Buddy Ebsen Exhibition on Display at Univ. of Wyoming American Heritage Center

“The Entertaining Life of Buddy Ebsen” is the new exhibition hosted by the University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center (AHC)

“The exhibit begins with Ebsen’s days as a song and dance man in vaudeville and in the ‘Ziegfeld Follies,’” says AHC Assistant Archivist Roger Simon, who curated the exhibition. “It then moves to his early Hollywood career in the late 1930s, when he acted alongside stars such as Jack Benny, Barbara Stanwyck and Judy Garland.”

Ebsen’s big break should have come when he played the Tin Man in “The Wizard of Oz” in 1939, but the aluminum dust in his makeup caused major health problems; he was hospitalized and forced to leave the production. Ebsen later observed, “I had ingested pure aluminum; it had coated my lungs like paint.”

The Ebsen exhibition features materials from all stages of his career, even exploring his playwriting and painting. It will be on display in the AHC’s loggia through Jan. 15. Through his wife Dorothy Ebsen’s gift, Buddy Ebsen’s papers and effects make the AHC exhibition possible, Flesher says.

The American Heritage Center in Laramie is open 10-5 Monday-Friday.

For more information, visit UW’s AHC at www.uwyo.edu/ahc/.