Emulating Essense: Film and its impact on New York City Until World War II
The time is 6:00 am, August 14, 1945. You wake up and get ready for work at a cloth factory in midtown Manhattan. Your humble but cozy one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn is all you can afford for you and your two young kids after your salary was cut in 1938. With that said, you are one of the lucky ones who kept their job after the depression, and ever since the war started, you have been making an additional $3 a week considering the demand for military uniforms. Unfortunately, your husband was shipped off last year, and every day you thank God that you haven’t gotten a letter notifying you of his death. The kids stay busy with school, but with the extra money you get, you take the tram down to Flatbush and take them to Loew’s Kings Theatre to catch a film. Gold pillars and crimson curtains frame the screen and give you a glimpse of wealth, even if it’s just for a second.
7:00 am comes, and you are on your way to work. Suddenly the tram stops, and you look up. Times Tower on Fifth avenue glitters with these five words “Official Truman announces Japanese surrender.” This day, better known as V-J Day or Victory Over Japan Day, was one that was cemented in the memory of thousands of New Yorkers and millions across the country. It signified hope, resilience, and proof that good always prevails at the end of the day. The end of World War II brought about many changes in the United States. However, one change that is often overlooked is its impact on the film industry, and specifically the film industry in New York City.
My name is Jordan Renville, and I have written countless conventional essays covering a myriad of different topics, from how documentaries can change the viewpoints of a population to how Catholics were oppressed when immigrating to America in the early 20th century. Today, I hope to bring you, the reader, an unconventional exploration of my two favorite topics; film and New York City. As a New Yorker myself, I believed that it would be extremely easy for me to recall the history of the place that I have called home for almost 20 years upon embarking on this project. I was drastically wrong. My research taught me about places that I never knew existed, and people I never knew had such a profound impact on my home. While there were so many new aspects that I learned about, there was one thing that stayed consistent throughout this experience; film not only helps tell the story of a place through time, but it is arguably the most impactful tool that can shape a generation.
Our story starts in the spring of 1896. At this time, New York was going through one of its most challenging periods as a city. Because of an influx of Irish, Polish, German, and various other European immigrants, the Streets of New York were filled far beyond capacity. One family tenements in the lower east side of Manhattan were often filled with eight or nine families at a time. This overpopulation made New York city a dangerous and uncomfortable place to live and heightened the competitiveness of its then relatively small economy. Yet, despite its pitfalls, everyone seemed to be content that they were there for one reason and one reason only; to have their piece of the “American Dream”. Insert; film. Up until this point, film was a relatively small industry in New York City, with most moving pictures taking the form of Thomas A. Edison’s kinetoscopes which were circulating Brooklyn and Manhattan. These were short, “storyless” loops that gave the illusion of movement by spinning images rapidly across an eyepiece. See the video and picture below as a representation.
While these kinetoscopes were a technological breakthrough and the start of what is now a multibillion-dollar industry, to many people, these wooden boxes seemed like a gimmick that wouldn’t gain enough traction to survive for more than a few years. This narrative changed when, on May 11th, 1896, a German immigrant by the name of William Heise picked up a new camera created by Edison and decided to simply capture what was around him. Heise saw men and women, tram cars, and light posts. Most importantly, however, he saw the real New York. Yes, it was crowded; yes, it was chaos, but what he captured goes far beyond what any verbal or written explanation could. He titled it “Herald Square” This film has no plot or storyline and is known as an Actuality.
I highlight the story of William Heise because I believe it is at this point that film begins to make a difference and tells the story of a young New York City. Instead of shrugging off Edison’s creations, Heise saw something in them. He saw his own “American Dream”. Heise went on to be a cameraman and director of hundreds of short films and is now recognized as one of the pioneers of film in America.
In the following months, Hundreds of these Actualities were shown at what was known as Koster & Bial’s Music Hall on 34th Street. These showings were mostly reserved for the upper-middle class, who were willing to pay upwards of $1.50 a ticket. Considering inflation, this equates to about $50 in the present day. Koster & Bial’s became one of the hubs for film in New York City throughout the rest of the 19th century and much of the early 20th century.
