August 2012 Roundup – Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Join the Westerners Los Angeles Corral for the August 2012 Roundup, Wednesday, August 8, 2012, at Almansor Court, 700 South Almansor, Alhambra, California.

Social Hour will begin at 5PM, with Dinner served at 6PM.

It will be Hawaiian Shirt Night.

Our speaker will be Michael Duchemin, and his topic is entitled New Deal Cowboy: Gene Autry and Public Diplomacy.

For more information on Mr. Duchemin and his presentation:

Gene Autry is the only person to be awarded stars in all five categories on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, for film, television, music, radio, and live performance. He has also received numerous other awards. He was a brilliant business man as well who among other operations, owned TV and radio stations, and the Angels baseball team. Many wonderful things could be recounted about Gene Autry.

Westerners is very fortunate to have Michael Duchemin to speak about Gene Autry. Michael has made a study of the life of Gene and was the Chief Curator at the Autry Museum 1993-2008. The talk will be on Gene Autry and public diplomacy. Michael will explain how Gene Autry used his mastery of multi-platform entertainment and extraordinary storytelling in working with the Franklin Roosevelt administration to make policies more attractive to the American public. The career of Gene Autry will be explored to exemplify how public diplomacy worked within the American cultural industries and media culture. He will show how Autry’s persona redefined Americanism and the American Way for rural, small town and newly urban fans emerging from the Great Depression.

With broad training in the arts, humanities and social sciences, besides chief curator, Michael has also worked as a museum director, exhibition and program developer, project manager, historian, and author. He specializes in museum exhibitions projects related to the cultural and intellectual history of the United States and the American West. Michael is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, with a Masters from Arizona State University and a doctorate from the University of Nevada. Currently he is the Executive Director of the Chinese American Museum in Los Angeles.

See you Wednesday, August 8, 2012, in Alhambra.

– Joe Cavallo, Deputy Sheriff