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Hello, thanks for listening to the Witness History Podcast from the BBC World Service

with me, Jill Curzley. I'm taking you back to 2005 and the theft of some of the most

treasured film memorabilia of all time, the Ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz.

They're more than just a pair of shoes, the slippers. They're an enduring symbol of the

power of belief.

That's Scott Johnson from Grand Rapids Police Force at a press conference in 2018. Grand Rapids

in Minnesota is where Judy Garland, who starred as Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, was born.

Her childhood home has been restored to appears it did in about 1925 when she grew up there,

and next door is the Judy Garland Museum. John Kelsch is one of the people who started

the museum where a pair of Ruby slippers that in the film had magical qualities, became

a symbol of Hollywood and even have their own fan club was stolen from in 2005.

This isn't just a story about some slippers being stolen that were used in a movie. They're

considered a work of art from the Wizard of Oz.

The musical fantasy film, The Wizard of Oz, premiered in August 1939. The movie starts

off in black and white, then changes to glorious technicala when Dorothy arrives in the magical

land of Oz. The story tells of her being swept away in a tornado, where she needs to find

the Wizard of Oz in order to get home. Waring her Ruby slippers, she follows the yellow

...