“The Steel Magnolia Scrapbook:  Memories of Movie Making in a Small Town” has been digitized and is available through Northwestern State University’s Tradition’s website, where the university’s digital archives can be accessed.  First printed in 1989, the book was produced by the NSU Press and edited by Tom Gresham, Jerry Pierce and Tom Whitehead to document the movie’s filming in Natchitoches – and the effect the movie had on on the town — in the summer of 1988.  The film was released in 1989.

Long out of print, the book’s digitization coincides with an upcoming 30th anniversary story about the premier of the “Steel Magnolias” play in New York in Garden and Gun magazine.

“After 30 years, “Steel Magnolias” is still performed around the world, and the movie still has a large fan following,” Whitehead said. “The stories of making the movie in Natchitoches and on the Northwestern campus are still told.”

Access to NSU’s archives is accessible at traditions.nsula.edu where users can also browse archived editions of Potpourri, NSU’s yearbook;  the Current Sauce student newspaper, Alumni Columns magazine, Argus literary magazine, college catalogs and “NSU 125,” a coffee table book about NSU’s history.  All of the archives are searchable.

The upcoming Garden and Gun article will include photos form the book and NSU coverage at the time of the filming, according to Tom Whitehead who worked with the magazine’s photo researcher.

Whitehead credited Sonny Carter, image specialist at Watson Library, and NSU’s Director of Marketing and Branding Cole Gentry for their work on the project.