The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

Page 304 The Educational Screen Thomas E. Finegan brought wide experience to the conduct of a broad enterprise. An exceptional man com- manding an exceptional undertaking. with the practical interest of the Kodak Company, and were gratified, too, to find a plan so inteUigently and pains- takingly developed. The proposal having been generally approved, therefore, the discussion turned, at George Eastman's request, to a naming of those teaching subjects where preliminary test films would probably be most valuable. The conclusion was reached, then, to make reels in geography, health and hygiene, civics, fine and practical arts and general science, concentrating on the fourth, fifth and sixth elementary grades and the junior high school level. The .scheduled time for the experiment was two years. During that period no sales either of films or proposed pro- jection equipment were to be made to any of the schools concerned in the ex- periment, those items to be loaned by the Eastman Company for the purpose. The school systems chosen were situated in Rochester, Detroit, Chicago, Kansas City, Denver, Los Angeles, San Diego, New York, Atlanta, Winston-Salem and Newton, Massachusetts, utilizing, ob- viously the better known active visual instruction centers. The pictures were all to be on I6mm film and the projector in each case was to be the Kodascope. It was a cause of satisfaction to edu- cators generally that, in December, 1926, the Eastman Kodak Company further announced that it had engaged, to direct the project. Dr. Thomas E. Finegan, who already had served on the prelim- inary committee. Dr. Finegan, who thus then began his new duties in January, was an educator of recognized standing and a gentleman of exceptionally high principle. He had been born in upper New York State in 1866, had been trained as a teacher, admitted to the bar, and had received degrees, earned and honorary, from Hamilton College, the New York State College for Teach- ers, Colgate, the University of Maine, Temple University, Grove City College. Dartmouth, the University of Pennsyl- vania and Susquehanna University. In 1919, when he was New York State deputy commissioner of education, he was taken over as State commissioner of public instruction for Pennsylvania. In his five years tenure of office there, he reorganized the State school system. But he finally declined reappointment because of what he termed "the un- ethical stipulations demanded by the Governor." His work thereafter, until he joined the Eastman enterprise, was essentially in making surveys of school systems in various large Eastern cities. When Eastman Teaching Films was in- corporated in 1928, he became president and general manager. He remained there until he died, suddenly, in November, 1932. When Dr. Finegan assumed command, the Eastman project had a little more than twenty films under way. There were ten on geography, five each on health and general science, one on the life of a New England fisherman, and one to show the effect of iron on the industrial progress of .'\merica. Approxi- mately thirty more subjects were ex- pected to be ready when the schools reopened after the 1927 summer vaca- tion. To prepare the content of these additional ones, teachers of the various subjects to be presented were brought to a training school at the Rochester offices during the summer. There, un- der direction of experts in visual edu- cation and especially of film practices, they were able to hold frequent con- ferences and review each stage of the work as it proceeded. The technical supervision of all these films was re- ferred to Herford Tynes Cowling, well known producer of travelogues, one-time cinematographer to Burton Holmes. Eastman Teaching Films, Inc., did useful work in another place, namely, the department of medical and surgical motion pictures. Here again Will H. Hays acted as go-between, this time bringing together the Eastman Kodak Company and the .American College of Physicians and Surgeons. The reader is aware of the early interest of the latter association in circumstances which produced Clinical Films, and in some other efforts in the line. A committee composed of eminent surgeons had been investigating the screen possibilities for the College over a long period. I have mentioned their conferences with Frank Tichenor. They also talked extensively with Visugraphic where Mariner was employed. Chairman of the committee. Dr. J. Bentley Squier, was rather an old hand at the work. His enthusiasm was tempered by much practical exper- ience, and he was seconded strongly by an exceptionally clear-headed gentleman, Dr. Franklin Martin, director-general of the College. It is due to Martin, principally, I am sure, that the film-making experience of the College has had no really serious pitfalls. The rest of the permanent committee, however, was composed of men of thorough penetration, including Doctors W. W. Chipman of Montreal, president of the College; George W. Crile, of Cleveland; C. H. Mayo, of Rochester, Minnesota, and Allan Craig, Bowman Crowell and Malcolm Mac- Kachern, all of Chicago. And by no means should one overlook the intensive personal investigation of the very cele- brated, indeed. Dr. Fred H. Albee, founding fellow and governor of the College. The College held its 1926 convention at Montreal, and the committee on films, in making its report, introduced Will Hays as honorary chairman. Hays, in his address, hailed the great opportunity for these men of science to use the facil- ities of the silver screen, and pledged the cooperation of his own organization, the M.P.P.D.A., to promote the making of needed presentations in medicine and surgery. He then arranged a meeting of the committee with representatives of the Eastman Company, and a plan was formulated to produce a series of appropriate subjects with which the med- ical division of the non-theatrical field Meet Mr. Maddock. Eastman Kodak took him on to sell a completed stock of Teaching Films. He did so well that they had to resume production. could win its proper start and gain a lasting momentum. .Actual progress was made that way, and in the next annual meeting of the College, at Detroit, mem- bers were shown the first two subjects, •"Infections of the Hand," and "Nursing" and were told the glad news that these were but the beginning of a series. It was intended, the committee ex- plained, that the films should be made available, through sale and rental, to doctors, nurses and hospitals, the East- man Company acting as physical dis- tributor. The list of subjects had been compiled carefully out of the recommen- dations of more than two hundred recog- nized professional specialists, and pro- duction was being supervised meticulously by a new board of medical motion picture films. Called for on the schedule were pictures on anatomy, physiology, bacteri- ology, embryology, surgery — including studies of special operations, fractures, cancer and operating room techniques— experimental medicine, health examina- tion, obstetrics, hygiene, sanitation, pub- lic health, neurology, hospital practice and, as mentioned previously, nursing. {Continued on page 306)