In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants (1913)

Page scan 00044 from In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants

Record Details:

Title:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants
Date:
1913
Publisher:
New York, Appeal Printing Co.
Volume:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants : record volume 4
Leaf #:
00044
Language:
English
Collection:
Government & Law and Early Cinema
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
These seven volumes contain the testimonies and supporting documents from the U.S. District Court's antitrust lawsuit against the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC). Formed in 1908, the MPPC (sometimes referred to asœ"the Edison Trust" or just "the Trust") sought to control the American film industry through pooling patents and demanding that producers and exhibitors acquire licenses to those patents. Independent producers and exhibitors, who refused to license the patents, argued that the MPPC was an unlawful monopoly. In 1912 and 1913, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania heard testimonies from both MPPC members, such as Siegmund Lubin, and "Independents" who later became Hollywood moguls, such as William Fox. Ultimately, in 1915, the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which found the MPPC in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and spelled the end for the already weakening MPPC. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012
Date Added:
September 12, 2024
Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

1894 William A. Landau, Direct Examination. Q. Where is that? A. Corner of 181st Street. Q. In Manhattan? A. Manhattan. Fort Washington. Q. You have been there two months? A. In this particular place, yes. Q. Are you the owner of the place, or a part owner? A. I am president of the company. Q. Are you interested in, or do you own any other motion picture theatre? A. At the present time, two open-air places. Q. And where are your two open-air places located? A. One on the corner of Wadsworth Avenue and 179th Street, the other one on Jerome Avenue and Fordham Road. Q. How long have you had the two open-air places? A. Going on four years. Q. How long have you been in the motion picture exhibiting business? A. Seven years. Q. What other places have you had or managed during the seven years? A. Two other places, which I sold recently. Q. Where were they located? A. Audubon Avenue and 181st Street, the other one on Ogden Avenue. Q. From what rental exchange do you rent motion pictures? A. General Film Company. Q. Have you been getting your motion pictures from the General Film Company since you acquired the place that you are now running? A. Yes. Q. Did you get your pictures from the General Film Company for the open-air places that you were running? A. Not all of them. Q. Did you get part of them from the General Film Company? A. Yes, sir. Q. Are the open-air places closed now? A. At the present time. Q. Do you advertise a regular and definite program for your theatre at the present time? A. Well, this new house, if you will allow me, is a new house of its type, an absolute fire-proof building, seats GOO and about 200 standing. The house is of such type that I claim, and it has been proclaimed the finest of its kind in the country, today, and I do not use any advertisements whatsoever, except use photos only in the lobby. 1 don't use any posters, as every