the film
Call of the Valley: The Enduring Lure of Sonoma is a labor of love -- more precisely a love of Sonoma Valley. It evolved from a three-way conversation between producer Julie Morrison, historian Bob Parmelee, and archivist Sandi Hansen about how to capture and preserve the beautiful richness of Sonoma Valley's historic legacy.
The film features conversations with Parmelee and other historians as well as legendary figures with longstanding roots in the community going back several generations.
The project encompasses not only the creation of the film but also the digitization and archiving of images from the historic Parmelee Collection which includes several hundred documents, photographs, maps, flags and artifacts representing an astonishing library of treasures dating back to the 1840s. Students from the Sonoma Valley High School's Advanced Photography class were responsible for the scanning of the images, many of which are highlighted in the film.
It is our hope that the film will be widely used as appropriate throughout the community including at our schools, parks, museums, libraries and for our many visitors.