Media History Digital Library - 25 Years of Photoplay

[missdupont]

I found a big boo boo in MOTION PICTURE CLASSIC. The years 1924-1926 are all linked to the 1923 issues, nothing for those years comes up. Nice to see THE TEN COMMANDMENTS in 1923, but it obviously didn't come out in those other years, and the exact same photos wouldn't have been used if it was mentioned.

[Bruce Long]

I found a big boo boo in MOTION PICTURE CLASSIC. The years 1924-1926 are all linked to the 1923 issues, nothing for those years comes up. Nice to see THE TEN COMMANDMENTS in 1923, but it obviously didn't come out in those other years, and the exact same photos wouldn't have been used if it was mentioned.

When I search, I can find the volume at
http://archive.org/details/motion1724moti" target="_blank
which contains various issues from 1923, 1924, and 1926.

[missdupont]

I searched through the MHDL, and when I opened 24-26 looking for Donald Biddle Keyes, it opened up to 1923 every time. No other magazine was like this, be it Photoplay, INternational Photographer, Shadowland, Picture Play Magazine, Movie Weekly, Screenland, Film-Play, American Cinematographer, etc.

[mndean]

I searched through the MHDL, and when I opened 24-26 looking for Donald Biddle Keyes, it opened up to 1923 every time. No other magazine was like this, be it Photoplay, INternational Photographer, Shadowland, Picture Play Magazine, Movie Weekly, Screenland, Film-Play, American Cinematographer, etc.

I have a memory that the volume you refer to is very incomplete and starts with a 1923 issue and has big gaps so the last issue is indeed from 1926. IIRC, it is poorly (i.e. deceptively) described. Happily, there's much new since the beginning of the year, here http://archive.org/search.php?query=col ... publicdate

For those who may not have found them listed yet on the homepage.

[missdupont]

Once again as I said, when you visit Media History Digital Library, and choose that magazine to search for an item, it only brings up issues for 1923 whatever year you choose. You get the exact same 1923 cover with Bebe Daniels, and the exact same references as 1923 when you try 1924-1926. It might be right in archive.org, but it is obviously wrong in MHDL, so it needs to be corrected.

[Bruce Long]

Once again as I said, when you visit Media History Digital Library, and choose that magazine to search for an item, it only brings up issues for 1923 whatever year you choose. You get the exact same 1923 cover with Bebe Daniels, and the exact same references as 1923 when you try 1924-1926. It might be right in archive.org, but it is obviously wrong in MHDL, so it needs to be corrected.

Well, the only thing that looks wrong about the Motion Picture Classic links on http://mediahistoryproject.org/collections/" target="_blank is that the volume contains no 1925 issues. But it does contain issues from 1924 and 1926.

[mndean]

Once again as I said, when you visit Media History Digital Library, and choose that magazine to search for an item, it only brings up issues for 1923 whatever year you choose. You get the exact same 1923 cover with Bebe Daniels, and the exact same references as 1923 when you try 1924-1926. It might be right in archive.org, but it is obviously wrong in MHDL, so it needs to be corrected.

I understand what you mean, and it's the same at archive.org. There's only one bound book of Motion Picture Classic issues that has been scanned for all of 1923-1926. The one book contains scattered issues from 1923-1926 and is very incomplete. MHDL gives it four separate listings and they all point to the same scanned book and will take you to the first page scanned (where you see Florence Vidor's smiling face on the June 1923 cover), which is what I meant by it being deceptively described there. Archive.org's description is just Motion Picture Classic (1923-1926), which is rather opaque as to what's contained.

So while it may look like we disagree about something, we don't! Someone there should change the darn listing to a more accurate one (like their 1922 listing of Motion Picture Classic, where each issue is individually listed, and the link should take you to the correct page).

[missdupont]

Bruce,
If you don't believe me, go to Motion Picture Classic in MHDL and try Donald Biddle Keyes for each year 1923-1926. You should see that each year brings up only the 1923 items, it doesn't bring up anything from those years. It should just bring up nothing rather than the items from 1923 if it was correct or working properly.

