The 40 acre backlot is the misnomer that was given to what was actually about 29 acres of land in Culver City, California, first used as a movie studio backlot in 1926 by Cecil DeMille, who had leased the property from Achille Casserini in March of 1926.

DeMille’s production company utilized the backlot for numerous silent films, including ‘The King of Kings’ (1927), for which a large Jerusalem temple and town were constructed, ‘The Fighting Eagle’ (1927), ‘Forbidden Woman’ (1927) and ‘The Godless Girl’ (1929).

In 1928, DeMille’s Culver City studio and backlot were acquired by RKO Pictures, whose films there on the backlot included ‘Bird of Paradise’ (1932) and the 1933 classic, ‘King Kong’. In 1937, David Selznick acquired the property in a long-term lease, and used the backlot to re-create a Civil War era Atlanta for his 1939 epic ‘Gone With The Wind’. During the filming of GWTW, leftover sets on the lot, including the King Kong gate were burned to depict the burning of Atlanta.

Under a variety of owners over the next two decades, the backlot appeared in dozens of films, and by the early 1950’s, the lot began to appear in television productions, including ‘The Adventures of Superman’.

Pictured below is in an aerial view from 1958 that shows the Tara set and what would become the Courthouse in ‘The Andy Griffith Show’. Also shown here are two photos of Tara, just before it was dismantled in 1959. As you will see in Part 5, Tara is now in Georgia and we’ll see if for the first time since 1959.

In 1958, the backlot changed ownership from RKO to Desilu Studios. For the next ten years, the backlot would provide outdoor locales for Desilu’s own television productions, as well as for series produced by others.

From 1960 – 1968, ‘The Andy Griffith Show’ exteriors would be shot on a set that was originally constructed for use as the streets of Atlanta for ‘Gone With The Wind’…that was “Mayberry.”

Paramount Pictures eventually bought out Desilu, and in 1968, sold off the Culver City studio facilities. As the studio continued to change hands, the “40 Acres” backlot fell out of use and into disrepair in the early 1970’s, and in 1976 it was bulldozed and the land was sold to industry.

Much of the information and many photos we will see this weekend are from the great Retro Web site which is linked below. There are hundreds of rare photos of the 40 Acres property there and you MUST visit. Many thanks to the site’s creators and it’s contributors for their extraordinary archival work on this subject, and many others. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

http://www.retroweb.com/40acres.html

Source