The esteemed Paramount Theater (also known as the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall) located on Broadway in Portland, Oregon, was banned from showing the controversial film “Imitation of Life”. The film, starring Louise Beavers and Fredi Washington told a story of a daughter in the film who supports the negro population by creating friendships and bonds in the negro community. The film expressed the cause of controversy in the white community.

The Moreland Theater, among others, was involved in a dispute against the Portland motion picture machine operator’s protective union. This was a major battle for better working conditions that began with the union demanding that there be two projection operators, instead of just one, and an increase in pay.

It seems that quite a bit of Portland theaters during the early 20th century would organize charity programs or host public leisure events to become friendly with the community, and further research proves that a similar kind of behavior exists among the popular theater chains of today.

As theater exhibition increased during the 1920s, theater owners went about making changes to their theaters; adding more seats, hiring more help, etc. For John Hamrick, owner of the Portland Blue Mouse theater, installing a new, custom designed Wurlitzer organ was just the trick. According to an article in the Oregonian, Hamrick had the Hope-Jones Wurlitzer organ installed at the local theater in the spring of 1922. As the first of its kind in the city, the new organ, on its own, was sure to stir up some attraction.

The Heilig theater, located in Portland Oregon, was a vibrant and thrilling addition to the Portland theater scene in the 1900s. It was built in 1910 and slowly became a staple for movie patrons in the Portland area. Although the Heilig was well known as a movie theatre, it was also extremely popular for showing comedic operas and vaudeville shows.

In The Oregon Daily Journa

           On May 15, 1909, readers of the Oregon Daily Journal were greeted with the front page news of the arrival of the mysterious Mr. Raffles. Also known as Edward F. Girard, this man reportedly baffled “thousands of people in other cities of America” and was now saying that doing the same in Portland would be “easy” (9). Raffles was his name, eluding people was his game, and all Portlanders had to do was identify him to win the promised prize of five hundred dollars (8).

The early 1900's era of filmmaking was under the firm grasp of the National Board of Censorship, an organization formed to prevent the showings of indecent or suggestive content in movies. This became quite a hot topic among viewers at the time. Some Americans preferred a restriction on what they considered to be inappropriate while others favored a more risqué style. This debate did not go unnoticed in Portland, Oregon and in fact seemed to emphasize the same national issues. Listed below are four separate segments from two Portland Newspapers between years of 1910 and 1922.

Upon doing more research on film censorship occurring in Portland in the early 1900s, I learned that there was a Portland board of motion pictures censor. Viewers of the Portland board of motion pictures censor had the authority to order scenes and subtitles from publicly released films to be removed. According to an article from The Oregon Daily Journal in March 1921, the film Passion was ordered to remove three scenes and one subtitle from its film, which is focused on Madame DuBarry, a French revolutionary.

On September 4, 1904, the