Ginger2

“Backwards and In High Heels” Ginger Rogers, star of screen and stage, had roots in Eagle Point during her lifetime. Born in 1911 in Missouri, she got her start at age 14 in a dance competition and toured as she got older. She performed in Medford at the Hunt’s Craterian Theater in the 1920’s. She never forgot the beautiful Rogue Valley because in 1940 Ginger bought a 1000 acre ranch on the Rogue River in Eagle Point off of Highway 62 just before Shady Cove. By that time she was starring in memorable films with Fred Astaire as well as other film greats of that era - Katherine Hepburn, David Niven, Marilyn Monroe, and Cary Grant to name a few. At the 4-R ranch - Rogers’ Rogue River Ranch - she raised some crops, had an orchard, and raised farm animals, notably milk cows. It was the milk from those cows that was bottled and sent to Camp White, the WWII training camp for the military on Highway 62 in White City. Her film career spanned decades beginning in 1929, including winning an Academy Award in 1940 for “Kitty Foyle”, a non-musical movie. When the Craterian Theater in Medford was being rebuilt, she helped secure money from the Fred Meyer trust, and they were able to reopen in 1997 with the new name of The Craterian Ginger Rogers Theater. The Butte Creek Mill Foundation was gifted her car that she drove on her ranch. It is a 1975 Dodge Coronet Station Wagon with only 7,347 original miles on it! If you are interested in acquiring this piece of Ginger Rogers’ history, please contact us! She was an iconic figure in our community as well, and I would recommend looking up some of her movies and be transported back in time. Check out “Stage Door”, “Bachelor Mother”, and “Monkey Business” as well as her amazing dancing with Fred Astaire in films such as “Top Hat”, “Follow the Fleet”, “Shall We Dance”, and “Swing Time”. You’ll then see why it was said “She did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels!” Truly another one of our local treasures. Therese Hoehne

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