Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1911-04-28

Anywhere. everywhere, you find them. In the
United States you will have to hunt town Of
less than 1000 Inhabitants If you wish to escape
the moving pictures
Five millions of Americans daily visit these
shows.
The exhibitors pay s1s.OOo,OOo year for their
films. The public pays $57.500000 year to
them.
therefrom of $4,000.
So 1t is a pretty big business pretty thor
oughly organized, quite universal in its reach
soap-bubbly in its universally.
The child Of the poor, with clay pipe and the
suds from the weekly wash, can have just
good time as any rich young fellow with i'm
ported meerschaum and the best CASTLE.
So 1t is with the moving-picture shows. 1t re-
quires little capital to them. A long room,
easily darkened, ninefeet square patch Of white
cloth, benches for the spectators an oper-
ator at ten dollars a week, and a rented film, now
takes the place of company of actors stage
scenery, properties, lights and properly
equipped building. And the poor boy gets as
much value for his nickel as the rich boy can get
for any number of dollars.
Yet, they run into dangers that no soapbubbles
can allure. Fire is Of these the most patent.
or the moral dangers will speak later It
is through the moral soap-bubble that we can see
more clearly the moving pictures gossamer
tinsel. ----.i
Fire, however, Is the first and most vital dan
ger The Charity Bazaar fire In Paris in which
SO many women were trampled to death by cow
ardly men, was caused by the fall of a spark
upon some celluloid moving picture films which
had been dropped into basket. In Canton 600
men, Cinnamon burned to death in fire
In moving-picture show house. In Quito, Ecua-
dor, fifty men and women lost their lives in
similar calamity.
1t speaks we'll for the widespread and con-
stant vigilance of the fire departments of the
United States that no great catastrophe has yet
come to the movng-picture houses of this
country.
Lives have not been lost in the moving picture
shows. Lives have been lost through the moving
picture shows.
Where once the dime and nickel novels sug-
gested ways of crime to unbalanced youth the
moving picture has come to make more ready
and potent appeal The printed word is
never so ardent with an impressonable mind as
the acted word.
Several ways have been thought of to lessen
these obvious evils. Charles Sprague Smith, late
chief of the Peoples Institute In New York.
thought he had solved the problem when he In
duced the manufacturers of the moving pictures
to agree to a national board Of censorship.
The manufacturers, good trade diplomats.
readily assented, and then saw to 1t that the
board of censorship should be advisory and not
antagonstic. The result is that many pictures
that create havoc among youthful minds when
shown on the public screens get by" the ma
tional board of censorship
No This bubble that Edison has loosed upon
us will play itself out Just far as the instincts
of the whole people of this country will permit
no farther, no sooner
One night went to prize fight. Only men
were present. The casual observer might have
said they were all tough men. After the fight
canvas was erected in the ring and an an
nouncer said "An exclusive film will now be
shown to the members of this club"
The picture proved to be of French manufac-
ture and portrayed vile situation in dive.
Instantly Kisses and a storm of execratlon burst
from the audience, The running of the film was
stopped and the picture removed before 1t was
all ghswn. Grim silence greeted the removal OF
the canvas,
The crowd that gloried in the action of the