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Long before Taylor Sheridan gave us the Dutton dynasty’s multi-generational frontier story, John Ford, George Marshall, and Henry Hathaway presented the story of the Prescott family. The 1962 epic “How the West Was Won” followed the Prescotts on their westward journey, thereby capturing the history of how manifest destiny played out in microcosm. The film was a big hit, helped in no small part by a cast as epic as the film’s scale. That cast included perhaps the most iconic actor of his generation, John Wayne.
The part of General William Tecumseh Sherman wasn’t one of Wayne’s best roles, simply because it provided him with around three minutes of screen time. But “How the West Was Won” was a prestigious project for the Duke, not only because of the film’s grandiose scale but because of the esteemed company in which Wayne found himself. Amassing that kind of ensemble cost Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer a pretty penny, but the studio almost spent as much on something decidedly less glamorous: wagons.
“How the West Was Won” was shot and showcased in Cinerama, an early precursor to the IMAX format that involved capturing scenes on three synchronized cameras and projecting the footage onto a 146-degree curved screen using three similarly synced 35mm projectors. Fittingly, the film boasted a trio of directors, who captured the action across five separate segments charting the experiences of the Prescotts and their descendants from the 1830s to the 1880s.
Who’d have thought that one of the biggest expenses for a film this vast would be wagons. Not to say that an epic about the history of westward expansion wouldn’t have considerable wagon requirements, but more than $1 million? According to producer Bernard Smith the film itself cost $14.4 million to make, which means a sizable chunk just went on transport.
How the West Was Won’s wagon woes
Not since the oft-overlooked but hugely influential Western epic “The Covered Wagon” had transportation been such a major consideration for a Western. In that 1923 silent feature, however, the Conestoga wagons were actual vestiges of American history. In May of 1961 when filming got underway on “How the West Was Won,” the filmmakers’ only option was to use wagons direct from Hollywood. The only problem was, “How the West Was Won” was deliberately filmed far from tinsel town.
Kentucky, the High Sierras, Jasper National Park, Arizona, Utah, South Dakota, Oregon, the Colorado Rockies; all these locations were used in “How the West Was Won.” As detailed in a New York Times article from 1963, the Rockies sequence in particular proved particularly costly, merely due to the fact production required wagons be transported from Los Angeles:
“More than a million dollars went into transportation. Mr. [Bernard] Smith gave as an illustration the sequence filmed near Montrose, Colo. This required covered wagons and the only covered wagons in the country are in Hollywood. The wagons had to be shipped 1,100 miles to Montrose on flat-bed trucks. Then a road had to be built from Montrose to the scene of the filming.”
According to the Times, the biggest expense was stars’ salaries, which totaled $2,204,000. Studio overhead came in second at $1,590,000, while location costs were third at $1,228,000. But thanks to the difficulty of transporting wagons to the Rockies, transport came in fourth at more than $1 million. Luckily, “How the West Was Won” grossed $50 million on a budget of $15 million and became a massive success. It also earned eight Oscar nominations, winning for Best Story and Screenplay, Best Sound, and Best Film Editing. No awards for commitment to wagon transportation, though.
John Wayne was barely in How the West Was Won
Interestingly enough, according to a separate New York Times report, “How the West Was Won” was budgeted at $12 million, which means the project went over budget by $2.4 million when it was all said and done. To think that at least a million of that was down to transporting wagons…
Not that John Wayne minded. His salary, along with all his co-stars, had already been taken care of by the time production had to shell out for the wagons. Of course, “How the West Was Won” wasn’t exactly a Wayne picture. The film boasted multiple A-listers including Henry Fonda, Gregory Peck, Debbie Reynolds, James Stewart, and narration by Spencer Tracy. The Duke only shows up as General William Tecumseh Sherman in the Civil War segment.
This was the section directed by John Ford, the same man who surprised everyone including Wayne when he gave the young actor his break in 1939 with “Stagecoach.” For this historic reunion you might have expected a little more than three minutes of screen time for Wayne. Alas the film was so packed with story and stars that a few minutes was all audiences got. At least they were able see Ford and Wayne team up that same year for one of their greatest ever collaborations in “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.”
While “How the West Was Won” is technically Wayne’s biggest box office success, it’s not really his film. That would make another 1962 John Wayne picture, “The Longest Day,” his biggest box office success — except that was also a sweeping, star-studded affair. This leaves 1969’s “True Grit,” which Wayne considered to be his first decent role in 20 years and which earned $37.6 million at the global box office.
