The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

Page 14 The Educational Screen MOTION PICTURES- NO! FOR THEATRES By ARTHUR EDWIN KROWS Installment 33. — Film activities of U. S. Government agencies ore reshaping the entire non-theatrical field. Here is their history irom the begiiming. IT has been related here that in 1912 Paul Redington, who became chief of the Bureau of Biological Survey in 1927 but was then engaged in field work for the U. S. Forest Service, accom- panied an Edison newsreel cameraman into the Sierras. This, though, did not represent the earliest motion picture work of the Department of Agriculture, that having been accomplished in 1908, when Lewis Williams, chief of the Di- vision of Illustrations, and W. S. Clime, his assistant, filmed a flight of the Wright Brothers at Fort Myer. The camera used at that time, a Jen- kins machine with a so-called "beater" movement, was brought forth again, in 1910 or 1911, to photograph cattle ship- ments for Joseph Abel, of the Bureau of Animal Industry. Secretary "Tama Jim" Wilson did not approve of motion pictures then, so C. Francis Jenkins, (founder of the Society of Motion Picture Engineers in 1916—he died in 1934), inventor of the camera in question, personally used it to help the good work along by sur- reptitiously "shooting" Wilson while he was addressing a group of Corn Club boys. The resultant film, sprung on the old gentleman as a surprise, won him over. In 1912, the time of Redington's trip, the Department of Agriculture film en- deavors began in earnest. W. S. Clime and George R. Goergens, under Andre Boetcher, chief of the Section of Illus- trations, were regularly assigned to mo- tion picture activity, and a laboratory— possibly the first government film lab- oratory in the world—was established. Two years later, 1914, a Departmental motion picture committee was set up under the late George Wharton, then chief of the Office of Information; and by 1915 the service was so far grown that it sent some forty completed subjects to the Panama-Pacific International Expo- sition at San Francisco. Don Carlos Ellis (not related to Carlyle Ellis) was placed in charge of the Department of Agriculture film work in 1917. Thirty-four years of age, he had been engaged during the preceding six years in educational projects for the U. S. Forest Service. Before that he had been an instructor in English and history at Gonzaga College, where he had ob- tained his master's degree after gaining his bachelor's certificate at Georgetown. He remained at the Department of Agri- culture film post until late in 1919. Under Ellis there seems to have been intensive effort to obtain theatrical cir- culation of the Department motion pic- tures, the need probably arising from the exigencies of wartime, because normal use of reels from this source is pri- marily for county agricultural agents of the State Extension Service. May 12, 1917, "by official wartime request," Bray used a Department of Agriculture film in "Paramount Pictographs No. 67" and six months later, in October, 1917, Uni- versal began releasing the "first pictures" made by the Department of Agriculture. The Bray output showed the improved results to be obtained by intensive farm- ing. The Universal announcement, at least, covered an entire series, it being stated there that the subjects "will in- Raymond Evans came to film work in the U. S Department of Agriculture with native understanding of farm problems and a newspaperman's way of presenting the helpful answers. elude some studies of the work of the Forestry Bureau in preventing and fight- ing fires in the big forest reserves under Government control, and other timely subjects will show the new methods of preserving vegetables by drying and by utilizing the cold pack." I have no information to show that this elaborate Universal series ever materialized—and certainly the pictures named were net "the first." Ellis's personal relations with Univer- sal must have been exceptionally cordial, however, for, in 1920, he joined Harry Levey as "director of educational pro- duction" there. In March of that same year he was succeeded at the Department of Agriculture Section of Motion Pic- tures, which was then a part of the Di- vision of Publications, by Fred W. Per- kins. Perkins showed much activity in the place, writing promotional articles and delivering lectures on the work, be- sides expanding the service itself. He had come to the Department in 1917 as staff member of the Office of Information after approximately ten years of newspaper experience. In 1921 the Section of Motion Pictures was transferred to the Extension Service as the Office of Motion Pictures. In 1922 the Office was housed in a laboratory building on C Street, built especially for the purpose. In 1924 the growing ac- tivity was provided with a separate building all its own, containing a studio, a complete processing laboratory, vaults, cutting space, projection theatre and of- fices. The chief cameraman there then was George R. Goergens, who is still vitally occupied with the film business of the Department of Agriculture. The Department circular of 1922 named 150 of its motion picture subjects, mostly single and double reelers, which would be furnished free (plus transportation charges) to responsible applicants. Ap- proximately 182 subjects were being dis- tributed in similar fashion in 1924, and the estimated number of persons who had viewed them during that year was ten million. Titles included reels on plant and animal care, federal meat inspection, home conveniences, national forest re- sources, game conservation and the or- ganization of juvenile agricultural clubs. Late in 1924 an especially promising arrangement was concluded whereby Pathe would produce, in cooperation with the Department of Agriculture, a series of pictures on the basic industries of the United States. In the following spring the first two of these were released: "Meat—from Hoof to Market," and "The Kindly Fruits of the Earth," both one- reelers. Each was accompanied by a syllabus for teachers. In the meantime, the direct production of the Section itself, speeded up, and announcement succeeded announcement of films on earthworms, grasshoppers and other insect pests, and one called "Milk for Health," in which Walter Johnson, baseball pitcher idolized by American youth, attested the virtues of that well known fluid for emulation of his example in drinking it. Work of the Section for 1925, as re- ported by the Secretary of .'\griculture in the first formal annual statement of that sort required of him, estimated showings, to and including that year, to 900 million persons of a library of 1,862 reels, comprising one to fifty copies of 201 separate subjects. Among the 201 were "The Ox-Warble—a $50,000,000 Tune," "Clean Herds and Hearts," "Out of the Shadows," "The Golden Fleece," "The Charge of the Tick Brigade." "She's Wild," "Cloud-Busting," "There's Magic in It" and "Weighed in the Balance." Distribution was accomplished chiefly through the 3,000 to 4,000 county exten- sion agents of the Department. Mlany more subjects were produced in 1926, with still higher circulation figures. But, at the end of that year, the efficient Mr.