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536 HARVARD BUSINESS REPORTS
interesting prospective candidates. Selection was determined by such factors as education, experience, intelligence, physique, personality, a natural aptitude for music, advertising, art and stage craft, and a desire to make theater management a life occupation. Outstanding company employees were particularly desirable, because of their experience in theater operation and the resultant favorable effect their enrollment in the school might have on other junior employees. The 1929 class was recruited exclusively from the ranks of the company and its parent organization, the Paramount Famous Lasky Corporation.
The first course conducted by the Publix Theater Managers Training School was in session for six months. In addition to a tuition fee, students were required to pay all their personal expenses. In 1929, the tuition fee was discontinued. Each student received $25 a week during his enrollment, and the duration of the course was reduced to three months.
The method of instruction varied. Upon entering the school, students were first acquainted briefly with the more general aspects of the motion picture industry, especially the interrelation of production, distribution, and exhibition. In the classroom they were presented with the problems involved in the promotion, building, and operation of a theater. They were familiarized with accounting and budgetary control; with all forms of mechanical equipment, including sound projection; ventilation and lighting technique; orchestral and organ music; stage presentations; program building; and with such executive duties as employment, supervision, discipline, and training. Particular emphasis was placed on advertising and exploitation, under which headings the following items, among others, were discussed: the mechanics of newspaper advertising, billboards, and window display; national campaign, tie-up, news story, and accessory advertising; and community propaganda.
To provide a proper application of the acquired theory, students were assigned to different departments in the company's various New York theaters and on several occasions they had been taken to Atlanta, Georgia, where they were provided with a knowledge of the operating problems peculiar to the theaters in that section of the country. While assigned to theaters, students were given an opportunity to perform certain functions and to supervise others. The performance check was indicative