In December, The Kansas City Star launched "Reel Rare: Found Films from Old KC," a five-part series exploring early 20th-century Kansas City home movies and the stories they reveal.  

As the series title suggests, few Kansas City films from the 1920s and ’30s are still around – although a wide range of photos and postcards can be searched in Missouri Valley Special Collections.  

“It’s really hard to find footage of this era in Kansas City,” says Special Collections Librarian Michael Wells. “But if you do find it, it’s formal. It’s a newsreel type of situation.” 

However, a local collector recently unearthed a “treasure trove of rare reels,” as The Star’s Randy Mason says in the first video in the series, from the 1920s and ’30s. The films have been digitized and will soon be available to view on the Library’s The Pendergast Years site.

“Busy streets, familiar landmarks, unfamiliar landmarks,” describes Mason, “the zoo, a circus, and yes, a well-known historical figure, too.” That historical figure: political boss Tom Pendergast.  

Joe Tomelleri, a vintage camera and film collector, started buying the 16-millimeter films online four years ago. They were in unmarked film canisters.  

“If nobody knows what’s on it, it’s usually priced pretty low,” Tomelleri says. 

Since then, the Leawood, Kansas, resident and scientific illustrator has built a collection that includes footage shot in and around the Kansas City metro area.  

“You see footage, and it seems more real,” says Special Collections Manager Jeremy Drouin. “It just really gives you a clear picture of what the city was like during that time period.”  

Wells adds, “These are kind of just slices of life. We drown in footage of slices of life today, but it’s rare that we get to see that from the ’ 20s and ’ 30s.”