Lee Wesley Collection
Inclusive Dates
1983 – 1986
Abstract
Films made by Lee Wesley while a student at Columbia College in the mid-1980s. Many of the elements in the collection are related to Wesley's film Nisei, about a Japanese American optometrist facing racism while living in Chicago.
Collection Items
To request more information about the items in this collection, please contact the archive at
info@chicagofilmarchives.org.
Items with Viewable Media
- #1; Cloud 9
- #1 Loose Ends 2/19/86
- #2; Cloud 9
- #2 Loose Ends 2/9/86
- #3; Cloud 9
- #3 Color bars; Self Portrait - LW; Color bars, Cheryl's Party
- #3 Loose Ends - Betsy - Silent Copy - Wesley/Farr; partial (20 min) Cheryl's Party
- Animat
- Battle, Traffic (Flag)
- Betsy Coatshake SXF 4 HDS
-
[Betsy Final Sound] 11/84 Wesley / Farr Final Sound Betsy HDS
- Betsy; Kiss / Heavy
- [Betsy Music] 8/21/84 Wesley/Farr Dub Music Betsy HDS
- [Betsy Pix] Wesley - Farr - Heads - Pix
- Betsy Titles
- Coatshake
- Colburn Film Lab Report and Lab Tape for Nisei 4-3-84 (Paper or Photographic Materials)
- Columbia - Wesley/Farr - 10561 - TLS
- Lab Tape (Paper or Photographic Materials)
- Loose Ends
- Loose Ends Script and Camera Set-up Plans (Paper or Photographic Materials)
- LW Dialogue + Room Presence
- "Mary & Jerry"
- Master Tape
- Music Premix; 11/84 Wesley/Farr Betsy HDS
- Music Roll A
- Music Roll B
- Nisei
- Nisei: 3/27/84 Dinello Tech II "Nisei" Soundtrack Mag Stock
- Nisei 3-29-01 Heads
- Nisei: B-Wind Positive Track
- Nisei: Dinello / Tech II 2/24/84 Nisei WP
- Nisei: Nagra Tape Voice Over
- Nisei: Now Sync Tails
- Pat Ma Thin
- Presence HDS
- SFX 2
- Tails [1]
- Tails [2]
- Toy Dove
- [Untitled]
- VO. - Pres. - SFX - Wesley/Farr HDS
Collection Identifier
C.2025-08
Extent of Collection
10 reels of 16mm film, 12 reels of 16mm full coat magnetic audio, 1 reel of 1/4" audio tape, and 9 videotape cassettes.
Custodial History
Stored by Wesley's wife Victoria Granacki in her Chicago home until arriving at CFA in November 2024.
Related Materials
The film System 2000 in the Sue and Marv Gold Collection was made for Wesley's company, Wesley-Jessen.
Related Collections
Use Restrictions
Chicago Film Archives holds the copyrights to the films in this collection.
Creators
Wesley, Lee
(was created by)
Newton Lee Wesley was born December 9, 1940 in Portland, Oregon to Cecilia Sasaki and Newton K. Uyesegi. He and his family were among the Japanese American citizens incarcerated during World War II at Minidoka in southern Idaho; his brother Roy was born a few days before the February 1942 internment order signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
When Lee and his family were granted permission to leave Minidoka in February 1944, they joined many former internees who came to Chicago seeking a fresh start. The family changed their surname to Wesley and settled into a greystone on Wilson Avenue in Uptown, where the Wesley boys attended Stewart grade school. His father, a successful optometrist, co-founded Wesley-Jessen Contact Lens Company in 1949. Lee graduated from Senn High School, then earned a BS in engineering from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the University of Chicago. Lee became manager of the research department at his father's company, and helped develop a computerized method of fitting contact lenses and the company’s first soft lens.
Lee married Victoria "Vicki" Granacki in 1977 and they raised their children Matthew and Monica in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood. The sale of Wesley-Jessen in 1980 allowed Lee to pursue a passion for learning that lasted his whole life. He completed his Doctor of Ministry at Chicago Theological Seminary in 1983. He then took classes in filmmaking at Columbia College and DePaul, making, among others, a short film about discrimination against Japanese Americans, Nisei. He additionally studied Japanese literature and playwriting, and wrote his own poetry. Art collecting was an obsession, with trips to art shows and galleries in Chicago, New York, and Miami. He was President of the Dr. Newton K. Wesley Foundation Fund which supports contact lens research, scholarships, and archival projects.
Lee died of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis on November 28, 2019.
When Lee and his family were granted permission to leave Minidoka in February 1944, they joined many former internees who came to Chicago seeking a fresh start. The family changed their surname to Wesley and settled into a greystone on Wilson Avenue in Uptown, where the Wesley boys attended Stewart grade school. His father, a successful optometrist, co-founded Wesley-Jessen Contact Lens Company in 1949. Lee graduated from Senn High School, then earned a BS in engineering from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the University of Chicago. Lee became manager of the research department at his father's company, and helped develop a computerized method of fitting contact lenses and the company’s first soft lens.
Lee married Victoria "Vicki" Granacki in 1977 and they raised their children Matthew and Monica in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood. The sale of Wesley-Jessen in 1980 allowed Lee to pursue a passion for learning that lasted his whole life. He completed his Doctor of Ministry at Chicago Theological Seminary in 1983. He then took classes in filmmaking at Columbia College and DePaul, making, among others, a short film about discrimination against Japanese Americans, Nisei. He additionally studied Japanese literature and playwriting, and wrote his own poetry. Art collecting was an obsession, with trips to art shows and galleries in Chicago, New York, and Miami. He was President of the Dr. Newton K. Wesley Foundation Fund which supports contact lens research, scholarships, and archival projects.
Lee died of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis on November 28, 2019.