Exhibitors Herald (Dec 1922 - Mar 1923)

December 30, 1922 (Exhibitors I^eralb 85 Heralding the "Herald " Log of Field Representative Gives You Intimate Sidelights About Exhibitors Met in 35,000Mile Tour {Field Representative of Exhibitors Herald) LOOK PLEASANT, PLEASE! THERE! HARRY E. NICHOLS, "Herald" field representative, and the car in which he traveled more than 35,0C0 miles in 1922. Pictures snapped with his camera have provided interesting illustration for these pages, presenting visually the highlights of his carefully kept record presented herewith. Cleveland, O., Dec. 19, '22. Dear Exhibitors: Every year the Herald gives me a chance to talk about you and to you in the Holiday Number, and I've always had such a tough job of it getting all I want to say, said (and always forgetting something) that this year I kept a log, as we old sea dogs call it, covering the 35,000 miles of my 1922 cruise. It's in pretty bad shape, what with camping out in Wisconsin and bucking cyclones and sand storms in Nebraska, but I've still got most of the pages and all of them are mighty interesting. My original idea was to just send it along and let you look at it, but 35,000 miles is a long road and I can't have all the space in the book to print it, so I'm going to scenarize it for you. And anyway, I wouldn't like to trust it to the mails. It's worth a lot to me. * * * You see, I haven't got any home, except the nearest theatre, and I haven't any brothers or sisters except brother or sister exhibitors. When I park the Herald service car out in front of your lobby, that's my garage and I'm home. If you think it don't mean anything when you hold out your hand as I come in or slap me on the back as I leave, you don't know how many bumps there are in 35,000 miles of miscellaneous country road and how far it is between theatres in this supposedly thickly theatred nation. No, I don't think I'd trust my log to the mails. It's my family album, so to speak, and I can't take chances on it. I hope you'll bear with my stumbling synopsis of it. Before you start reading, though, I want to tell you that I'm sincerely grateful to all of you for the good times you've given me during the year and to wish every one of you the merriest kind of a Merry Christmas and the happiest of Happy New Years. Harry E. Nichols. My first big stop in 1922 was Omaha, home of the World Realty Company, operating the Sun, Moon, Muse and World theatres, headed by the progressive and efficient Harry Goldberg. I was made at home in short order by the gifted Mr. Goldberg and was welcomed also by Nate Frudenfeld, exploitation wizard in charge of the World theatre. Everybody who reads anything, or travels, knows the kind of showmanship Frudenfeld dishes out, and anybody who's ever been in Omaha knows his brand of hospitality too. * * * Here I was present at the banquet given salesmen by the Film Board of Trade in the interests of clean selling. A big event, well managed and attended and bringing together as fine a lot of square shooters as one meets in a blue moon. William H. Creal, pal of J. C. Jenkins and proprietor of the Suburban theatre, also made life considerably more than worth while in the Nebraska metropolis, as did George McArdle, whose Benalto is one of the most attractive neighborhood houses in the city, and Bruce Johnson, manager of the Rialto, another theatre widely known for its excellent advertising. Moving on to Alliance, I arrived just in time for the opening of J. E. Hughes' new house, an event of import managed in the manner of a born showman. By HARRY E. NICHOLS On to Hay Springs, a small town where reside those consistent contributors to "What the Picture Did for Me," Messrs. Horn and Morgan, owners of the Star theatre and a booming real estate business on the side. Genoa was the next stop, and Mrs. M. Peterson, who operates the Grand theatre, proved to me again the capability of the feminine sex in matters of showmanship. I doubt if there's a man in the business who could improve upon her management of the Grand. * * * It was with real home-coming enthusiasm that I drove into Neligh and stopped in front of J. C. Jenkins' Auditorium theatre. "J. C." and I found so much to talk about that I declared a temporary holiday, went out and put my feet under the groaning board presided over by the motherly Mrs. Jenkins, talked and talked and talked, and went to church with the head of the house on Sunday morning. All of you know "J. C." pretty well through his writings in the Herald, so there isn't anything for me to tell you about him except that he's just like he writes, only more so. If you ever get within a thousand miles of Neligh you shouldn't fail to drop in and let him tell vou anything you happen not to know about the show business. At Grand Junction another exhibitoress, if I may use the term, added proof to the conviction that a good many exhibitors ought to run their theatres in their wives' names. Mrs. D. I. Kimman makes the Rex do things just about as she wants it to, yet still has time to make a road weary field representative feel like he belongs. This jaunt through Nebraska was no holiday excursion. After narrowly missing a cyclone that tore things up all around me, I managed to run right into the heart of more sand storms than I saw in all the sheik pictures of 1922. All a man needs out there in Western Nebraska is a strong back and a compass, but I didn't have a compass. Luckily, the farmers see strangers so seldom that they'll spend an hour directing you to the next cross roads just as quickly as they'll sell you the best farm dinner vou ever sat down to for a quarter. * * * Nebraska exhibitors weren't getting rich when I went through, but there was optimism that did your heart good on every* side. I didn't meet a quitter in the state. Entering Wisconsin, I made Virocqua just in time to be present at the opening of Ben Brown's splendid new theatre, the Temple. Mr. Brown put the event over in big city style and made everybody, including this wayfarer, a booster for the house the first night. At Stanley I met another showman of the same school, Tom Foster, whose genial personality is the chief asset of a house of many assets, the Star. The minute you shake hands with Tom you get the feeling that you've known him all your life. And he treats you as if he felt the same way about it. After a lot of camping out in the lake country, where the mosquitoes not men (.Concluded on page III)