Still from The Flying Ace shot just outside the wardrobe cottage, courtesy Florida State Library & Archives

Over the past decade, local preservationists and directors of Norman Studios Silent Film Museum and Old Arlington, Inc. worked alongside City of Jacksonville officials to help land state and federal grants to purchase four of the five Norman buildings. Passionate pleas to to state legislators landed emergency funding to repair structural damage that nearly destroyed several of the buildings.

Efforts are under way to annex a portion of the Norman Studios property to the National Parks Service to ensure continued preservation and development. Potential plans include a history center spotlighting Northeast Florida’s place in the motion picture industry; film-related workshops, field trips and summer camps for youth and adults of all income levels; and fun, open-to-the-public events; even family and corporate team-building experiences.

Wardrobe cottage as it looks today.

Over the next  year, the Friends of the Norman Studios will kick off a capital campaign that will allow us to fully support legislative efforts to annex the city-owned Norman property to the National Parks Service and to lease or purchase the remaining Norman building, bringing the entire complex back into the same fold. If you have professional grant writing, fundraising or capital campaign experience and would be interested in working with us to achieve the goal of allowing the Norman Studios its great comeback, please contact us at info@normanstudiossfm.org.