Arena: Cestus III Fortress Set

Good Morning Folks,

Something I ran across you might find interesting. Remember the fortress set they beamed down into in "Arena?" I always kind of wondered about that one. A while ago, I was watching old Re-runs of "The Rat Patrol" and recognized the set they were using.

"The Darers go First Raid" uses the same set as a German fortress.



(Just pretend that the Sherman tanks they're using are German.)

I gather that the fort was originally built for a show called "Tales of the 77th Bengal Lancers" in 1956. It was torn down by the park service in 1974.

 

A rather different backstory for the set is given in Memory Alpha, this being attributed to an Alamo-themed film back in the thirties already; demolishing is also indicated to have happened in "late sixties". I'd gather the set would see a lot of use through the decades. Plus quite a few renovations and repairs, since it hardly looks like it would endure anything but the mildest weather...

Timo Saloniemi

 

Yeah, I'm not sure about the truth of the story. The internet is full of conflicting information on any subject.
But, one thing's for sure:
If that was supposed to be The Alamo, the people building it had no idea what the Alamo looks like.

Scott Kellogg

 

Here's an episode of the Bengal Lancers that shows the fort, and Vasqez Rocks as well.
https://scvhistory.com/scvhistory/lw3620.htm

 

One additional thought:
I can't be too sure, but it looks to me as if the area the Fortress is set up in changes
from "Arena" to "Rat Patrol" to "77th Lancers"

Perhaps it wasn't so much an actual set, but just a series of facades that could be moved as needed?

 

Sorry about that.
Is there an Edit function on here?
I can't seem to find it.

 

Hmm! I'm surprised by that, and I bow to your first hand knowledge.

When I first looked at the "Rat Patrol" episode, I thought they'd reduced the structure to a four sided box about the width of the gate. But, looking more closely at it (It only shows up for about 2 seconds) I can see you're right. The bulk of the structure was hidden by trees and clever framing. With the shadows on it, it only Looks like a 4 sided box.

Very cleverly constructed. It almost looks bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. (Tardis tech?

I have to think that with all the CGI modeling of Star Trek out there, I wonder if anyone's tried to digitally re-create the fort.
That would be interesting!

Scott Kellogg

 

The one remaining question would seem to be, could the structure have been erected out of elements that had something to do with the purported 1930s Alamo movie?

A quick look at IMDB reveals only one such movie, said to reuse battle scenes from a 1926 flick and thus being an unlikely link in a chain of reuses of specific set elements all the way till 1974...

Memory Alpha no doubt gets its information directly from the old Encyclopedia, which simply got it wrong somehow. It's not wrong in Asherman's TOS Compendium yet. (Asherman says the action was at Paramount Ranch and Vasquez Rocks, without quite specifying which bits were at the Ranch.)

Timo Saloniemi

 

Here is a shot from The High Chaparral, 1968, where you can see part of the unfinished side. (Henry Darrow in the foreground, RIP)

 

For Reference: Here's the Alamo, which is why I question that this was a set for a movie about it.

 

The Alamo was more than just the chapel (which didn't have the "hump" in 1836.) Here's one map that shows the additional components that were defended in 1836.

 

@M'Sharak Gotcha. Still, not bad. At least the walls and palisade are roughly in the right spots.

 

Back in my Boy Scouting days, one weekend my troop took a trip to Vasquez Rocks. Someone mentioned something about an "old Spanish fort" on the property, so I went to have a look. When I got inside the fort, I saw that it was made of two-by-fours, chicken wire and plaster -- not exactly authentic Spanish Colonial architecture!