Institutes of Learning
Orson and WeWhen William Vance brought a camera to school, he and his buddy Orson decided to take it for a test drive with some friends.
AN 8 Minute, 16mm short
Hearts of Age
Seven years before the word “Rosebud” was even uttered, Orson Welles and his close friend William Vance created “The Hearts of Age,” a student project which is considered to be Welles’ first, and worst, film.
William and Orson made the movie during a Summer Festival of Drama in Woodstock, Illinois. Its silent imagery is a humorous jumble of deliberately heavy-handed symbolism, arty montage and youthful actors in ridiculous theatrical makeup.

1934 student film
Hearts of Age

Virginia
Old Woman

William
Indian in Blanket

Orson
Show Runner

Edgerton
Bell Ringer
Co-director’s cut
It’s nothing at all. Absolutely nothing. It was a joke. I wanted to make a parody of Jean Cocteau’s first film. That’s all. We shot it in two hours, for fun, one Sunday afternoon. It has no sort of meaning.
Orson Welles, Co-Director

KukLa, Fran and OMG
William Vance
Producer, Kukla, Fran and Ollie. NBC Chicago.
James Thurber once wrote that Kukla, Fran and Ollie was “helping to save the sanity of the nation and to improve, if not even to invent, the quality of television.”
Vicki Vance, the daughter of KFO producer William Vance, was not as impressed. When she and her brother Denny were invited to be part of the studio audience, Vicki loudly expressed her opinion on live TV.
Fearless Girl
Vicki Vance
Vicki may have been frightened by Ollie, but she was probably the only person who could look Steve Jobs in the eye and give him a better idea.
As a high-level sales executive for Sony, Vicki was the person who convinced Steve to incorporate the Sony 3 1/2 inch disk into the 128K Macintosh.
They played nicely together.

Vicki Vance, shleping a Sony AVC-3400 connected to a Sony AV-3400 black & white, reel-to-reel deck.