Showmen's Trade Review (Jan-Mar 1943)

Frhniary 27. 104S S H O W iM EN'S TRADE R E V I E W 35 Inventory of Equipment Held War-Time Necessity Complete Listing of Maker's Nome, Model, Etc.: Aid to Efficient Maintenance Equipment manufacturers are being impeded in work they are striving mightily to do (with such time and manpower as is at their disposal ) for servicing existing theatre installations of their products with spare parts. The cause of the difficulty lies in the failure of large numbers of theatre owners to ascertain the manufacturer who produced such equipment as chairs, projector lamps, generators, proscenium equipment, etc., in order that the request for needed replacement parts may be addressed to the maker of the particular apparatus. There are few, if indeed any, manufacturers of theatre equipment whose plants are not now converted to production of war materials, and that means their plants and personnel are working under the greatest pressure of time. Under the circumstances these manufacturers are making a definite sacrifice of their time and resources in order to help theatre owners maintain existing equipment when a spare part is needed. But the work is being vastly increased by unnecessary correspondence resulting from requests for parts for a chair or other unit of theatre apparatus made by some other manufacturer. Save Valuable Time Naturally, no manufacturer can make or supply a part for a piece of equipment he has not produced at his own factory. Even if there were enough parts to go around — which certainly tliere are not — the part would be useless for other than a precise model and make for which it is designed. This publication urged theatremen repeatedly, when restrictions on equipment manufacture first were ordered by the government, to compile a complete inventory of all equipment in the theatre. The inventory should be as complete as possible, and can be made with a reasonable expenditure of time and effort. Such data will be most useful to the theatreman — and will, most certainly, be the means of avoiding unfair demands upon the time of manufacturers, who are doing their best to aid customers who installed their products in theatres by furnishing, as rapidly as factory help and transportation facilities permit, the part or parts needed to keep apparatus in operation. The inventory should be made up on the basis of departmentalizing the theatre. The departments should be headed: Projection Room, Seating, Stage, I.obby, Janitorial Equipment, etc. Should Cover All Units Each departmental heading should cover every piece of working equipment in that department — in detail. The projection department list should include number and descriptive name of each article: Projector, Lamp House, Generator or Rectifier, Sound Head, Amplifier, Lens, Rewinder — everything used in the projection booth. The stage department should head a list of the screen, the speakers, the curtain control electrical unit and the track. The items should be listed individually — 1 Projector, its maker's name, the address to which inquiries for spare parts should be sent, its model number, its serial number — all the data that can be found on name and designation plates. Only by such systematic inventory of the entire equipment of the theatre can the person who must send out inquiries for spare parts work intelligently — and save the time which is all too frequently being wasted by misdirected appeals for a new part for some piece of equipment. Beyond the efficiency of such procedure for the theatre itself, is the just as important cooperation that should be accorded to manufacturers and the government itself. A theatre could be forced to an untimely, and mighty costly close-down because of this waste of time over correspondence that has no other purpose than to confuse ever3rbody and force upon wholly innocent parties the burden of replying to a letter they never should have received. The matter is stressed at length here because t'ne situation is such that many manufacturers are being imposed upon and because, even if tliis unnecessary work were to be forgiven, the menace to the whole program now going along with surprising smoothness will be jeopardized. If the constantly shrinking manpower of the manufacturing plants continues to be unnecessarily taxed, it may result in a stoppage or at least a very serious crippling of the good work being done to service existing equipment with necessary, but strictly limited, supplies of spare parts. Harris Grand Being Rebuilt Bloomington, Ind. — Construction of the Harris Grand Theatre is now entering its second month after a $50,000 blaze razed the building. Mrs. Judson Buchanan, owner, expects the theatre to be opened some time in April. De VRY is building .sturdy Jiiotion picture equipment for the U.S. Navy, U.S. Array Air Corps, and other armed .wrvices. When peace comes, De VRY equipment, built to stand the shocks of battle, will be available to you. Sijmbol of Qualilij You who demand projectors that can stand the gaff of continuous peacetime service, consider what De VRY 35mm. equipment is withstanding today under wartime projection conditions on U.S. fighting ships and at U.S. Army Air Corps bases ! Shock of offensive bombs . . . repercussion of defensive guns . . . punishing vibration of mighty men-of-war . . . constant day-in, day-out use under all manner of weather and tempera turevariations. You who want to be first with the latest will want to be first to know about new war born De VRY Projectors for theatre use. De VRY Corporation, 1110 Armitagc, Chicago, U.S.A. * BUY U. S. WAR BONDS * DeYRY WORLD'S MOST COMPLETE LINE OF MOTION PICTURE SOUND EQUIPMENT