Film distribution and licensing agencies play a major role in how films are dispersed and delivered to individual theaters in a specific area. One of the major distribution companies in the Pacific Northwest during the early 1900s was the Amalgamated Film Exchange of Portland and Seattle. This exchange company was one of the only licensed exchanges in the area and additionally owned quite a few theaters under the name of the People's Amusement Company throughout Oregon and Washington.

The Empire Theater in Albany was open during the early 1900s and while the population today has reached over fifty-thousand, the city was much smaller back then. The Empire was also not the only theater open in this area at the time, so in order to ensure they would have steady business, this theater was forced to explore alternative promotional strategies. This included many musical performances.

My main research throughout this course has been about Salem, Oregon. More specifically, my research has been about the Wexford movie theater in this city. Because of helpful resources such as newspapers.com, I have been able to find plenty of information about the theater and its surrounding contexts from newspapers such as the Capital Journal. However, I wanted to dig deeper into the different aspects of film and exhibition in Salem, so I searched “Mexican Film” in the database and found some interesting information.

Since the emergence of cinema, local and federal governing bodies have had a say in what actually makes it to the silver screen. The roots of cinema established the art form as a family-friendly way to keep people out of trouble. Any sort of film promoting or even alluding to behaviors which don’t align with these values got the chop. However, while promoting itself as in the best interests of the people, the box office turnouts for heavily censored films often showed otherwise. 

The Portland Playhouse is a nonprofit theatre company created by Nikki and Brian (last names unknown) in 2008/2009. They both shared a deep passion for theatre, which led them to buy an old Church in the King Neighborhood. This theatre stands out against other non-commercial theatres because of its use of its platform. Their mission statements, which can be found throughout their website, is to work to be radically inclusive on and off stage. They prioritize the needs of their community and use various events to help create a safe place free of discrimination and oppressive mannerisms.

Theaters can play important roles in towns big and small, like by creating a sense of community. Other activities coming to a town aren’t always a form of competition, instead they may work together. In the small town of Athena, plans for construction of a new swimming pool in City Park were set in February of 1928. A majority of the funds and labor needed for construction were donated by various people and business, one of those being the Standard Theatre (1).

While today we expect movie theaters just to play movies, this wasn’t always the case. Theaters were more prominent parts of their neighborhoods and hosted all kinds of events. In Tillamook, Oregon in the 1910s, it was not out of the ordinary for films to not play at all on some days at certain theaters. Specifically, at the Gem Theatre, there were quite a few productions from high schools and churches performing things like plays, comedy, and music¹.

Frank Neugebauer the proprietor and manager of the Dime Theater in Pendleton was attacked by Councilman J.T. Hinkle on Febuary 17th 1909. The main reason for this was that Frank had decided to cancel an act due to it being a very poor act. He brings up in his response that this act had previously been “chased” out of the Star theater the year before because of how bad it was. Also, he says that the act had an initial trial run and did not go well. He paid them for their nights work but refused to let them come back again.

A woman theater owner? Pre-suffrage? Love to see it.