Tweet Perplexed by Preservation Puff Piece

http://www.metnews.com/articles/reminiscing052903.htm

Also, in about 1958, the company that had been the Du Mont network intentionally destroyed many kinescopes in the process of salvaging silver from them.

What kind of silver content can be salvaged from safety film? I understand that just about all kines were 16mm and I've never heard that silver can be recovered from safety stock, making me either to doubt this story or to at least think there's something missing. Perhaps the successors to Du Mont had inherited some 35mm prints of old nitrate films that they melted down -- that would explain what happened to their print of White Heat (1934).

spadeneal

It makes no difference whether the film was nitrate or safety, the emulsion producing the image was silver, supported by gelatin.
The base is irrelevant in silver recovery. This is still done today with polyester based film (Kodak's trade name Estar).
Color film is a different story, as the silver is dissolved out during processing, replaced by dyes. Silver is recovered from the used processing solutions.
Since heavy use of color film came in around the same time as safety base, silver recovery from used film decreased.

Individually, the cost of retrieving silver from one print is not worth the extraction. However, on a large scale, it was money that the content of the films was no longer worth.

Now I'm curious -- how much silver can you recover from one film print?

I think a noir film have more silver, since it's darker, dark atmosphere, shadow photography.

A portion of the silver is removed during development.

In technicolor dye transfer, all siver was renoved, leaving just the gelatin as a "fingerprint" to be filled with dyes.

Now I'm curious -- how much silver can you recover from one film print?

I believe the rising cost of silver was at least one factor in the downfall of Blackhawk Films. That company used to supply beautiful 16mm prints of the Laurel & Hardy shorts as well as many other Chaplin, Keaton, Little Rascals and Sennett Keystone shorts.

In the late 1960's, a two-reel 16mm short from Blackhawk cost about $40. By the mid-1970's, that price had doubled and continued to go up from there; I just couldn't afford to buy 16mm prints anymore. Then Beta and VHS came in and delivered another knockout blow. I guess Blackhawk either wasn't interested in pursuing the video angle, or was not licensed to do so. SETH

Blackhawk attempted to enter the video market. I have a VHS tape of His Royal Slyness put out by Blackhawk. But soon after as I recall, the Blackhawk catalogs disappeared to be replaced by a Republic Pictures (Home Video) catalog.

And surely video all but killed off the 8mm and 16mm home market, though I tend to agree the rising cost of silver hampered many of us from getting some of those great titles on film back in the day.

[silentfilm]

Blackhawk also decided to start selling video discs (although not making them themselves) and they miscalculated and sold the RCA CED discs rather than laserdiscs.

I think that one more problem with them though was that Kent Eastin and Martin Phelan retired, and the guys running the company were not ready for the changes to the business that video tapes presented.

I forgot about the CED discs, Bruce. Just for the heck of it, maybe should have gotten at least one; I made that same miscalcuation too!

Probably somewhere around here is the Blackhawk catalog in which the company was selling off its film printers. When I saw that, I thought, "Un ho, that's not good..."

Technicolor dye transfer had some silver. The sound track and frame lines were printed first, on a black and white film stock. The dye image was then transferred to the blank space remaining.

I forgot about the CED discs, Bruce. Just for the heck of it, maybe should have gotten at least one; I made that same miscalcuation too!

Probably somewhere around here is the Blackhawk catalog in which the company was selling off its film printers. When I saw that, I thought, "Un ho, that's not good..."

Lee Enterprises, the company that owned Blackhawk between the Eastin-Phelen golden era and the later sale to Republic, seems to be at death's door.

It's got over a billion dollars' worth of long-term debt coming due in less than a year. A plan to raise that money in a junk bond offering just fell apart, and the stock has fallen 60% in the last month, to about a buck a share. Lee's main business is the publishing of newspapers in small cities, not exactly a growth industry.

I forgot about the CED discs, Bruce. Just for the heck of it, maybe should have gotten at least one; I made that same miscalcuation too!

Probably somewhere around here is the Blackhawk catalog in which the company was selling off its film printers. When I saw that, I thought, "Un ho, that's not good..."

