A piece of history so unique that it has people telling the man who discovered it in eastern Iowa to share it in San Francisco and Paris is coming to Vinton tomorrow night.
Despite its very unassuming name, The Brinton Silent Film Project is that uniquely and significantly historical, says Mike Zahs, the retired teacher and history buff who suddenly has found that sharing 120-year-old movies is a full-time gig.
I asked Mike to share some of the titles of some of those films that will appear on the Palace screen at 7 p.m. Thursday.
“I could tell you the names of those movies but nobody has ever heard any of them before,” said Mike. He went on to explain that the very first moving picture was made in 1894 and that those in his collection go back as far as 1895.
“That’s 20 years before Charlie Chaplin,” Mike says.
The Frank Brinton story
Mike, as a history teacher and history enthusiast, had known for years about the story of Frank Brinton, the Washington, Iowa inventor and entertainer. Mike taught middle school – he still refers to it as junior high – in the Washington school district. During my three years a journalist there, I heard one of Mike’s presentations on Frank Brinton. I also sat in his class on Sept. 11, 2001, as he and his students watched those events unfold on TV and discussed their impact on our country and our future.
Mike often tells Brinton’s story during historical presentations, mostly in that area of Iowa about 100 miles south of Vinton, a few miles west of Highway 218/27. He loves to show photos of Brinton’s flying machines, and share the history of how Brinton, 20 years before the Wright Brothers, came close to success but was mostly remembered for his very public failures. But a decade later, Brinton and his wife, whose first name really was Indiana, became famous (and rich) by finding then-new movies in catalogs, ordering them and showing them in a local theater.
“Sometimes they made up to $150 per day in an era when many people didn’t make that much in one year,” Mike says.
Brinton began showing those films in 1898. He ran the Globe Opera House in Washington (which is still in business at the State Theater) until just before his death in 1917.
Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton and others dominated the next decade, but as technology made “talkies” possible and then the norm, the silent films were quickly forgotten.
Hardly any copies of the first movies exist; some were even dangerous to store, made from cellulose nitrate, which is highly explosive.
Sometime in 1981, the man in charge of the Brinton estate was cleaning out “Brinton crap,” and he offered to sell it to Mike.
Knowing that there may be something of historical value in that house, Mike bought three truckloads of items.
Soon, he discovered many of the films Brinton had bought to show Iowa audiences. Approximately 90 of them were in good enough condition to preserve and show modern audiences.
Mike spent decades showing those films occasionally, wondering if someday, the world would realize the value of the treasure he had found.
‘Hugo’ and Maries Georges Jean Méliès
Two things happened in the past few years that have helped Mike tell the world about Brinton’s films.
First, the 2011 movie “Hugo” told the story of a boy who discovered in the early 20th Century that moving picture pioneer Maries Georges Jean Méliès was alive. “Hugo” helped revive interest in Méliès and the importance of his contributions to the movie industry.
Some of the films that will appear Thursday at the Palace are the works of Méliès. Mike credits “Hugo” for reviving interest in Méliès; as one of the few people possessing original works by Méliès, Mike found his collection in demand. In addition to displaying the films throughout Iowa and media interviews with statewide radio and newspapers, Mike has also been in contact with film enthusiasts who believe the films should appear in the well-known silent film festival in San Francisco and also the Cannes festival in Paris.
The other thing that happened was a $51,000 Humanities Iowa grant, made possible with funds from the Riverside Casino and the Washington County Riverboat Foundation. This helped restore the films in a way that makes it easier to show them, and also to publicize the story of Brinton’s collection. Mike is working with a company called MediaPreserve and the U of I Special Collections Dept.
Music by Red Cedar
The music that will accompany the films will come from members of a group very familiar to Vinton residents: The Red Cedar Chamber Music. The group has performed many times in Vinton. Some of its members will play their instruments to accompany the films the audience sees on Thursday.
“The films are good; the music is great,” Mike says.
Tickets for the 7 p.m. Thursday show are $10.
For more information about the Brinton Silent Film Project, click on links below:
KCCK radio interview about the project
Humanities Magazine interview with Mike Zahs
Brinton Silent Film Project Schedule
Iowa Public Radio interview with Red Cedar Chamber
Des Moines Register interview with Mike Zahs as project began
Comments
Submit a CommentPlease refresh the page to leave Comment.
Still seeing this message? Press Ctrl + F5 to do a "Hard Refresh".