quite a few film production houses ... including the major studios! It was quite good and must have had a million hours of music available. The DeWolfe Library, another musical library, was not there. Yes, I do indeed remember writing music for the "drive-in" spots. As a matter of fact, quite a few! There were fun to write and challenging in that there was not a lot of time to develop themes and they had to be complete in a very short time. Of course there were longer spots and I especially liked to do those.

I would go off and write and when we had enough for recording we'd schedule a session and record a whole lot of music. In a sense, we put together our own "library" of music that was, of course, royalty free and could be used over and over on anything. Some of them were also pretty lush sounding. Lots of strings and woodwinds ... some were jazz combos ... some big band ... lots of different styles and sounds. Tim has commented to me about the "cold chills" he feels upon hearing certain music. I know what he means! I love those lush sounds also! Full, rich orchestrations with beautiful, haunting melodies and inner instrumentation that can be so complimentary to visuals. I still feel that way and hopefully, always will!

Of course my music was not just for the drive-ins, but also for other spots and promotions. I think I might be able to recognize my stuff ... some of it was pretty similar to the kind of things in the Capitol Library ... since that's what they wanted. Those three commercials in the Venice Film Festival had music I provided. I also had a great time writing for some Ford auto commercials. It was a little unusual in that it was written for woodwind quintet, harp and five voices ... 4 male and 1 female. They wanted a catchy jingle so I gave them a catchy jingle! "Go Ford, buy Ford ... for looks they admire ..." & etc.

Outside of AFCO, I also continued to do big band arrangements, for local folk as I did while I was still in the Army at Carson. I loved to do vocals. The girl in the group mentioned above sang locally also and I did a number of vocal arrangements for her as well as some of the singers I knew from my army days. I always enjoyed doing vocal arrangements. I could use the vocalist as a totally solo instrument and then write these full backgrounds that everyone seemed to like. I'm currently reconstructing some of my old big band arrangements (as I remember them) for Monica (the bride) to hear. Some of them were originally done as vocals, but since I have no vocalist I've substituted a nice, legato flute to take the singing part. Works out pretty well. But I sure do miss doing all that stuff for real! Ah ... but I remember ...

"Anatomy of a Psycho", although it was great to work on a "real feature" film, was something else. I wonder if any prints of it exist or were they all destroyed, intentionally or otherwise? It was pretty much all produced at AFCO and various Colorado Springs locations. Most of the cast was brought in from California although some local talent did appear in it. John Lee, that fellow I mentioned earlier that was responsible for my employment, had a part in it. Although some crew was also brought in from California, it was mostly AFCO people. The director, Boris Petroff, was also from California. It was not IATSE, but another California union whose name escapes me. AFCO was totally non-union, but as I was getting ready to head for Philly, (and make my mark!), IATSE did appear on the scene, and I believe it was voted in.

Most of the talent AFCO used for Voice Overs was local either drawn from radio or TV. None of them were actually employees of AFCO. Some were from out of town. Lou Crosby was a Californian that was often used. He had quite a distinctive voice ... a voice with an attitude!

On-screen people were usually local folk, but again, there were times when they were brought in from other places. I even had a hand in bringing in some people. There was a fellow, Gordon, from Colorado College that had a super voice and I urged him to come in and audition. He did, and was hired for a bunch of VOs for drive in trailers. A singer I did vocal arrangements for, Bonnie Boyd, was also brought in for screen testing and she wound up doing some things also.

About sound recording/transfers. We had a number of machines. Most of the V.O. stuff was recorded on a Fairchild 1/4 inch tape machine at 15 ips. using their Pic-Sync Signal technology. Paul, or Wes, or whoever, would show up every morning about 9:30 AM and take his place in the booth. All the copy to be read was on individual cards. There was a special clock behind the mike that the announcer would set 5 or so seconds before the zero mark and then at zero would read the copy and hopefully get it in before the 10, 20, 30 or 60 second mark was reached! These guys were good and there were seldom a problem.

The way sound tracks are placed on film, there was a 1 1/2 second delay before the sound started and it ends a 1/2 second before the end of the film. (Due to placement of optical sound pickup head in the projector and splicing.) This was also indicated on the timing card that the announcer had in front of him as shaded areas. These V.O.s were all destined for the drive-in "clocks" and trailers ... AFCO's bread and butter. Original recording took about 2 - 3 hours each morning.

Afterwards, I'd take the tape and edit out all the flubs, jokes, expletives, etc., and as I did that, I'd add the syncpop, at the obligatory 1 1/2 second mark prior to the start of audio for each trailer and also make sure it was within the time limit. Also, had to remove P "pops" and breath sounds and things like that. When the tape was "clean", I'd go to the re-recording room, load up the 35mm film into the sound recording camera, and re-record the tape to 35mm optical film. In between each trailer, I put an optical "mark" on the film so Annabelle, the cutter would see it after processing when she did her final edit. These particular 1/4 inch tapes were not transferred to mag film but used as is. The PicSync signal was enough to sync to the picture.

Some of those optical recording cameras can be seen in a photo on the Alexander pages on Tim's website that also shows an announcer doing his thing. The photo is somewhat fuzzy, but it's possible that the fellow in the booth is Paul, himself. As for the engineer at the console, I can't be 100% certain, but it just may be a gentleman by the name of Vilmars Zile. He was responsible for training me. He was there before I arrived and long after I left. But I have no idea where he is now.

The mag film recorders, Magnasync 16 and 35mm machines, were used for live sound recording along with picture, and also to mix down all tracks, dialogue, music, SFX to a master. At times 1/4 inch also went to mag film. When I was editing on the Moviola I would need mag film, of course, since that's what ran side by side with the picture. Edited voice, music and sound effects tracks were then all synced and a final mix produced. All final mixes were then re-recorded to optical tracks. A far cry from the days when all sound was done directly to optical film. If there was a goof, or whatever, the recorders had to be reloaded since you just couldn't erase or back up and record over. It must've been a real grunt in those days!!

Yes, I did a lot of editing of audio, on tape and mag film! I loved it! I just loved all that stuff and Man! do I ever miss it!! Ah ... but at least I remember ...

Recently, I came across a newspaper article that closes down the AFCO story once and for all. It tells of the selling of the " ... last remaining parcel of the former Alexander Film Company ... consisting of 11.37 acres ..." and how the area is planned to be redeveloped into " ... offices and warehouses ...". I suppose that during our recent visit there, we were witness to some of that redevelopment in progress. Chances are we were there in the nick o' time, as they say, since I imagine that if we had postponed our visit to the area for another year or so, we would have found nothing but offices and warehouses.

And that, as they also say, is that.