Showmen's Trade Review (Jan-Mar 1945)

January 20, 1945 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW 9 Gamble, Mills Ask Industry Prolong Aid Ted Gamble, National Director, War Finance Division, Treasury Department, and Taylor M. Mills, Chief of Motion Pictures, OWI, called on the motion picture industry for continued aid to the Government's war program in addresses which featured the WAC board members at their annual meeting in Hollywood Tuesday (16th). In describing the urgency of a concentrated drive toward just one goal-the shortenmg of the war— Mills told the meetmg that ihe Army Navy, and OWI are fully cognizant of the raw film stock situation. You may be sure that only essential projects will be dealt with. Toward that end, armed services are now working together on a single film which will show cooperative effort in one big operation. Public information films now m work through the cooperation of Government agencies and the motion picture industry's War Activities Committee deal with veteran rehabilitation, the Bill of Rights, International trade, an explanation of lend-lease, Nurse's aid recruiting, and post-war jobs. Ted Gamble lauded the motion picture industry for the work done in previous war loans. In disclosing significant statistics on the national economy, Gamble said: "The job that has been done would have been utterly impossible without the aid of the motion picture industry." He revealed that from May, 1941, up to the last war loan, the Treasury borrowed $157 billion, oi which amount 38 billion came from 8^,000,000 individuals averaging nine bonds per person. 'These are buyers the Treasury especially want to reach," Gamble explained, "not only for financing the war, but for the welfare of this nation's future economy." In disclosing these significant statistics on the national economy. Gamble said that m the Seventh and Eighth loan drives, he will ask Hollywood— both the Victory Committee and the War Activities Committee— for even more aid than has been provided in the past. Board members representing the motion picture industry at the meeting dedicated the entire industry to the nation's service, and launched a stepped-up program for the coming year. Plans for even closer cooperation with Government agencies this year were explained by Francis S. Harmon, War Activities Committee coordinator. Harmon read messages of thanks to the motion picture industry from Basil O'Connor, head of the Red Cross, Winthrop W. Aldrich, President of the National War Fund, and Rear Admiral A. S. Merrill of the Navy. H armon r raises rress Quoting frsm the report of Jack Alicoate, Trade Press Committee chairman for the WAC, Francis S. Harmon, coordinator of the War Activities Committee, told the annual WAC luncheon meeting in Hollywood this week that a total of 833 pages cf advertising to all War Activities Committee undertakings had been contributed by the trade journals of the industry. Harmon said the cost of such advertising at regular page rates would have been $272,534. Trade journals also devoted 13,554 editorial columns to the same causes, the WAC Coordinator informed his audience in praising the industry's trade press for its contribution to war effort causes. Exhibitor Chairmen Named for RC Week Appointment of 55 exhibitors who will serve as exchange area chairmen throughout the United States and insular possessions during Motion Picture Industry Red Cross War Fund Week beginning March 15 were announced last week by N. Peter Rathvon, national chairman. The appointees and the areas they will supervise are : C. J. Latta, Albany; R. B. Wilby and O. C. Lara, Atlanta; S. Pinanski and Nathan Yamins, Boston; Ed Fay, Rhode Island; Robert T. Murphy, Buffalo; H. F. Kincey, Charlotte ; John Balaban and Jack Kirsch, Chicago ; Col. Arthur Frudenfeld and P. J. Wood, Cincinnati ; Meyer Fine and P. J. Wood, Cleveland ; R. J. O'Donnell, Henry Reeve and Don Douglas, Dallas; Rick Ricketson, Denver; A. H. Blank, Des Moines; Earl Hudson and Ray Branch. Detroit; Marc Wolf, Indianapolis ; Freeman Sniith, Kentucky ; Elmer Rhoden, Kansas City; Chas. Skouras and R. H. Poole, Los Angeles ; M. A. Lightman, Memphis ; Harold Fitzgerald, Milwaukee; John Friedl, Minneapolis; I. J. Hoffman, New Haven; E. V. Richards, New Orleans; Fred J. Schwartz and Sam Rinzler, New York; Harry Lowenstein and Frank Damis, Northern New Jersey; L. C. Griffith, Oklahoma City; Wm. Miskell, Omaha; Earle W, Sweigert, Philadelphia; M. A. Silver and M. Finkel, Pittsburgh; O. J. Miller, Portland; Harry .\rthur, St. Louis ; Sam L. Gillette, Salt Lake City ; B. V. Sturdivant and Roy Cooper, San Francisco; Frank Newman and J. M. Hone, Seattle; John J. Payette and Carter Barron, Washington; I. J. Rappaport, Maryland; W. J. Crockett, Virginia. Exchange area chairmen outside the Continental Cnited States are: Homer Garvin, Alaska; Robert O. Schoham, Puerto Rico; V. Fredericksen, St. Croix, and Clarence Payne, St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. East and West Exhibitors First To Pledge Support to RC Drive One eastern and one western showman share jointly the honor of being the first among the nation's 16,000 exhibitors to pledge their support to the Motion Picture Industry's Red Cross War Fund Week next March, it was announced recently by N. Peter Rathvon, national chairman. The pledges received simultaneously