Reconstructing Thanhouser: The Twenty-Five-Year Journey of a Citizen Archivist

"Preservation without access is pointless."

—The Committee for Film Preservation and Public Access, 1993

The Thanhouser film enterprise produced and released 1,086 films between 1910 and 1917, working from its headquarters in New Rochelle, New York. ¹ Unlike the studio founders at Biograph or Edison, Edwin Thanhouser saw no reason to preserve any of his negatives or distribution prints. ² Without a central repository for its films, the Thanhouser studio output was deconstructed, its films scattered across the globe via its network of distribution channels. As a result, surviving Thanhouser films have gone largely unseen. Early film history was consequently written by scholars who principally studied productions from a handful of studios and from archives that provided easy access. Now, with a catalog of surviving Thanhouser films and improved access, a new perspective on this important era is starting to emerge.

This article chronicles my twenty-five-year journey to reconstruct the Thanhouser film legacy by locating, identifying, assuring the preservation of, and improving access to 222 surviving Thanhouser films that have been located around the world at archives and in private collections. The ability to view surviving Thanhouser films is no longer limited to scholars and researchers who travel to archives to view preservation prints under controlled conditions.

Technological advances in video distribution over the past three decades have redefined the paradigm for access. As Rick Prelinger argues, archive managers and collectors should be "points of origin," supporting public access to their materials to enable a new generation of citizens and scholars to view and interpret our cinematic history. He succinctly states, "While expanding access has become a relatively uncontroversial objective, its implementation is roadblocked by constraint, uncertainty, and ambivalence." ³ My hope is that archives will view my twenty-five-year quest as a case study and a call-to-action for improved access to their collections.

Back Story

Why would Edwin Thanhouser burn what today we judge as treasures? He considered the films to have only fleeting value, so he commanded, "They're worthless—burn 'em." ⁴ Taking a closer look at our family history, I believe it was more than just an issue of cost. Certainly the expense of storing thousands of reels of highly flammable nitrate film was a factor, especially for a man who learned through the school of hard knocks to be frugal and cautious with his money. More was at stake, however. Edwin Thanhouser had a desire to rise above the second-class social stigma commonly associated with actors and actresses from the stage and screen, and he hoped to enjoy the wealth and status he had worked to achieve.

Edwin began his career on the stage as a supporting actor in the mid-1890s, traveling by train on a grueling schedule from city to city. He honed his craft and eventually left the stage as a performer to establish a very successful theatrical company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1909, however, box office receipts were on the decline as nickelodeons were opening on every street corner, stealing his audiences by showing the latest novelty: one-reel motion pictures.

The decision to enter the film industry was a business venture for Edwin Thanhouser, not an idealistic dream of changing the world with better entertainment. He was the first with a theatrical background to manage a studio in the United States, which uniquely prepared him to enter the new motion picture business. He had the experience of running a successful theatrical stock company for over a decade and possessed a collection of screen-ready plays combined with access to experienced actors. It was fiscal survival for his family—either suffer declining revenue managing a dwindling enterprise or enter the new entertainment growth industry.

Edwin moved his family to New Rochelle, New York, in fall 1909, and with a ten thousand dollar investment, he translated his theatrical savvy from the stage to the screen. Starting

Edwin Thanhouser as Captain Larolle in Under the Red Robe, circa 1895. Thanhouser Collection.

Thanhouser...