Lee Enterprises, the company that owned Blackhawk between the Eastin-Phelen golden era and the later sale to Republic, seems to be at death's door.

It's got over a billion dollars' worth of long-term debt coming due in less than a year. A plan to raise that money in a junk bond offering just fell apart, and the stock has fallen 60% in the last month, to about a buck a share. Lee's main business is the publishing of newspapers in small cities, not exactly a growth industry.

This doesn't bode well for CLASSIC IMAGES or FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE which Lee Enterprises still owns.

RICHARD M ROBERTS

Well you guys threw up a lot of things that need replying to in those posts.

Firstly, I was unaware of Lee Enterprises coming debt payment. I have just renewed a friend's Golden Age subs for the next 12 months and my Classic Images subs are due by June. Hmmm.. In the past where US mags have cosed down or the organization publishing them ceases the publication and carries on with their other enterprises I have been compensated such as a 1970s Movie Digest??? who sent me the balance of the subs back and AFI's magazine which gave Entertainment Tonight subs for the balance of outstanding payments. ET did not try and canvass a renewal when the subs were ending. I would have continued. The Big reel passed these on to the new publisher but it fell apart.

As an agent for Blackhawk films here in Australia I believe Kent Eastin had died before any demise came about but Martin Phelan was a much younger guy who had been in the services in WW2. My understanding was that they were savvy and had home video rights to the L&H stuff before the medium came on the market. I went laserdiscs MCA/Pioneer but I thought Blackhawk got the remnants of the RCA stock and machines and were selling the machines at US$50 each and I forget what the discs were going for. I never saw or got any. The price of silver did have an effect on film and Kodak upped the price of raw stock along wioth everyone else but they did have their own silver mines. The price was bumped up for silver by a rogue investor who may have been from Texas and the price of raw stock went up, it seems, almost daily and it cost me money and I lost hundreds of dollars and items in 16mm not paid for or returned from universities, one on particular in Australia, who refused to pay the higher prices even though they knew what happened and it was not my fault. They relied on the premise that I could not increase the price quoted even though they ordered at the old prices months after the quotes were given and were notified. I had the best 16mm prices in Australia for films used in schools etc. A short like Land Without Bread I could sell and make a profit on then at around $50 was $200 or more from other firms dealing with schools. Lower prices didn't get me the business I should have had. I even had a Uni wanting me to replace footage missing from The Blue Angel and sent me a page copy from a book of the script demanding this footage. Telling these 'experts' that no known copies had this footage fell on deaf ears. I even had a projectionist demanding money back on Abbott & Costello bloopers because they were not pristine quality which would have been impossible for this material now on DVDs.

Getting silver from used film was practiced in my city at a place where most films went but MGM was never sent there. Collectors had an in and various guys got say reel 1 & two from that copy and another 3&4 form another copy and the reels would be assembled for a screening from the various collectors. Later someone was caught and stool pigeoned the other guys and they landed in court and fined with the film destroyed. Later 35mm safety was freely sold and cheap because few could afford t buy 35mm projectors. Around this time(1970s) the 16mm market was hotting up and soon to demise with the advent of Beta & VHS. I was told Fox had the prints taken to a city dump with a lawyer with a list and watched whilst someone at the dump put an ax(e) thru the reels. This is not saving the reels for the silver content. But as someone said it is not worth it in the long run and in Australia they would not have the footage quantity they have in USA and surrounds.

Dumont is a sad case but my slant on this was that much of their material was thrown in the river in NYC where it is said that the first season or more of the NYC based kinescopes of The Johnny Carson Show went. People like Jackie Gleason took their own stuff away as did some others and occasionally a DVD shows up that has Dumont's name on it. I would guess a few reels went west to some collectors at the time. It happens in UK and it probably goes on all the time in USA. Prints often surface when someone dies when they property is being cleared. There is more awareness today about Archives and TV news reports and in the paper announce some of these finds. Of course, there are always the guys who what meager bucks & the studios won't pay those demands as a rule.