Happy Birthday Raymond 'Raymie' Isenberg

Raymond J. ‘Raymie’ Isenberg, Jr. was born on June 18, 1949 and grew up on a farm in Twolick, Valley, Pennsylvania. Ray’s father was a horse trader and Ray learned from an early age much of his horse sense and love for both horses and mules. An expert horseman Ray competed in various riding competitions while growing up.

 
While growing up Ray developed a love for all things western including western films and actors especially Jimmy Stewart who was born and grew up in nearby Indiana, Pennyslvania. Ray’s love of westerns spurred him to make his own films using an 8mm camera. Borrowing his friend John Nudge’s father’s Argosy camera the pair made a 12 minute epic called “The Trio”. Over the next few years Ramie made several more homemade westerns such as “Bad Company: The Stitt Legend”, “Legend of a Gunfighter”, “Four Sides” and “Dance With the Devil.” Using much of the footage used in these previous films plus tons of random stock footage Ray joined forces with Canadian Riek Gladys and the two assembled 40 years of film footage into a single epic tale called “Once Upon a Time in the Autumn” which premiered at Rancho Bruce in Rancho Cucamonga, California to mixed reviews and received limited DVD release and is now considered a much sought-after classic. 
 
In the meantime Ray and his late wife Helen cared for many foster children along with two of their own suns Justin and the late Chris Isenberg and adopting a boy named Clint. They also ran
a halfway house for mentally challenged adults.
 
Ray became a great fan of Euro-westerns starting with “A Fsitful of Dollars” in 1966 little did he know he actually go on to appear in two Euro-westerns: “Outlaws and Angels” (2012) and “The Alien Showdown: The Day the Old West Stood Still (2013) and receive acclaim for his appearance in the recent American western “The Scarlet Worm” (2011). Still active today Ray receives scripts and film offers but is quite selective on the films he chooses to have grace his presence.
 
Today we celebrate Ray Isenberg’s 65^th birthday.