came from Mrs. J. J. Parker who operates seven theatres in the Portland, Oregon, area, and Harry Brandt, president of the Brandt Theatres, operating 123 theatres throughout New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Anne O'Donnell Joins PRC Anne O'Donnell, one of the original PRC franchise holders in Detroit, will join PRC in its home office in an executive capacity under Leo J. McCarthy, general sales manager. PRC recently purchased the Detroit franchise from Miss O'Donnell and William Flemion. J. Reg. Wilson Celebrating 25 Years in Film Industry J. Reg. Wilson, city manager at Savannah for the Savannah Theatres Company's Lucas, Bijou, Band Box, Victory and Odeon theatres, is celebrating his twenty fifth anniversary in the industry. Wilson entered the motion picture field in February 1920 with Educational Film in New York and remained with that company for fifteen years. Later he became associated with Gaumont British in this country, and later still with Universal. He was appointed to his present post by the late Arthur Lucas of Lucas and Jenkins, following a reorganization in the Georgia theatres setup of the company when E. E. Whitaker, former general manager, entered the Army. Before taking over as city manager for Savannah, Wilson had been city manager at Gainesville, Georgia, for L & J. He served as a pilot and instructor in the Air Force overseas during World War I. He and Mrs. Wilson have a home in Coronado Beach, Florida. They have a son who is a lieutenant serving now with the U. S. Engineers in the South Pacific tlieatre. J. Reg. Wilson 14,000 Theatres Set For 1945 Dimes Drive With indications that the goal of 14,000 theatres would be attained before this weekend in the 1945 March of Dimes drive under the national chairmanship of Nicholas M. Schenck, headquarters of the Theatre Division in New York reported this week that over 13,000 theatres had already pledged their participation as collectingagencies for the National Foundation's drive against infantile paralysis. .\dditional reports from six state chairmen also heartened the sponsors of the drive with the knowledge that their respective states passed last year's record (an achievement in itself) by topping the previous enrollment. The chairmen reporting included : Rick Ricketson, Colorado ; J. O. Brooks and Paul Schlossman, Michigan ; Arthur Lehman, Mississippi ; Fred Schwartz, Sam Rinzler, Max Yellen, and J. Meyer Schine, New York ; Moe Silver, Ted Schlanger, and Sidney Solomon, Pennsylvania; and William C. Sears and W. H. Workman, Minnesota. Further assurances of attaining the unofficial $5 million dollar goal were manifested by a report from circuit chairman Joseph R. Vogel in which two-thirds of all circuits of 10 or more theatres pledged themselves to book the strongest possible attractions during the collection week, Jan. 25-31. Telegraphic communication from M. A. Lightman, Arkansas chairman, received at headquarters informed the committee that all theatres in that state with the exception of 17 small towns have been signed. In Connecticut the drive will have the cooperation of every theatre in that state, I. J. Hoffman declared in a communication to the committee. In Boston Harry Browning's publicity committee added a variation to the collecting forces which gives promise of swelling this year's gross to the fund by enrolling every large restaurant and cafeteria chain in that city for the placement of coin boxes on cashiers' desks. Because of his record in last year's drive and the method of his campaign which has been held up to fellow-exhibitors as a pattern, Roscoe Drissell, manager of Loew's State, Norfolk, Va., has been appointed vice-chairman of the 1945 drive. Drissell's record of a total collection of $12,585 in the '44 drive is a mark at which most managers are aiming and hope to surpass. Other reports from the Southern territory reveal that Arthur Lehman, Mississippi chairman, has set $50,000 as the state's goal ; and the entire opening night's receipts of Interstate's new 1000-seat Laurel Theatre, San Antonio, Texas, will be added to that state's Dimes total, it has been disclosed by Texas chairmen Robert J. O'Donnell and Karl Hoblitzelle. In a telegram to national headquarters O'Donnell stated that unprecedented cooperation is anticipated in the drive from the 900 theatres in Texas, adding that the goal is to double last year's collections of $214,058. Television will have a definite place in this year's drive and plans have been completed to televise the Greer Garson trailer over stations in New York, Schenectady, and Philadelp'hia during the week of Jan. 25-31. Dedication of the Times Square "March of Dimes" display, as part of the WAC's Statue of Liberty, is scheduled for Jan. 25. Eciward C. Dowden, special events chairman, is planning a parade with military bands, stars of stage and screen, addresses by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, Basil O'Connor, president of the National Foundation, and Harry Brandt of the National Committee. Each day a difl^erent Broadway theatre will be in charge of securing contributions to the several hundred glass jars, each bearing the name of a different child. Paula Gould, publicist for Loew's State, New York City has arranged to have a special "Dimes" appeal by little Margaret O'Brien recorded and amplified for street display.