Missing for decades, the university's long-rumored possession of the blue gingham dress worn by Judy Garland as Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz" showed up without much Hollywood fanfare this summer in a white trash bag stashed high in a theater department's office.

The rediscovery of something that had almost seemed legend in the drama department – except for photos of it and descriptions from people who remembered seeing it – echoes a theme taken right from the classic 1939 movie.

Dorothy promises never to look for her heart's desire "any further than my own back yard" after likely taking to heart the wizard's advice that everything she was "looking for was right there with you all along."

In early June, in preparation for renovation work to start on the university's Hartke Theater, a department faculty member sorting through things noticed a white trash bag above the faculty mail slots. Inside it was a green shoe-sized box whose contents needed no explanation for Matt Ripa.

Ripa, a lecturer and operations coordinator in the university's drama department, took one look inside and seeing the faded blue squares and the aged yellowing blouse of the classic film dress, he began laughing hysterically.
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For the past seven years, since he started working at the school where he earned his graduate degree, it's been his personal mission to find this dress. It was given to Dominican Father Gilbert Hartke – founder of the drama department and namesake of its theater – in 1972, two years before he retired.

There are pictures of the priest holding the dress and showing it to faculty members but after he died in 1986 no one knew what became of the iconic costume.

Ripa had looked for it in the theater's archives and storage closets and had essentially given up hope of finding it, so its unexpected appearance was a pretty welcome surprise. He and a co-worker got some gloves, held the dress up and took pictures and then called the university's archive department with the news: "We have Judy Garland's dress!"

The piece of movie history, one of six original dresses believed to be in existence, was a gift from Mercedes McCambridge, an actress and friend of Garland's, who was artist-in-residence at the university in 1972-1973.

McCambridge won an Oscar for best supporting actress in "All the King's Men" in 1949 and was nominated for the same award for the 1956 film "Giant," but she became perhaps even more well-known for being the voice of the demon child in "The Exorcist" in 1973, even though Warner Brothers failed to credit her for the role.

A 1973 article in the campus newspaper, The Tower, said she donated Garland's dress to be a "a source of hope, strength and courage" to the students.

The writer pointed out that in a small way it also answered Garland's expressed regret that she hadn't gone to college and her questions if "it all could have been different" if she had. "Judy's fantasy has come true. A real part of her has made it to college," the article said.

Although no one knows how McCambridge came to own the dress, it doesn't seem unusual that she gave it to Father Hartke. Maria Mazzenga, curator of the university's American Catholic History Collections, noted the priest's flair for the unique, saying he also owned a silk jacket from India, a 6-foot-long aviator scarf and a Russian fur hat.

"People gave him clothes because they knew he would like it," she said.