Showmen's Trade Review (Apr-Jun 1939)

Great Pictures Deserve Great Advance Selling. The Greatest Publicity Stunt in Picture History! From Wednesday, April 26th through Saturday, April 29th the great city of Omaha, Nebraska will give "Union Pacific" the greatest send<off in motion picture history. Two blocks of city streets will be made into replicas of the 1869 period. Only horse-driven stage coaches, prairie schooners, and Civil War Cavalry will be allowed in the streets. 52 blocks, including the business section, will be elaborately decorated. A tribe of 35 Sioux Indians will camp on the Court House grounds. On Thursday there will be a huge military parade. Mr. DeMille and the Paramount stars from the Coast will be guests of the city and of the State. Other celebrities will include the governors of Nebraska and neighboring states, as well as 12 presidents of America's great railroads. On Friday there will be another tremendous parade starting off another day of city-wide celebration leading up to the official world premiere of "Union Pacific" at the Omaha Theatre to be broadcast ever the Mutual Network of 125 stations. Portions of the celebration will be picked up by the N.B.C. Red network on Thursday night over 51 stations, and on Friday night ever 52 stations. The size of the celebration is quickly shown by such figures as these: 34,000 Nebraskan males now growing beards for "Union Pacific" celebrations, 60,000 men, women and children will be in costume, 325,000 Nebroskans will be present during the four-day celebration. Space does not permit further details— you will hear them en the radio, you will read them in your paper, as this greatest of all world premieres takes place. The Greatest Exploitation Stunt in Picture History During the period, just before and after the release day of the picture. Cecil B. DeMille and a great number of famous Paramount stars, including Roy Milland, John Howard, Patricia Morison and Martha Raye, will make a huge coast-to-coast tour, hitting 36 key cities enroute, on the great Cecil B. DeMille "Union Pacific" special train. Leading this train will be the famous old engine No. 58, a locomotive built in the late 60's and used in the picture. Immediately following this will be the first of the great, new "Union Pacific" super turbine-electric streamlined locomotives showing in one quick glance 70 years of railroad progress. Behind this will come one of the first passenger coaches ever built in the United States, an 1869 baggage car, a civil war period coach and a blacksmith's car. Following these will come the line-up of streamlined pullmans carrying the Paramount stars. You can see the key cities the train will hit en the map at the bottom of this page. A special shortwave transmitter, as part of the train equipment, will make possible continuous broadcasts of the train to the cities it is approaching. There will be another big-time broadcast from Schenee* tody. A Hollywood preview of "Union Pacific" is planned for each city where the train stops. The train will be open to the public and Mr. DeMille and the stars will be available, where possible, for personal appearances at previews. The Greatest Advertising Campaign in Picture History In addition to cooperative campaigns in many key cities, Paramount will run a huge national advertising campaign in the American Weekly and in This Week. A full-page, 4-eolor advertisement In American Weekly on April 30 will sell "Union Pacific" to its 12,293,119 readers. A 4-color, double spread in This Week en May 7 will sell "Union Pacific" to 12,979,050 readers. A full-page advertisement in Life's April 24 issue will sell "Union Pacific" to 17.300.000 readers. Other Paramount ads will appear in Hellyweed Magaiine. Motion Picture Magazine. Movie Story, Modern Screen, Screen Book and Picture Play. In addition to the five radio broadcasts from Omaha, Cecil B. DeMille's Lux Radio Theatre, with its millions of listeners, has for the past 15 weeks been plugging Mr. DeMille's newest, and he believes, his greatest picture; and will continue to do so until past release date. The Union Pacific Railroad is crashing through with a tremendous cooperative advertising and exploitation campaign for the picture, timed to synchronize with its own 70th anniversary and release date of the film. A $50,000 advertising campaign will include national ads during April, May and June in Collier's, Look. Newsweek, The New Yorker. Saturday Evening Post. Time. Liberty. Photoplay. Red Book, American Weekly and will feature billing scenes from the picture. The Hamilton Watch Company will run a nation-wide advertising campaign built around "Union Pacific." Other national advertisers to tie-in are California Fruit Growers' Exchange, Wonder Bread with full-page and half-page, full-color ads in the American Weekly: Tea Bureau, Pennzoll, Pan-American Oil Company, with 24-sheett in the four southern States in which it operates. International Silver Company is launching a series of ads which will appear in national magazines at release date of "Uniea Pacific."