Delmer J. Yoakum

Delmer Yoakum was born in St. Joseph, Missouri. He studied at the Kansas City Art Institute, Jepson Institute and University of Southern California. His occupation was that of a Painter – Designer – Motion Picture Artist (21 years). Among his many accomplishments during his long career, he painted the Grand Canyon Dioramic Scenery, Primeval World Dioramic Scenery, portions of Pirates of the Caribbean and It’s a Small World at Disneyland. He also painted scenery for movies like “The Shoes of the Fisherman” for which he recreated the Vatican interiors (MGM Studios). He created the city of Jerusalem for “The Robe”, after which he created a fantastic 600 foot cyclorama that backed the safari camp set of “Snows of Kilimanjaro”. Other films he created Dioramic scenes for included “Some Like it Hot”, “The King and I”, “Niagara” and many others. During his term at 20th Century Fox, he worked on every one of the Marilyn Monroe pictures. He also painted a portrait of Elvis Presley, for one of the singers films while at 20th Century Fox. That portrait (like much of his movie studio work), is missing. It is suspected to be hanging at Graceland, but that has not been confirmed.

Filmography:

-The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968)
-Some Like it Hot (1959)
-The King and I (1956)
-The Robe (1953)
-Niagara (1953)
-Snows of Kilimanjaro (1952)

Gallery:

Two images from “The Shoes of the Fisherman”

Fisherman1 fisherman2

Two images of the scenic paintings from The Robe.

RobeScenic RobeScenic2