Jimmy Stewart graced the silver screen for over 50 years, racking up five Academy Award nominations. While his first Oscar bid for “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” didn’t result in a win in 1940, the next year he was more successful. For his role in the critically acclaimed “The Philidelphia Story,” Stewart took home the Oscar for best actor.
According to The Washington Post, Stewart received an early morning phone call from his father the day after the award ceremony. During this 4 a.m. exchange between the two, the elder Stewart was remembered for saying “I hear you won some kind of award. What was it, a plaque or something? Well, anyway, you better bring it back here, and we’ll put it in the window of the store.”
“The store” referred to a hardware store that his family had founded in 1848 (per ExplorePAhistory.com). The younger Stewart obliged and brought the coveted Academy Award with him to Indiana, PA, where his father proudly displayed it in the window of the hardware store for the next 25 years.