[Bruce Long]

What we have here, is a failure to commu-cate. Please give the web address that you are doing your search from.

From the Media History Digital Library site at http://mediahistoryproject.org" target="_blank I get nothing at all when I type "Donald Biddle Keyes" in the search box at the upper right corner.

[missdupont]

Here is the link to Motion Picture Classic, supposedly year 1925 under the list of all holdings in MHDL, searching for Donald biddle Keyes. If you notice, all six items are from the year 1923.
http://archive.org/stream/motion1724mot ... 3/mode/2up" target="_blank

This also happens when you search the years 1924 and 1926 from this list. As MnDean says, either it should be one general link from here as 1923-1926, or the supposed links to years 1924-1926 should disappear.

[Bruce Long]

OK, that link is on the Internet Archive, and is a link for that bound volume which contains various issues from the years 1923-26. So a search there would find naturally results from any of the issues in that volume.

Because that volume contains such scattered issues, it would be have been better if the PDF file had been broken up into individual issues (which anyone with Acrobat could do) prior to placing in the Internet Archive. But I don't see any error with the listing for it on the MHDL site (except that 1925 should not be included), because the link does indeed take you to that volume. I suppose it would be more user-friendly if the links for 1924 and 1926 were modified to go to the first issue from that year:
1924: http://archive.org/stream/motion1724mot ... 9/mode/2up" target="_blank
1926: http://archive.org/stream/motion1724mot ... 7/mode/2up" target="_blank

[David Pierce]

I've reviewed all of the comments above, and it's unfortunate that missdupont found the online volume to be so confusing that we were accused of a "big boo boo" and that mndean finds the volume to be "deceptively described." Keep in mind that this is a free resource that is the product of volunteer labor and private contributions.

I've gone to the Internet Archive page, clarified the date range, and added a description of the volume which includes the following issues:

June, 1923 (cover - Florence Vidor)
September, 1923 (cover - Norma Talmadge)
October 1923 (cover - Alice Terry)
December 1923 (cover - Baby Peggy)
February 1924 (cover - Lillian Gish)
October 1924 (cover - Bebe Daniels)
April 1926 (cover - Renee Adoree)
May 1926 (cover - Colleen Moore)
June 1926 (cover - Clara Bow)
July 1926 (cover - Richard Dix)
August 1926 (cover - Dolores Costello)
September 1926 (cover - Claire Windsor)
October 1926 (cover - Louise Brooks)

David Pierce
Media History Digital Library
http://mediahistoryproject.org/

[mndean]

David, I gave an example of the same publication in a year where it is not deceptively described. 1922 has two issues and they are listed individually. There are other examples of that degree of accuracy with other publications at MHDL. Sorry, but I got bit by the same listing as missdupont, only it was longer ago. I did not think to complain then since I found information elsewhere which was useful to me. The newer listings seem much better as they do mention in the description there may be pages missing, and in some cases which pages are missing. The one case of 1923-26 Motion Picture Classic is an anomaly, and egregious considering the relative accuracy of the rest of the listings.

Also, if someone contacted me from archive.org asking if I would be willing to donate time to repair listings, I'd of course be happy to. I have attempted to assist some with the Feature Films section, looking up copyrights to keep non-PD films out. It isn't as if I haven't volunteered anything to archive.org. The MHDL and media publication area of IA seem to only wish my money and not my time. Time I have, money I don't.

Your call.

[Bruce Long]

...I gave an example of the same publication in a year where it is not deceptively described. 1922 has two issues and they are listed individually...

Well you could say that's my doing. I scanned and uploaded 100+ issues from my collection (including those two 1922 issues of Classic), and the MHDL asked me if they could include them in their library; I agreed. (But I don't edit their item descriptions, and they don't edit mine.) My relatively few items were hand-scanned from individual issues and I described them in the detail I felt was appropriate; their gazillion issues were primarily scanned from bound volumes using automated book scanners and described with different standards.

