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What Motion Pictures Have Done for " Safety First "
By A. J. Van Brunt ^
THE words "safety first" are a sign post pointing out a path, and at the end of that path, when the millennium arrives, no accident will be caused by lack of thought, hurry, selfishness or penuriousness, and then no accident will occur. I answer the question that is given to me as the title upon which to write by replying, more than any other one type of effort.
It is a fact that conviction is carried more readily to the unthinking mind by the spoken word, and to the better trained and more analytical mind by the printed word. It is also a fact that pictures of any kind, because of the lack of necessity for concentrated mental effort, appeal more strongly to a greater number of minds than either the spoken or written word.
In the motion pictures are combined the picture and the printed word, which latter, because of its brevity, closely approximates a slogan or catch phrase, is easily understood and apt to be remembered.
There can be no question but that the success of the tabloid newspaper is attributable to the fact that a very large percentage of its news is placed before see-ers, not readers. There is little reading matter in that type of publication, and that little of the simplest kind.
The average intellect is far below par, much further than is generally supposed; the picture makes a greater appeal to the average intellect and a more lasting impression on the average memory than any one other method of selling the thought.
\ Director of Safety Education, Public Service Corporation of New Jersey.
Comparatively few people think things out for themselves; they prefer to be told or shown, and they better enjoy the showing by pictures than the telling by words either printed or spoken.
The popularity of the motion picture, the financial success of that industry and of the daily paper that carries many pictures and only a few printed â– words in large type, clearly demonstrate that the motion picture with its terse and infrequent titles, the major part of the story being carried by pictures, does appeal more strongly to the majority of people. And it is the majority of people who must be reached and taught in this now necessary type of educational effort.
The safety educational motion picture showing the common type of accidents has a better and more lasting effect than the distribution of much printed matter or long, frequent lectures.
A picture 2000 feet long, consimiing one-half hour in the projection, is the most desirable length, and the picture in addition to depicting accidents, their causes and inevitable, deplorable results, will best maintain the interest of the audience if there is incorporated in it a story, not necessarily a love story, but some story that will maintain the interest until the end of the showing and aid in fixing in memory the lesson.
These conclusions have also been arrived at by the school educational authorities of numerous municipalities in the schools of which have been installed motion picture projection machines and many of the subjects now taught in schools are being taught suc
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