Barons School is a former school building in the village of Barons in southern Alberta, Canada. The village lies north of Lethbridge, in the open prairie landscape that helped make the area suitable for the Smallville scenes in Superman. The school’s plain exterior, rural setting and small-town surroundings allowed it to stand in for the kind of ordinary Kansas high school that Clark Kent attends before leaving home and discovering his larger destiny. Barons School has since become one of the better-known Superman filming locations in Alberta.
Barons School appears in Superman, where it represents Smallville High School. The production filmed several Smallville scenes in southern Alberta, using the prairie landscape and small communities around Barons, Blackie and other nearby locations to create the young Clark Kent’s Kansas world.
In Superman (1978), Barons School appears as Smallville High School. The school is seen during the young Clark Kent section of the film, when Clark is still living in Smallville and trying to understand both his powers and his place among ordinary people. The location is tied to the school scenes around teenage Clark, including the material where he is shown as an outsider among his classmates before later revealing his extraordinary speed. The simple rural school setting helps establish Smallville as a modest, everyday place, making the contrast with Superman’s later life in Metropolis much stronger.
Timberline Lodge
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Devils Tower
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Oregon Film Museum
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Boneyard Saloon
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Ontario Mine
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Mac’s Motel Heber City
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The Stanley Hotel
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Double Arch
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Strater Hotel
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