Big, Bold and Brave is coming to the Deposit Historical Society on Nov. 21 at 7 p.m. by Judith Present, illuminating three men whose presence changed many lives. If you believe you’re a lion you are and if you believe you are a grasshopper you are. It is what one believes about themselves that makes a difference. Power comes in many forms, including charisma, control, physical strength and even money. But power and strength can be two different things. 

Louie B. Mayer (John Montgomery) was an ambitious man, which paid off. He was a film producer and Co-founder of Metro Goldwyn Mayer studios in 1924. He made it the most prestigious movie studio in Hollywood. Louie loved money and made sure nobody took advantage of him. He ruled his actors with an iron fist. Some actors disliked his attempts to control their private lives, while Louie wanted to make sure the company was known for wholesome entertainment and that included their personal lives. In his demands he ruined actors’ lives, one such, Judy Garland, when she was a child star in the Andy Hardy series with Micky Rooney. By 1951 as the taste for movies changed and the company began to lose profits he was forced out.  

Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (Nick DeLucia) was a circumspect leader and a man who would never ask his men to do anything he would not do himself. He was also good at improvisation, a man not afraid to throw away the rulebook or abandon plans if they were not working. This is what got all his men back home after the sinking of the Endurance as he led them across ice, sea and land with all the tools he could muster. He left his men on Elephant Island to get help promising to be back for them, and he was. He became famous for remarkable perseverance and survival. He died at 47 on January 5^th, 1922.  His last words, “In the darkening twilight I saw a lone star hover, gem-like above the bay.”

Buffalo Bill Cody (John Carey) had a love for the western style life and used it to make his career in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show making himself a legend. Many things he said about himself were true and many were embellished around the truth. His aim as an entertainer was to romanticize the frontier while leaving out all the physical hardships, like the mosquitoes, blizzards, drunkenness, the difficulty of clearing land for farming and wolves were never mentioned. Mark Twain termed Cody’s shows genuine "down to its smallest details." Even General George Armstrong Custer's widow endorsed its depiction of her husband's "Last Stand." But just how accurate was Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West show nobody knows for sure. Dramatic action for him was the name of the game and he proved himself to be an excellent showman until movies put him out of business.