FOREWORD by George Turner

The following is based on the notes of three separate interviews, all of which were conducted at Mr. Delgado's home.

Delgado was 67 the first time I met him. He exhibited some bitterness and even vehemence when he recalled the treatment accorded him by some of his past associates. He spoke highly of certain others, notably Merian Cooper, Ernest Schoedsack, Mario Larrinaga and E. B. Gibson. His feelings for his “discoverer,” Willis O'Brien seemed to approach reverence.

Two scrap books of stills and test frame enlargements from some of his films were the only relics he had retained from his long career in motion pictures.

The interviews have been arranged into a more or less cohesive whole. In addition, some information in Mr. Delgado's own words from a biographical sketch published by the Marcel Delgado Appreciation Society in 1969 have been included, notably in the second paragraph of this work.

MARCEL DELGADO: I was born January 16, 1901, in the State of Coahila, Mexico, in a small village called La Parrita, which was close to the border near Laredo, Texas. My parents were Francisco Sevalles and Francisca Medina Delgado. There were two older sisters and five brothers, I being in the middle.

My first memories are of the family living in what was known as a vecinidad, an enclosure containing about ten houses with a play yard in the center. I recall an older man who lived in one of the houses and whom we called “The Patron Saint,” and who wore a tunic and beard and who carved statues of the saints to be sold outside. I watched him work for hours each day and got the inspiration to go to the river and get clay and model little figures and learned to sculpt by myself. I was about five or six years of age. This was shortly after the turn of the century and no one went to school. I always made my own toys out of evaporated milk cans, spools and anything available.

During the Revolution in Mexico the family moved to Saticoy, California, when I was nine years old. We worked at fruit picking and in the bean fields and walnut orchards. I started to go to school when I was ten, but during the walnut season I had to quit, and when I went back to school, the others were far ahead of me. I never did catch up. I was eager to learn but had to quit when I was fourteen, when my father died, so I could help my family. I didn't want to go to work, to drop out, but we were very poor. I never got past the seventh grade and I didn't speak English until 1917. Prejudice against Mexicans was very bad then. I had to fight every day.

After the family moved to Los Angeles, I worked as a grocery clerk in the daytime from nine to twelve and one to six, and went to art school at night from seven to nine thirty. I got a job as a monitor at Otis Art Institute in order to pay for my tuition. It was while I was doing this, that Mr. O'Brien came to Otis, presumably to study, but probably to find a helper. He took an interest in my work.

He was starting work on The Lost World, and one night he asked me, “Would you like to work in motion pictures?” I told him no, that I wanted to be an artist. Every time he saw me he asked again. I was making $18 a week and Obie offered me $75 to come work for him. I still said no. I guess I felt a certain sense of security. One Friday he asked me to lay off work and visit the motion picture studio where he was working. I'd never been to one so I decided to do it. Obie left a pass at the gate and when I went in Obie met me and took me to his little studio. It was all set up perfectly. There was a phone, some cameras, and pictures all over. “How do you like your studio?” he asked me. I was amazed. “My studio?” I asked. He said, “It's yours if you want it!” It was a 21 year old boy's dream, so I couldn't very well refuse, and that was the start of my career in special effects. I signed up and worked for the next couple of years building dinosaurs for The Lost World.

I made 49 or 50 dinosaurs. It was all done under cover with no visitors allowed, although some of the studio big shots came in anyhow. This was the first picture to combine dinosaurs and live people. The armatures were made of aluminum for lightness.

While this was going on I got to be well known. When that job was finished there was nothing to go to at once, so I went to work in the prop shop. I experienced quite a lot of discrimination because of my race, but persevered and went on to work on many, many pictures. I worked hard to convince them of my talent. Everything was okay when I was up high, but when I just worked in the shop I was snubbed and insulted.

After about two years at First National I was laid off when the Warner Bros. took it over, but I had lots of friends by then and there were plenty of jobs available. I kept at it, at William Fox Western Studio, building miniatures and props. I got in the union and did jobs for various studios.

Around 1930, Obie called. He wanted me to make dinosaurs for Creation at RKO. I worked on that for a while and it was shelved after nearly a year's work. Some scenes had been filmed, but I never read the script so I don't know what it was about. Then they shifted me to King Kong. It was written almost day to day, an indefinite script. We were making tests for a long time.

Cooper wanted Obie to use a real monkey and make him look forty feet high, but Obie told me to make a Kong that was almost human. We did it over several times to get what Cooper wanted. With Kong we used several animals from Creation, such as a tyrannosaurus, triceratops, brontosaurus and arsinoitherium. A writer from England came over to work on it. What's his name? Edgar Wallace. He would wander around like a sleepwalker for days, then write furiously.

There were six small Kongs, about 18 inches tall. The skeletons were made of high tempered aluminum-dural. They sent me rabbit fur to cover them with, and I was never satisfied with that because the fingerprints of the animators would show and make his fur appear to bristle. I made muscles that react, and that's why my animals look alive instead of stiff.