I think it's understandable that they want to keep tight control over who has the ability to edit their entries in the Internet Archive.

But each entry has a place for "Reviews", which anyone can write. If you want to add more information about an item, you can add that information in a Review, and then whatever you added would be found by others doing a google search.

[mndean]

Well you could say that's my doing. I scanned and uploaded 100+ issues from my collection (including those two 1922 issues of Classic), and the MHDL asked me if they could include them in their library; I agreed. (But I don't edit their item descriptions, and they don't edit mine.) My relatively few items were hand-scanned from individual issues and I described them in the detail I felt was appropriate; their gazillion issues were primarily scanned from bound volumes using automated book scanners and described with different standards.

I think it's understandable that they want to keep tight control over who has the ability to edit their entries in the Internet Archive.

But each entry has a place for "Reviews", which anyone can write. If you want to add more information about an item, you can add that information in a Review, and then whatever you added would be found by others doing a google search.

I've done the dance with "reviews" and "comments" in another section of IA and few if anyone read them, and the comments can (and do) get deleted. Volunteering is one thing (which is why I said I'd do that - there are pieces of some pages razored out of some issues, sometimes very large pieces). I'm not going to go to Reviews to do that. What I would write is not a review for one thing, and it also leaves my errata list as unrecognized as having value to IA. I've had problems with libraries before taking my work, repairing things and then forgetting I existed. My own city library even misidentified a number of photos, corrected them as per my input, and then not so much as a thank you. No more.

[Brooksie]

Just to give a contrasting view to the grumpiness, I am constantly amazed that the Media History Digital Library's material is as user-friendly as it is, given that I'm sure it has all been put together on the smell of an oily rag. Over Christmas I did an old-fashioned microfische trawl and boy, did it remind me how lucky we are to have this material scanned and ready to look at on our home PCs. I've not yet had a single problem with the material, and it's aided my own research to an extent unfathomable even five years ago. Thanks to all the volunteers for all their hard work, it's truly worthwhile.

[barry byrne]

" Thanks to all the volunteers for all their hard work, it's truly worthwhile"

Amen to that. Your work is much appreciated by those of us miles, perhaps continents, away from access to material that has now been scanned in for all of us to use. Very many of the commercial news databases have big issues with their search facilities also, as you discover when you actually know something is there but it does not show, or turn up lots of false positives. This type of access really will change scholarship in time. Now if the translation engines were better for handling foreign languages, some more gems will be available (Icelandic film reviews anyone?)

[mndean]

Just to give a contrasting view to the grumpiness, I am constantly amazed that the Media History Digital Library's material is as user-friendly as it is, given that I'm sure it has all been put together on the smell of an oily rag. Over Christmas I did an old-fashioned microfische trawl and boy, did it remind me how lucky we are to have this material scanned and ready to look at on our home PCs. I've not yet had a single problem with the material, and it's aided my own research to an extent unfathomable even five years ago. Thanks to all the volunteers for all their hard work, it's truly worthwhile.

My grumpiness only extended to David and his comment. I use the IA extensively as an earlier comment of mine suggests, since I know what's new and usually have grabbed it before it gets put up on MHDL.

[missdupont]

People shouldn't jump to conclusions about what someone feels if they don't ask. I have happily used the MHDL for research, which is obvious if you read some of my posts here, but was just pointing out something that did not match the other thoroughness and/or correctness of links that go exactly to what is requested. In this case, trying to help make MOTION PICTURE CLASSIC be easily understandable, usable, and accessible for ALL researchers who come to MHDL to use it.

[Harlett O'Dowd]

This is a little outside the scope of this thread, but hopefully someone here will be able to point me in the right direction - whether it be to an archive, a microfilm reader or an on-line source:

In the later 1930s, there was a San Francisco-published, west-coast-centric trade paper called THE STAGE. It covered stage, nightclubs, radio and the like (little if any film material.)

worldcat comes up empty - but does anyone know of anyone who might have a more-or-less complete run of this periodical available in some seeable format?

Thanks in advance