The Movies Move
Unoccupied space in the. Dartmouth buildings is enough of a rarity to make it news when one of the departments of the College manages to move into new and larger quarters. This spring Dartmouth College Films, which is in charge of visual aids on the educational side and the production and distribution of Dartmouth movies on the alumni and public relations side, transferred its operations from Baker Library to the white, pillared building on College Street that most alumni know as the old Dragon Tomb and that students of more recent vintage refer to as the Naturalist's Building.
The use of educational movies, film strips and slides has increased steadily at Dartmouth and is now an important part of the overall educational program, as it is at most other colleges and universities. During the academic year 1949-50, for example, 72 different courses made use of movies. Dartmouth College Films keeps five sound projectors in pretty constant use and has a staff of nine student operators on call for class assignments. The NROTC Unit has four sound projectors of its own, and when the equipment owned individually by the three associated schools, the DCAC, and the college photographic studio is added, you arrive at a total of at least 15 projectors on the campus.
Dartmouth's educational film program is directed by J. Blair Watson Jr., who took charge in the fall of 1945 after special training in that field at the University of New Hampshire. In his new headquarters he now has greatly increased storage space for the films owned by the College; a projection booth, which was not possible in the library quarters; a large audience room; an office; a dark room; and special facilities for the inspection and editing of films.
Dartmouth follows the policy of renting most of the educational films it uses, drawing on the libraries of professional firms but more frequently on those offered by universities such as New Hampshire, Columbia and Indiana. The College does have about 75 films of its own, however. Certain departments make more extensive use of visual aids than others, with Zoology following perhaps the most detailed plan. Psychology courses make frequent use of films, and other departments with which Mr. Watson works a good deal are Education, Art, Botany, Geology, Comparative Literature, Geography, Sociology, Hygiene, Speech, and the modern languages, which use foreign films for social background as well as for the native tongue. Great Issues favors films and the new Russian Civilization Department plans to make extensive use of them next year.
In addition to its educational work, Dartmouth College Films has a busy time handling the showing of the College's own movies among alumni clubs, schools and other organizations. The newest catalogue lists thirty films for rent, not counting the annual football movies. No film produced by the College has enjoyed greater success than its most recent one, My First Week at Dartmouth. Six prints have been in constant use this spring and bookings for next fall have already begun. Seven alumni clubs have purchased copies for repeated showing in their home regions and more clubs are expected to follow suit. A non-professional, low-cost effort, My First Week at Dartmouth has turned out to be a highly effective vehicle of public relations and a tribute to the authorship and direction of Maurice Rapf '35 and the photography of Adrian Bouchard, whose skill in still another photographic medium is presented in this issue.