I also worked on the big head. I didn't design it–if I had, I'd have done it differently–but I made everything in it. The eyeballs were plastic and the teeth were balsa wood. One or two men could operate it. Cooper wanted the big head and I didn't think it would be worth it. I thought they only used it once, but when I saw it with Coop at the Motion Picture Hall of Fame, I saw they used it a lot. He was saying I told you so and telling all the places where they used it. He was having a ball, I never saw him so happy!

The hand in Kong wasn't designed right. A real hand has the metacarpals up here and the long bone to the forefinger and three joints on each finger. That's why we can cup our hands. But the palm on that hand was just a flat piece. The hand didn't cup and the fingers would only close like this. The first big hand was just used for a few shots and I redesigned it so it would work. I also worked on the pterodactyl's legs to carry Fay Wray, and a big Kong foot.

In that picture (technicians working on the big bust of Kong) that's me on the ladder, Gibson in the mouth, and the bald-headed guy is Mario (Larrinaga). In the picture of two men working on the big hand, the other fellow's my brother. He worked with me on several of these things.

The skins of the dinosaurs were made of rubber, and I applied the warts, scales and plates separately. One brontosaurus was made on a track for swimming and operated from underneath. The other one was for walking and we used it in the close-ups.

None of the Kongs exist anymore except as skeletons. The one they have at the Motion Picture Hall of Fame is one that was built for the Volkswagen commercial. That young fellow (David Allen) who did that commercial is amazing. He brought his model in to me for an okay. I thought at first it was one of mine! He didn't miss a thing. It was a little smaller, but he made it just as I would... I think he must have counted the hairs! I kidded him about it ... told him it was all wrong because he got five hairs out of place.

We used three of the Kong armatures for Son of Kong. And that was the original brontosaurus that showed up in the water. The big hand was the same hand that was in Kong. The big reptile that little Kong fought in the cave was one I just made up. Obie told me to just create something new that nobody had ever seen before, so I did. The sea monster was the same way.

After that I stayed with RKO. That picture of Obie with a swordfish... I made that fish for The Last Days of Pompeii, but for some reason it was never used. And I made more dinosaurs for Obie's Gwangi, which was never made. He made a sequence, I think. It had to do with finding dinosaurs alive in the Grand Canyon.

About 1939 I worked for Obie at MGM on War Eagles which Cooper was going to make. I made a spearman riding a giant eagle and throwing a spear at a tyrannosaurus. It could have been a hell of a good picture. I don't know exactly why they didn't finish it; they spent a hell of a lot of time and money on it. The film is lost now. George Pal has been searching for it. MGM was going to start on it again after the war, but they didn't.

I think Joe Young was my best ape. He was 15 or 16 inches high and the skin was unborn calf skin which I asked for so it wouldn't bristle like the rabbit fur on Kong. The one we used in the tug-of-war was only four inches tall. It worked beautifully. I wish I could have kept it as a souvenir, but somebody stole it.

I made some miniature people for that and two miniature horses with riders about a foot high. When the cowboys were roping Joe Young they used real horses and riders for most of it, but I had to have two to throw ropes over him in the foreground. Those horses were beautiful and you couldn't tell in the film that they were miniatures. I made very detailed clothes for the little cowboys.

One day I was watching Joe Young on television. That's the first time I thought one of my animals looked alive. Of course Joe Young was a better ape than Kong. I designed it myself from the skeleton up. I'd have done Kong differently if I could have designed the armature. I never liked Ray Harryhausen's animals because he casts them. I like to construct them up from the armature.

Let's see now, I made the dog costume for Disney's The Shaggy Dog and worked on Adventureland at Disneyland. I did the balloons and airship for Master of the Word. I built the monsters for Jack the Giant Killer, but they made some changes in them so I asked to have my name taken off the credits. Those same fellows put in Project Unlimited and they gave me a hard time about my methods, but they've gone out of business now. Obie never once asked me for a change of any kind, and he was the master!

I made the dinosaurs for Dinosaurus! for Jack Harris, a cheap producer. I made a tyrannosaurus and a brontosaurus. They asked me how long it would take me to make them and I told them about five or six weeks. They said okay, but I hadn't been working two weeks when they came in all excited and said they were going to start shooting Tuesday. So I delivered them and they didn't look worth a damn. But it was just a cheap picture anyhow. They didn't take any pains with the sets–just set up a few trees. In Kong the sets had depth...You could see for miles.

I made all those little men in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. And I built the miniature building, trees and ladder. I animated fourteen scenes for that and when somebody bragged on those scenes Lin Dunn didn't like it. They were perfect–you couldn't tell it was trick work at all. Lin was so jealous he got my shots thrown out and brought in Jim Danforth to do them over. That picture could still be improved if they'd put those original scenes back in.

I retired when I was sixty-five, but I've had more recognition than I got when I was working. There are fan clubs all over and they have conventions. I go and make a speech for them sometimes. They're even trying to get the Hollywood people to put my name in the sidewalk on Hollywood Boulevard. I never lost any time and worked at various studios for forty-three years, and retired in 1966.