Jerry Juroe, one-time Eon publicity man, dies

Cover to Jerry Juroe’s recent book

Charles “Jerry” Juroe, a long-time publicity man whose career included a stint at Eon Productions, has died at 97.

Friends of Juroe, including Doug Redenius of the Ian Fleming Foundation, and Raymond Benson, former Bond novel continuation author, published tributes this week on social media.

Juroe published a book about his career in 2018. Besides Bond, he worked with many others as a publicist including Marilyn Monroe and The Beatles.

In addition, Juroe was a presence on home video documentaries about the Bond film series produced by Eon Productions. His career also included time at United Artists where he worked on non-Bond UA movies such as It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Jerry Juroe in 1963 working on the UA-released It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World

UPDATE: Eon’s official James Bond feed on Twitter acknowledged Juroe’s passing.

“We are so very sad to hear that Charles ‘Jerry’ Juroe passed away yesterday, aged 97. pic.twitter.com/EFnZJO283Q

— James Bond (@007) October 1, 2021

Doug Redenius sells his 007 collection, Daily Journal says

Doug Redenius, a vice president with the Ian Fleming Foundation, has sold his large personal James Bond collection, The Daily Journal newspaper in Kankakee, Illinois, reports. He’ll also be moving from Illinois to Florida to manage a new museum whose contents will include his former 007 collection.

The newspaper ran two stories Sept. 17. It only runs a short preview on the free portion of its Web site. Here’s a portion OF THE SECOND ARTICLE:

Soon Redenius will be starting a new career in North Miami Beach, Fla., were he will be a manager of a new 15,000-square-foot museum devoted to the life and times of the fictional character.

While many people questioned Redenius’ emotional and financial commitment to Bond during the past 30 years, he was always confident it would pay off in the end.

The lead article A PORTION OF WHICH YOU CAN VIEW BY CLICKING HERE says a proposed 007 museum in Momence, Illinois, was not going to happen.

The free portions of both articles give you a flavor of what’s happening. There are links to the paper’s e-editon as a way to get the unabridged versions of the stories.

Meanwhile, here’s a directory of previous HMSS Weblog posts about Redenius. His personal collection is separate from the 007 film vehicles owned by the Ian Fleming Foundation.

American Airlines magazine profiles IFF’s Doug Redenius

American Airline’s magazine (the one you can read while flying the airline), has a feature story on Doug Redenius, the Ian Fleming Foundation vice president who oversees that group’s efforts to acquire and rehabiliate vehicles than once appeared in James Bond movies.

You can read the story BY CLICKING HERE. Here’s an excerpt:

How did a postal carrier in Illinois wind up with one of the coolest car collections ever? By being as relentless as James Bond himself.

You might imagine that the man with America’s largest collection of James Bond movie vehicles is a reclusive, millionaire owner of an obscure, multinational ­corporation — a shadowy, Auric Goldfinger type, jonesing for cool cars instead of gold bullion.

You’d be wrong. The man’s name is Redenius. Doug Redenius. He’s a 55-year-old rural postal carrier. And hold on to your steering wheel: Most of the 34 cars, boats and other mind-bending vehicles sit under tarps. In a rented metal barn. Surrounded by farm fields near tiny Momence, Ill., about an hour south of Chicago.

The Architectural Record talks about the IFF “Bond Vehicles” museum

Although it’s not exactly breaking news at this point, the Architectural Record website has got a nice little article, posted today, about the Ian Fleming Foundation’s planned “Bond Vehicles” museum.

Tudor Van Hampton’s piece, Gensler Tapped for James Bond Museum, is a brief précis on the genesis of the museum, and the famed architectural firm’s involvement in the project. It also carries a very interesting slideshow featuring CGI mockups and architectural drawings of the facility.

(Sadly, the slideshow does not feature this picture of HMSS Managing Editor Tom Zielinski taking the Live and Let Die speedboat for an imaginary spin.)

Click for larger -- and funnier -- image.

Of course, we here at HMSS wish the IFF in general — and our good pal (and sometimes contributor) Doug Redenius in particular — all the luck in the world with this ambitious project. Today, Momence; tomorrow… who knows?

You can read all about it RIGHT HERE.

WMAQ in Chicago profiles Ian Fleming Foundation’s Doug Redenius

WMAQ, NBC’s affiiliate in Chicago, has profiled Doug Redenius, vice president of the Ian Fleming Foundation, who supervises that group’s efforts to collect vehicles that appeared in James Bond movies.

