The theatre of science; a volume of progress and achievement in the motion picture industry (1914)

26 Ci)e Cfjeatte Hennessy, the association of vaudeville managers vi^ould have gone out of existence. That it has survived to beconae one of the greatest institutions in theatredom may now^ be due to the efforts of its brilliant head officers, but fourteen years ago it vs^as the despised moving picture, erstwhile "chaser," that prevented dissolution, bankruptcy and humiliation. Automatically w^ith the formation of the Managerial Combine, eight intrepid actors of the "variety show" era, headed by the most unselfish thespian of his time, organized after the manner of the London Water Rats, the now vast body of stagefolk know^n as "the White Rats." George Fuller Golden, who has since given up his life, a martyr to the cause which the organization stood for, resented the spectacle of the vaudeville managers paying the actors ninety and ninety-five per cent, of their salaries and retaining the difference for themselves ; moreover he protested, yet the so-called evil continued, and one day, a red-letter day in motion picture history, when the membership of "the White Rats" assumed tremendous proportions, the daring Golden, as if by the press of an electric button, called out the vaudeville performers in the majority of the theatres, controlled by the "trust." The local managers, as well as the mighty potentates who dictate the destiny of modern vaudeville to this day, were struck with consternation. They were wholly unprepared for such a catastrophe, and the effort to replace the public favorites vath amateur talent and professionals, such as could be hastily summoned to their aid, failed absolutely. Some of the play houses closed temporarily, others were enabled to open solely through the help of the camera man. At last, the latter had come into his own. The day of the "chaser" had passed for all time