CANYON CITY — It’s not often you come face to face with yourself after half a century.

But that’s what happened Sept. 30, when actor Johnny Whitaker returned to Grant County for the first time since filming the Walt Disney movie “Napoleon and Samantha” there in 1971. Whitaker had breakfast with his stand-in, Bob Armstrong, of John Day.

The two sat across from each other at the Squeeze-In Restaurant in Canyon City and took a stroll down memory lane.

The men are in their mid-60s now, but in the summer of 1971 they were just a couple of red-headed little boys … who just happened to be making a movie together.

The red hair was what got Armstrong hired as the ginger-maned Whitaker’s stand-in, although he remembers being replaced partway through production by another local lad who was closer to the child star’s build.

Armstrong never appears in the film himself. Rather than doing anything on camera, his role was to represent Whitaker as the film crew was setting up shots.

“I would stand there while they did the lighting,” he recalled. “They would say, ‘Stand over here’ or ‘Walk this way.’”

The reunion between the two was one of the high points of a whirlwind visit by Whitaker, who lives in Los Angeles but was traveling from Portland to Salt Lake City on personal business with Traci Parsons, a close friend of Whitaker’s who manages a Facebook page for fans of the former child star.

The pair stayed overnight at the John Day Motel, previously known as Little Mac’s, where most of the cast and crew of “Napoleon and Samantha” stayed during production. They spent the next morning revisiting some of the two dozen locations around Grant County that were used in filming outdoor scenes. (Most of the indoor scenes were shot on a soundstage set up in the gym at Grant Union Junior/Senior High School.)

Cast of characters

Released in 1972 by Walt Disney Productions, “Napoleon and Samantha” is the unlikely story of two young runaways traipsing across the Oregon wilderness protected by a pet lion.

Whitaker was a hot commodity when he got the role of Napoleon, riding a wave of fame as Jody in the wildly popular TV sitcom “Family Affair.” His other television credits include appearances on “General Hospital,” “Bonanza,” “Green Acres” and “Gunsmoke,” as well as a long-running role on the children’s show “Sigmund and the Sea Monsters.”

He went on to star in a number of movies, including “The Littlest Angel,” “Snowball Express,” “The Biscuit Eater” and the 1973 musical version of “Tom Sawyer.”

Some of Whitaker’s “Samantha and Napoleon” co-stars would go on to have even bigger Hollywood careers — namely Michael Douglas as an idealistic grad student and an 8-year-old Jodie Foster as Samantha in her first feature film role.

“I gave her her first onscreen kiss,” Whitaker said of Foster, who grew up to be a film industry powerhouse whose accolades include a pair of Oscars. “And I think she gave me my first onscreen kiss.”

The film also featured character actors Will Geer and Ellen Corby, who were later paired as Grandpa and Grandma on the long-running television series “The Waltons.”

Another scene-stealer in the movie was Major McTavish, the lovable lion who turns ferocious when necessary to defend Napoleon and Samantha on their trek across the untamed wilds of Grant County.

In real life, Whitaker recalled, Major was just a big pussycat.

“He lived out his life at Magic Mountain as a lion you could sit down and take pictures with,” he said. “I’ve got a picture of Major and me at Magic Mountain.”

But Major wasn’t the only lion on set — he had a stunt double, a younger feline named Simba. And Simba sometimes got a little frisky.

Whitaker’s father, who served as his chaperone during production, found that out while watching his son film a scene at a local ranch. Simba was chained up some distance behind the action, waiting for his next scene, and nobody was paying much attention to him.

“My father was watching me,” Whitaker said. “I remember he had on a big hat, like a sun hat, and it had a feather on it.

“He feels this breeze behind him, and he isn’t sure what it is,” Whitaker continued. “He looks behind him and he almost craps his pants because he sees this lion trying to grab the feather — as any kitty would do, but it happens to be a 250- to 350-pound lion.

“It was Simba at the end of his chain.”

Canyon City memories

After breakfast, Armstrong led Whitaker on a guided tour of Canyon City locations that were used in scenes from the film — including the Community Corrections office (which was the unemployment office in ’71), the Canyon City Community Hall (billed as the Grantville Theater in the film) and the former Gerald and Jessie Lewis house on Rebel Hill — with Parsons recording the proceedings on her cellphone for the fan page.

