Byron Caplan’s Documentary Celebrates Small-Town America

After having spent more than 20 years covering such breaking stories as the TWA hostage crisis in Lebanon, the Reagan-Gorbachev summit, and the politics of the gulf war, assistant professor of television-radio Byron Caplan thought he’d like to take a look at a more relaxed and fun side of American life. So in the summer of 1998 he set off on an adventure around the country, stopping at little-known towns in search of some good stories. A stop in Hannibal, Missouri, led to his discovery of Tom Sawyer Days, which inspired Caplan to do some further research on small towns and the peculiar ways in which some of them celebrate their identities. The culmination of his research was a half-hour documentary, Three Small-Town American Celebrations, which has been broadcast twice on the Binghamton-area PBS station and has earned several awards, including a Broadcast Educators Association Faculty Production Competition documentary award and a silver regional Cindy Award from the International Association of Audio Visual Communicators.

Hannibal’s Tom Sawyer Days (photo), held annually on the Fourth of July, attracts visitors from all over the world to experience the town as seen through the eyes of its most famous son, Mark Twain. The fence-painting contest is perhaps the best-known and best-loved event, but entrants are legion, too, for the Tom Sawyer and Tomboy Sawyer look-alike, bubblegum-blowing, watermelon seed–spitting, frog-jumping, and minnow-catching contests. You can see why Caplan couldn’t pass up a chance to record such a celebration!

After discovering Tom Sawyer Days, Caplan heard about Lucy-Desi Days in Jamestown, New York, and the irresistible draw in Bethel, Maine, known as the North American Wife-Carrying Championships. During Lucy-Desi Days participants get silly and messy while taking part in a grape-stomping contest, reenacting an I Love Lucy episode. In Bethel the crowds roar with laughter and cheer as men carry their wives on their backs while navigating a demanding obstacle course. The motivation for such absurd behavior? It’s certainly not big prize money or fame. According to Caplan, it’s "pure joy. People participate because it’s fun."

Caplan loves small towns and these festivals. An admirer of the late CBS reporter Charles Kuralt, he says he has tried to model his work on Kuralt’s. While the documentary shows a lighter side of life, it also honors small-town America in ways that Kuralt did in his On the Road series. "There is something more genuine, more real, about small towns," says Caplan. "Every place has its own unique history. That uniqueness creates a sense of identity for that place --- and it is in small places where that identity is most important." Not only do the festivals attract visitors from afar and bring in money to their host towns, he points out, but they actually bring the communities themselves together.

The creation of Three Small-Town American Celebrations was an all-consuming labor of love for Caplan. He spent the summers of 1999 through 2001 independently researching, writing, filming, and editing, and he created original music for the documentary. It was a challenging but rewarding project, he says, because he did all the work on his own. A summer research grant from the College enabled him to carry out his plans.

Caplan continues to explore his interest in the unique and far-fetched. One of his current projects focuses on particularly peculiar homes. "Outrageousness," he says, "is a draw."