Amateur Movie Makers (Dec 1926-Dec 1927)

Colored Home Movies By Radio? UP in Hartford, Connecticut, there is an inventor who has achieved world-wide recognition through his knowledge of noise and silence. His uncle, also an inventor, developed the most powerful of all explosives for armour piercing projectiles. His father invented a gun which can fire six hundred shots per minute. The third member of this paradoxical family, Hiram Percy Maxim, inventor of the Maxim silencer, who is called "Daddy" by nineteen thousand amateur radio telegraphers throughout the world, who organized the first aero club of America, is now the pioneer in forming an Amateur Cinema League. Someone has said that we are responsible for our own actions, but that we cannot foresee the reactions. The Maxim family is a family of action and the reactions which have followed their inventions and their vision continue to add fame to the name. Every night while most of us are asleep thousands of ears are listening for radio messages from all parts of the world and in the early hours of the morning many messages end with these letters : 'G N O M." It is not unusual for amateur radio operators in Australia or Africa to send messages or exchange messages with Mr. Maxim at night. They have a world-wide brotherhood and they always end their messages by these letters, which stand for "Good Night, Old Man." Today professional radio owes much to these amateurs and it was largely through the genius of Hiram Percy Maxim that they organized a number of years ago the American Radio Relay League. About two years ago Mr. Maxim was photographing sound waves in his laboratory, and became interested in amateur cinematography. From his laboratory, he began to take pictures T w e n t y f o u r B3) Dorotky Rowden of his family and friends in action. Here he conceived the idea of forming an international organization of men and women who are interested in making their own motion pictures. He made inquiries in Hartford and found that in that city alone there were fifty other "movie makers." They held a meeting at his home and there the Amateur Cinema League was first projected. Recently, at a luncheon in New York City, the national organization was launched. Letters were read from an amazing group of prominent men and women, professionals, if you please, and experts in their own field, who are, however, amateur motion picture directors, stage managers, actresses and actors. "You are going to see the day when radio-transmitted colored motion pictures will be shown not only in theatres, but in your own homes. When that day will come, cannot be said, but it was predicted to me by a man upon whose judgment in such matters I put faith." This, however, is but one vision which Mr. Maxim had in regard to amateur cinematography. Mr. Maxim believes that the day is not far distant when amateur movie makers will be exchanging films with the same great ease and enjoyment as the amateur radio operator now communicates with his distant friends. "I talk very frequently with my radio acquaintances in Europe and Australia, and I certainly should like to see the kind of film which amateur movie makers are taking in those parts of the world. I should like to see the film of an amateur in the South Sea Islands. (Doubtless there are other Americans who would like to see such films). I am equally sure that he would like to see my film 'This Little Connecticut of Ours.' " While the energies of Mr. Maxim's father and uncle were Tete Miss Elsie Janis was ACTUALLY SMILING AT HER MOTHER, AND devoted to making noises those of Hiram Percy have been turned principally to eliminating them. His principal mission in life might be termed his indefatigable efforts to make the world safe for sensitive ears. There may be a reason. Perhaps he got tired of the constant noises about his home during his youth. At any rate he certainly had plenty of noise with which to experiment in working out his .silencing devices. Mr. Maxim would probably be the last to attach any bombastic importance to his inventions. Given his genius for things mechanical, they are of course logical developments of his natural interests. Born in Brooklyn 57 years ago he developed, early in life, a flair for studying the phenomenon of sound. He specialized in acoustics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, from which he was graduated in 1886, the youngest student in his class. He will tell you that the principle of his silencers is all very simple. Noise he describes as being the result of any material substance moving through the air in excess of the velocity of sound. This "substance" of course applies to exhausting gases from engines, as well as from the muzzles of fire