As the years went on, cinema became more and more developed. The introduction of staged scenes, plot lines, and character development made the film industry more versatile and lucrative than ever before. By 1905 many new theaters like the Republic and the Lyric were built in New York City, and film became a more affordable form of entertainment. By 1920, Actors like Charlie Chaplin and Harold Lloyd were becoming household names in the city and across the world. It is safe to say that film took a giant leap from small kinetoscopes to motion pictures that were beginning to shape a country in these few short decades.
The next part of my research took me to the summer of 1928. By this time, New York city is drastically different. Once filled with horse-drawn carriages and trams, streets are now littered with diesel cars and express subways. The overcrowdedness that once characterized the city has lessened due to the immigration act of 1924, which dramatically decreased the number of European immigrants that were allowed into the country per year. As you can see, there were a large number of physical changes that occurred since the 1890s; however, I believe that the most interesting changes were cultural. As a country, the United States had, just ten years prior, gone through World War I, which at its time was the deadliest war involving America. This conflict generated an overwhelming sense of nationalism that was echoed throughout the smallest parts of the nation, let alone New York. A disjointed country that was a melting pot of immigrants from all of the world suddenly united and fought against a common evil.
This sense of community and patriotism did not fail to show itself throughout the film industry. On July 6th, 1928, a film by the name of “Lights of New York” was released by the then 5-year-old production company, “Warner Bros.” If the name does not already say enough, the 57-minute film is about two friends who have been struggling in upstate New York and finally scrape together enough money to move to the big apple and open a barbershop. The film shows scenes of joy and dancing and depicts New York as the true cultural center that it was. However, the plot and shot selection alone is not what makes this movie remarkable. “Lights of New York” was branded as America’s first film with fully integrated and synchronized audio. This fact brought the film to a whole new level. Not only did it show the grandiose high-class nature of New York, but it also signified a major technological breakthrough in the world of film. In a nutshell, things were looking good for the country and film industry as a whole.
Little did anyone expect, just over a year later, on October 24, 1929, the front page of the Brooklyn Eagle would read…
This day known now as Black Thursday marks the start of the great depression, an eleven-year time period that saw the greatest poverty rates in America’s history. Every industry, including the film industry, suffered. People were not able to afford food, let alone tickets to their local theater. In addition to the economic crisis that the country was going through, a new threat began to rise; The Nazis. On September 1st, 1939, the Germans invaded Poland. Although America was not yet involved in the war, the consensus around the country was that we would need to intervene in order to dismantle the evil that was Hitler’s Germany and the rest of the Axis. To many Americas, the combination of these two events seemed like almost the breaking point of the country. However, what ended up happening defied what the majority thought was possible and solidified in the minds of millions across the country that America could not be broken.
Much like World War I, the American population rallied together when troops were first sent to the shores of Normandy in 1944. The economy started to pick up and revolve around the military. Slowly but surely, various industries began to normalize, and the film industry was no different.
1945 not only marked the end of the war, resulting in an Allies victory, but it also marked a boom for film. Production houses all over the country were working as hard as they could to create a movie that could encapsulate the essence of what had just happened in the United States. Arguably the film to win this race was a film noir picture by the name of “The House on 92nd Street”. The film is about a New York City-based FBI agent who was recruited to be a spy for the Germans in 1939. The double agent working for the FBI plays a crucial role in thwarting the plans of the Nazis.
This film was a marvel at its time with brilliant writing and an all-star cast; however, I do not believe this made the film so popular. I truly think that this film became popular because it took the events of World War II and even as far back as the great depression and made them digestible for the American people.
I found one thing to be true about film throughout my research, no matter what time period. The most impactful films are ones that emulate the essence of what is really going on at the time. These films can be as literal as “Herald Square” or as figurative as “Lights of New York.” It is for this reason that films are such a powerful tool for historians to use when looking at the past. There is an inherent quality in film that one can not get through the oral or written medium. When filmmakers can capture this inherent quality, I believe that film elevates from just a form of entertainment but undoubtedly the most important form of media that can shape a place and its people.
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