In just over a year, planners say a new museum celebrating Oregon’s film history will open to the public in the Cottage Grove Armory. The city and surrounding area has served as a backdrop to many notable films since the 1920s.
Recently in the lobby of Cottage Grove City Hall, Katherine Wilson’s voice trembled as a finance clerk handed her and her husband Phillip a $15,000 check.
“Let’s pull it out of the envelope for you,” said the clerk.
“Yeah,” said Wilson, softly crying. She motioned to her husband to take the check.
“Thank you, very much,” he responded, before adding. “I’m going to Mexico!”
“Don’t even joke about that!” chided Wilson, as several staffers laughed.
The money from the Woodard Family Foundation launches a 24-year dream for Wilson, who’s worked on many major film projects in the past half century, including “National Lampoon’s Animal House.”
Nicknamed “The Godmother of Film in Oregon,” Wilson has worked both on-screen and behind-the-scenes for multiple Hollywood productions, with titles ranging from location manager to director. Looking intently at the check, she explained to KLCC what the money will cover.
“Building the six ‘Animal House’ bedroom sets in the basement of the armory,” she said. “We’ve got 14 months to get it all built and set decorated.”
Wilson said back in the 1970s, dozens of universities and colleges had been approached to film John Landis’ comedy of a hedonistic fraternity house’s antics at fictional Faber College in the early 1960s. The University of Oregon agreed, forever tying the school, and the county, to the movie.
According to the university’s account of the school’s involvement with the film, UO President at the time, William Beatty Boyd, previously declined to allow “The Graduate” to be filmed at the University of California-Berkley when he was head administrator some years before, and didn’t want to repeat that regret (though he also had reservations about the more raunchy elements of Landis’ film shot on his campus).
The infamous closing scene shows the Delta House misfits sabotaging a parade, as horrified university administrators and straitlaced Omega House members watch on. A building currently housing the Cottage Grove Chamber of Commerce had one of its front windows smashed in by a runaway car as part of the filming in 1977.
In the back of her vehicle, Wilson pulled out a diorama showing the schematics of the museum, which will be developed in the armory’s basement. The dorm rooms or bedrooms of various “Animal House” characters will be recreated.
“We were nobodies until that movie,” Wilson said, reflecting on the box-office success of the movie, which elevated the status of many of its actors –including Saturday Night Live performer John Belushi – and turbocharged the career of director John Landis, who went on to other major hits including “The Blues Brothers” and “An American Werewolf in London.”
To this day, many tourists and movie aficionados frequent sites used in filming "Animal House,” including a cafeteria booth at the University of Oregon’s ERB Memorial Union, and Cottage Grove’s downtown.
Kurt Liedtke is secretary for the newly-formed nonprofit, Oregon Arts and Film, which is supporting Wilson’s project. He said Cottage Grove has been an “epicenter” for filmmaking for decades.
“Going back to the silent film era and the much-celebrated Buster Keaton film, ‘The General’ through films like ‘Stand By Me’ and of course, ‘National Lampoon’s Animal House,’” Liedtke told KLCC. He added that while his organization’s immediate focus will be on filmmaking ventures in Lane County, it’ll eventually look to support projects across the state. He said Oregon has a lot of geographic diversity that provides settings for all types of movies, from metropolitan centers to deserts to coastlines.
“This state packs everything you would need for a single film production, which not a lot of states can offer,” he said.
Cottage Grove city manager Mike Sauerwein said he expects the movie museum to be a huge draw for tourists. He said its scheduled opening next year will coincide with a visit by the traveling mural group, The Walldogs, who’ll do a series of 15 murals across the downtown when they visit.
“This is just really the beginning of the process,” Sauerwein said when asked about other funding opportunities and needs for the movie museum. “But I’m a child of the 70s, so ‘Animal House’ is part of that.”
Wilson said besides the six movie set recreations, she’s also planning to put in a Native American art gallery and props from other notable productions with connections to the area.
Copyright 2026, KLCC News.
