Ben-Hur at the Strand Theater

You may already be familiar with the 1959 movie version of Ben-Hur starring Charlton Heston, but did you know it was already filmed twice before that as silent films, the first time in 1907, and then again in 1925? The 1925 film starred Ramón Novarro as Judah Ben-Hur.This version was a big hit for MGM, and its cost of $4-$6 million made it the most expensive silent film ever. Your library has preserved a part of a booklet that was circulated in Crawfordsville several weeks before this film was to be shown at the Strand Theater. The movie was shown twice daily for three days beginning on January 10, 1926. You can see a part of the cover here. To see the four-page booklet, view the .pdf at http://history.cdpl.lib.in.us/images/p025-7.pdf

The middle two pages of the booklet show pictures from the movie with captions describing the scenes.