Edmond DeRousse's Blog – July 2015 Archive (3)

I was born and raised in Sparta, Illinois into a family of seven. It was the 1950s and things were much simpler then. No home computers, Facebook, Twitter, cell phones, etc. Sparta was then and has always been a neat little community.

The citizens of Sparta enjoy life in a small town and value family and friends. We look for the positive in life, help each other out, and even go to church together. It is a quiet community full of hard working, caring, and family-centered…

In 1966, a major motion picture was made in a small community in Southern Illinois.  As it turned out, the movie happened to be considered one of the best one hundred movies ever made. That movie, “In the Heat of the Night”, was made in my home town, Sparta, Illinois.



The movie was a mystery drama based on a 1965 book written by John Ball. It was about a black police detective, Virgil Tibbs, from Philadelphia, PA who became involved in a murder investigation in a small Mississippi…

It may come as a surprise to some people, but not all movies are made on a huge set in a warehouse in Los Angeles, or in location in New York, London, or any of the major big cities. Some movies are made in small towns on small budgets.



My town, Sparta, Illinois, which is also the setting of my book, The Mighty Spartan and His Common Man Adventures, was once the location of a movie filming in the 1960’s. It was In the Heat of the Night, and it starred Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger and…