The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

/page 340 The Educational Screen / now portraying. The situation is so / serious that no matter how busy we are with other things we should all take time to enlist in this field and stop further exploitation. January 15, 1925. at the National Motion Picture Conference in Washing- ton, appeared another enemy crusader, Mrs. Catheryne Cooke-Gilman, executive secretary of the Women's Cooperative Alliance of Minneapolis, demanding the passage of the Upshaw Bill, then be- fore Congress, providing for federal con- trol of motion picture production. In May of the same year, Mary R. Cald- well took up the cudgels for Mrs. Mer- riam's Film Councils of America—of which, by the way, F. Dean McCIusky, who later prepared a survey for the M.P.P.D.A., was vice-president—and continued the personal belaboring of Hays. In November, Dr. Charles Scan- Ian, president of the Motion Picture Council in America, Inc., issued a pamph- let entitled Motion Pictures charging that the Hays Public Relations Com- mittee was simply a hoax to deceive the public, and attacking too, the useful, unexcitable National Board of Review as a creature of the "film trust." In these trying circumstances the tactics of Hays were principally concil- iatory. In the manner of international diplomats he has tried manfully to keep the peace, using the time thus gained to strengthen the industry—to develop power within it, too, for constructive public service, because Hays, in common with other distinguished public relations coun- sels, knows full well that useful service is also good business. But, in justice to Will Hays as to the non-theatrical field and from the view- point of this history, it must be borne in mind that he is the paid servant of the professional motion picture men and must serve their immediate legitimate interests first. It should be understood, too, that he is not the ofiicial spokes- man for the entire professional industry, but for that large portion of it which is represented by the major companies (and a few lesser ones) which are mem- bers of his Association. Even among those there are dissenters to his opinion. Many objectives which he personally would like to see reached, may not be achieved without practical support of those for whom he presumably speaks. The methods he employs are those of any able chief who realizes that to gain even worthy ends, it is necessary to make some enemies, try as he will to avoid needless antagonisms. And it must not be for- gotten, either, that if Hays has tem- porized with non-theatrical leaders, it has frequently been charged also, that, when theatrical leaders have complained to him of non-theatrical competition, he has tabled their demands for punitive action. His purpose in offering the as- sistance of his office in the launching of any considerable non-theatrical enterprise is undoubtedly to guide its course so as not to interfere with the normal opera- tion of the theatrical industry; but there has been no concealment of that motive, and assuredly no reason why its pursuit should mean the suppression of non- theatricals. There are many reasons, moreover, why his advice and practical help should be of great value to those who avail themselves of his offers and who know how to utilize the benefits with- out throwing so undeservedly upon Hays the full responsibility for their own prob- lems. Earlier pages have sketched all but one of the principal contacts of the M.P.P.D.A. and the non-theatrical field One more—what the Hays Office did to assist the National Education Associa- tion in the fourth decade of the century —is reserved for later mention. In the Hays Office's own recital of such achieve- ments, its representatives grow pardon- ably boastful about the measure of its cooperation with the Harmon Foun- dation and the Eastman Teaching Films including the pictures for the American College of Surgeons. They have im- plied, also, a moving part in the Chroni- cles of America Picture Corporation: but that suggestion has usually come from those who know the facts scantily and from hearsay. The Chronicles of America Corporation had been in prep- aration nearly three years before the M.P.P.D.A. was organized. When the Chronicles of America formally opened its own offices in 1921. it was in the same lately-remodeled build- ing at 522 Fifth Avenue in which the M.P.P.D.A. began. We were already established at that address while the im- posing second floor suite with its wide marble staircase was being made ready for Will Hays and his staff^a place so very imposing that he presently moved away from it as too dangerous in its grandeur. But, during the original ten- ancy of Hays, Robert MacAlarney, of the Chronicles of America Picture Corpora- tion, went downstairs one day and told Ralph Hayes, of the Will Hays staff, about the intended Yale historical pic- tures. In most cases the credit claimed by the organization has been explicit and modest. It has been interesting to see how successfully the Hays policy has kept responsibility for what has been done in the hands of the non-theatrical groups which have contacted the M.P.P.D.A. Excellent confirmation of these facts is in the Report of the Com- mittee on the Use of Motion Pictures for Religious Education issued at Bos- ton in 1930 and already discussed. Similar cautiousness was evinced in the arrange- ments for the Eastman Teaching Films, with the Kodak Company also leaning backward to place the facilities at the dis- posal of those who are presumed to know how to use them to further the given especial ends, that unhappy results might be nobody's fault but theirs. In non-theatrical issues the M.P.P.D.A. never appears outwardly on the defensive. Its efforts in any state of siege seem mainly to uncover facts which by simple statement will render further attacks senseless, and such statement to be made then only as a last resort. The handling of the Rev. Reid Andrews matter was an illustration of that. Non-theatrical sur- veys undertaken on the Hays Office's own initiative have tended only to make useful information available. They have been employed to promote good feeling by establishing the theatrical industry's right to be respected by the public at large. The specimen called to witness here is the published report of the .Amount of Gratis Film Furnished In- stitutions by Film Boards of Trade in the United States During 1928. This interesting document, with strong impli- cations which the reader will recognize promptly from the title, gave elaborate statistics, broken down in many illumin- ating ways. It ■ told of free shows furnished to 736 institutions, such as hospitals, asylums, prisons and sani- tariums, in thirty-two leading cities from Coast to Coast, and involving 28,- 456 separate pictures, with an approxi- mate total rental value of $310,870.72. Despite the strong non-theatrical in- terest of Ralph Hayes, he was with the organization too briefly for non-theatri- cal folk to become well acquainted with him. They saw more of Col. Jason S. Joy in the early days. Col. Joy—given his rank in the Officers' Reserve Corps in 1920 after his war service—was the son of a well-known clergyman. For two years before joining the M.P.P.D.A. as director of public relations, he had been executive secretary of the American Red Cross. In the Hays connection, where I knew him slightly, he was in complete readiness to assist any non-theatrical venture which had legitimate claim to his attention. He set many admirable pre- cedents in the work of the organization, and is especially to be remembered as the executive secretary of the Committee on Public Relations, carrying on its activities between its semiannual meet- ings. In 1926 he removed to Los Angeles to take charge of a new department of studio relations, giving excellent service there also until December. 1932, when he became associated with Fox Films as a "censorship" expert. (To be eontlnverf)