To see the story, CLICK RIGHT HERE. The WMAQ story occurred after The Wall Street Journal ran a similar feature in August.

WSJ profiles Ian Fleming Foundation’s Doug Redenius

The Wall Street Journal, in its Personal Journal section, ran a profile of Doug Redenius, the Ian Fleming Foundation vice president who supervises that group’s efforts to acquire and revamp vehicles that have appeared in James Bond movies.

The story by Mark Yost has this passage:

The 54-year old has been a postal worker for more than 30 years and married to the same woman for almost as long. But through luck and determination this humble, middle-class Bond enthusiast from Illinois, who has been a fan of the films and of Agent 007 since the age of 8, has managed to amass the largest collection of James Bond cars in the world. You could call him Q’s archivist.

Unfortunately, for much of the year, this impressive 33-item collection is sitting in a barn in a cornfield here, about 10 miles from St. Ann, Ill., where Mr. Redenius grew up. But he is hoping to change that. He has partnered with the city of Momence, one of many dying river towns in the Midwest. Together, Mr. Redenius and Momence are hoping to raise enough money to build the Museum of Bond Vehicles and Espionage. At the bare minimum, they’ll renovate an abandoned used-car dealership, hoping to draw about 20,000 visitors a year. If they can find a rich benefactor, they’d like to build a $1.5 million, 14,000-square-foot exhibit space, designed by the hip Chicago architecture firm Gensler.

You can read all of Yost’s story BY CLICKING HERE. That link also includes a slideshow of some of the vehicles stored at Momence, Illinois. If you’re looking for a copy of the print edition, the story is in the D section (page D5 of the edition we saw).

Also, from the HMSS archives, you read about Redenius’ personal collection (which is separate from the foundation vehicles) BY CLICKING HERE.

The new issue of HMSS has arrived!

Volume VI, Issue 2

The publishers and editors of Her Majesty’s Secret Servant take enormous pleasure, and a little bit of pride, in announcing that a brand-new issue is up, awaiting your perusal and enjoyment. There’s lots of good stuff to explore in this one: an exhaustive cataloguing of the collectible goodies spun off from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service; an examination of the Cold War career of Mr. Tony Stark (a.k.a. Iron Man); an investigation into what the heck happened with the cinematic “Blofeld trilogy;” an appreciation of Roger Moore’s contribution to the 007 screen saga; and an eye-pleasing look at our top 10 favorite (and hottest!) Bond girls.

So, swing on over to HMSS.com and get knee-deep in the 007 weeds!

A James Bond museum near Chicago?

Dateline Momence, Illinois, as chronicled by http://www.mytimesweb.com:

A former Momence auto dealership is being eyed by the Ian Fleming Foundation as a potential location for a James Bond museum that would display many vehicles used in the fictional British secret agent movies.

Doug Redenius, a Momence post office employee and the vice president of the Ian Fleming Foundation, addressed Momence aldermen about using the former Case Motor Sales dealership near the intersection of Illinois Route 1 and Illinois 114 on the city”s south side to display the vehicles valued at $5 million.

Momence is about a 90-minute drive (depending on traffic) south of Chicago (part of 2002’s Road to Perdition was filmed there). The town is already home to many 007 vehicles. There seem to be a lot of issues to be resolved (like who would run such a museum) and no timetable set for anything.

To read the entire story just CLICK HERE.

To read a previous HMSS story about Doug Redenius, CLICK HERE.

Chicago Tribune slideshow on James Bond cars

The Nov. 9 Chicago Tribune includes photos of cars (and other transportation) featured in James Bond movies. They’ve been restored and maintained by the Ian Fleming Foundation under one of its vice presidents, Doug Redenius.

Thanks to the Internets, you don’t have to go to Chicago to see them. Just click click HERE.

And you can read about Doug’s 007 collection in the current issue of HMSS by clicking HERE.

We’ve got a friend in ILLUSTRATED 007!

London-based book collector Linus runs a nifty blog, ILLUSTRATED 007, about James Bond books and artwork.

He liked Ed Werner’s article about Bond collector Doug Redenius, “License to Killect” so much that he asked if he could run a couple of pictures of Doug’s Bond book collection. Kudos to Linus for A.) Asking permission; and B.) Showing them off to such great effect!

Check out the way-cool ILLUSTRATED 007 for all kinds of great James Bond stuff!