In the movie, the Lewis house is the home of Napoleon’s grandfather, whose death leaves the boy with no adult supervision and starts him on a cross-country walkabout with Grandpa’s pet lion and his plucky pal Samantha.

No one was home when they arrived, but after knocking on the door and calling out a few times, Whitaker walked around to the backyard, which brought back some memories.

“Here we go,” he said. “The chicken coop is still there, or part of it. And Grandpa was buried up on that hill.”

The home’s owner, Jerry Barrow, arrived as the group was leaving and offered some Grant County hospitality.

“You’re lucky you didn’t get shot,” he told Whitaker — but he was smiling as he said it and graciously accepted Whitaker’s apology.

The next stop was across the street at the former Canyon City schoolhouse, which the film also featured. After the school closed, it fell into disrepair and was eventually purchased by Steve Fischer, now the town’s mayor, and his wife, Shelley.

The couple have completely renovated the structure, which now serves as their home as well as a short-term rental accommodation and special event space. There’s even a small home theater with movie posters on the walls — including one for “Napoleon and Samantha.”

“That’s an original poster,” Steve Fischer said. “I ordered it on eBay, I think.”

Whitaker signed it before he left town.

Road show

After saying goodbye to Armstrong, Whitaker and Parsons made the short drive to John Day, where they checked out a couple of houses on Hillcrest Street (one of which is now a Lutheran church) that served as shooting locations in the movie.

From there it was on to Mt. Vernon, where the film’s opening sequence was shot. In the first scene, Napoleon pilfers some empty soda bottles from behind a general store, then takes them in the front to redeem them for the deposit money.

Two buildings separated by an empty lot on the town’s main drag both looked like possible contenders, but Whitaker couldn’t remember for certain which was used in the filming.

“I’m not sure,” he said. “Either or — after 53 years, it doesn’t really make a difference.”

In the end it’s determined it was the old Damon’s Mercantile — now home to the David Hamilton Winery — that was used in the movie.

Whitaker’s exploration of downtown Mt. Vernon attracted the attention of a few local residents, including Tyler Stout, who works for the city.

Stout isn’t old enough to remember when the movie came out, but he watched it as a kid. He remembers being puzzled by a chase scene in which a wrongfully accused Michael Douglas runs from the cops on his motorcycle.

The sequence starts out in downtown John Day (rechristened Grantville in the movie) but then magically hopscotches from one far-flung locale to another. The scene appears seamless to most viewers but could be confusing for Grant County natives.

“They’re going this way, then going that way, then all over the county,” Stout said. “If you’re from here you go, ‘What the heck?’”

Whitaker’s response: “That’s the magic of Hollywood.”

Time and perspective

A lot has changed since the summer of ’71 for the former child star and his onetime stand-in.

Bob Armstrong grew up to be an accountant. He owned his own firm, Solutions CPAs in John Day, and now sits on the board of the Bank of Eastern Oregon.

Johnny Whitaker’s life had a very different trajectory.

After enjoying worldwide fame as a young actor, he found the roles harder to come by as he entered adulthood. He began to have serious problems with alcohol and drugs — especially crack cocaine.

It took an intervention by his family to get him into treatment — but it worked.

“I just celebrated 27 years clean and sober,” he said.

“I am a certified addiction treatment counselor, and I’ve been doing that for 23 years.”

He also has several new ventures in the works. He’s writing his memoirs, putting together a Mexican Riviera cruise for friends and fans, working on a documentary about Portugal’s highly successful drug treatment policy (on which Oregon’s ill-fated Measure 110 was based) and trying to get financing for a film project titled “Skye Bleu.”

What does he remember about his time in Grant County filming “Napoleon and Samantha”?

“What I remember,” he said, “is having lots of fun.”

Armstrong has fond memories of that summer as well, although he admits many of the details have faded with the years. Reuniting with Whitaker for a few hours, he said, shed fresh light on the time he worked as a stand-in for a Hollywood star.

“You forget so much when you’re 11 years old, 12 years old. … It was neat at the time, but now, looking back 53 years, it’s very cool,” he said.

“It was great to hear his perspective on things.”