Trusted Writing on History, Travel, and American Culture Since 1949
Silent Films
The men and women who labored in the ghostly light of the great screen to make the music that accompanied silent movies were as much a part of the show as Lillian Gish or Douglas Fairbanks
If I ever kill anyone,” D. W. Griffith once exclaimed, “it won’t be an actor but a musician.” He had been arguing with Joseph Carl Breil, his collaborator on the score for The Birth of a Nation. Read more >>
GOOD READING
The Shattered Silents: How the Talkies Came to Stay
by Alexander Walker William Morrow and Co., Inc. 65 photographs, 218 pages, $10.95 Read more >>
The last of the major silent films, made shortly before sound engulfed the movie industry in 1928, may not have been golden, but they glittered brightly. Read more >>
Superstar of the Silents
In early Hollywood there lived a King. He was married to a Queen. Her name was Mary, and she was a Golden Girl. He was dashing and marvellously graceful and young—above all young. Youth was very American, and besides, it was essential to the King Read more >>
For almost two decades at the turn of the century illustrated songs charmed nickelodeon audiences.