Post-Tribune

December 29, 2017

During my two decades writing about the annual Wizard of Oz Festival in Chesterton, the highlight of every year was the arrival of the actors and actresses who played Munchkins in the 1939 MGM film classic. Northwest Indiana residents greeted these little people as Hollywood royalty. During the festival's biggest years spanning the 1990s, as many as 20 Munchkins and spouses would attend the event.

The final year for the festival was 2012. Today, of the original 124 little people who starred in the film, the only Munchkin survivor is Jerry Maren, who will celebrate his 98th birthday on Jan. 24.

In "The Wizard of Oz," Jerry played one of the tough-talking members of The Lollipop Guild trio, with his added duty of center position center and tasked with presenting Judy Garland as Dorothy with a large spiral-striped lollipop after the Kansas twister lands her in Oz's Munchkinland.

Jerry's beloved wife Elizabeth, who was also a little person but did not star in "The Wizard of Oz," died in 2011 at age 69. Married in Las Vegas in 1975, the couple first met while attending a meeting of the organization Little People of America. Today, Jerry is retired and lives in an assisted living home in California where he can be close to his niece and nephews.