Rescued From the Permafrost

7/24/2019 Rescued From the Permafrost

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ommunications

RESCUE D FR OM THE PERM AFRO ST: The DawsonCollection of M otion PicturesTh e discovery of gold in 1896 touched off a mad rush to the Klondike th at transfo rmed amud flat on a bend in the Yukon River into the City of Gold -Dawson City, YukonTerritory. W ithin mon ths the n ames of the gold bearing creeks that flowed into theKlondike River-Bonanza, Eldor ado, Gold Bottom , Sko ok um Gulch-were know nroun d the world. By the fall of 1896, a ragged arm y of men a nd w omen was o n the marchto emulate the good fortune of such instant 'millionaires' as George WashingtonCarmack, Skookum Jim, and Tagish Charley.

Very few of them m ade it throug h the mo untains th at stood between the Klondike andthe Pacific Oce an route via Alaska t o the gold fields tha t year. The 22,000 who arrived inSkagway in the summ er and fall of 1897faced not only the Chilkoot Pass (3,500feet to thesum mit, with the last4 miles a 35 slope of ice an d drifting snow) but a decre e tha t no-onecould set fo ot in the Y ukon Territory unless they were equipped with at least a ton of foodan d essential supplies. Once over the Pass, the exhau sted arm y had to survive a n equally

hazard ous trip dow n river fr om Lake Bennet to Dawson City. Wh en the weird flotilla ofhome-mad e rafts, canoes, and boats of every description (7,000 of them ) finally arrivedthat sum mer, D awso n, with a population now swollen to 30,000, became the most popu-lous city in C ana da west of Winnipeg. A lthough there is n o evidence that any one packed amotion picture came ra over the Chilko ot Pass in the Winter of 1897, Rob ert Bonine wasprobably in the Klondike as early as the summ er of 1898 to record the event for the EdisonCompany. His films, and the photographs of E.A. Hegg, a professional photographerwho did backp ack his camera and his supplies over the Pass that mem orable winter, con-vey, as no verbal descriptions can, what life in that instant comm unity, spawned by goldfever, was like.

Everything was for sale in D awson City, and t o accom modate the personal fortunesbeing crea ted every da y all the amenities of weste rn civilization were being introduced tomeet the de man d. By 1 July , 1897, there were two bank s, two newspapers, five churchesand an on-again, off-again telephone service available, and by the turn of the century itsresidents could boast of Arizona C harlies' Palace Gr and , a n Opera House, a PublicLibrary, and a range of amusemen ts that would have done credit to any commu nity inNorth America three times the size. Among the amusements was the motion picture,althoug h little is known ab ou t exhibition in Daw son City. Ther e were advertisements forthe amazing wonders of the nimatograph and the Projectoscope as early as the summ erof 1898, but no real evidence tha t these were more than limited presentations by itineran tshowmen anxiou s for their share of the riches that flowed from the creek beds. What is

Rescued rom the Permafrost s adaptedfrom an articleby Sam Kula publishedin merica n Film(J u ly 1979)


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Front Street Dawson, Yukon, 1899 (National Film Board 81217)

clear, however, is that the Daw son Am ateur Athletic Association, forme d in 1902, was

adding film shows to its program of amateur and professional theatricals to amuse itsmembers by the end of 1903. Th e professional performers would have to be shipped Sou thagain, even if they had to wait until the weather unlocked the Y ukon before they couldleave, but neither the exchanges nor the distributors in the irtur n were prepared to ab sorbthe cost of shipping the films back afte r their run at the D AA A. F or the newsrzels, theserials, and the program features of the day, Daw son City became the end of th e line.

Although it was highly unlikely that anyone in Dawson would try to pirate theirproduct, it became the practice for distributor s to leave the prints in the custody of theCanad ian Bank of Com merce, on e of the two rival banks racing to be the first to open itsdoors in Ju ne 1897. Th e Bank, ign orant of or ignoring the fire hazard associated withnitrocellulose base film (the stand ard stock used in the industry u ntil 1950), store d thegrowing collection in the basemen t of the Carnegie Library Building. Since Dawson Citylies close enough to the Arctic Circle that the groun d is permanently frozen to a depth ofbetween 10 and 15 feet, one can only assume that th e basement of the L ibrary, resting onor in the permafrost, approx imated the refrigerated storage conditions recommended fornitrate film.

The rest of the story comes from C lifford T hom son, now a resident of Chilliwack, B.C.An em ployee of the Bank between 1928 and 1932, Mr. Tho ms on also served as Treasu rerof the H ockey Association. It s arena was adjacent to the D AA A an d in its centre,somehow, a swimming tank, roughly 20x 30 , had been hacked through the permafrost.M r. Th omso n recalls that the pool was covered by boards before the arena was flooded,but that the ice bulged over the pool area. In the su mm er of 1929, the decision was made toeliminate the pool an d the prob lem, and o n M r. Thomson s suggestion all the film thathad accum ulated in the Library s basem ent was used as fill. Well covered with earth , an d


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with the board s replaced, this slice of Nor th Am erican film history, in all i ts variety, con-t inued to make i ts own hum ble contr ibut ion in suppo rt of the DAAA 's recreat ional pro-gram.

In the Su mm er of 1978, Daw son City had a permanent populat ion of only 800, and theair of a place frozen in time. K londike N ational H istoric Sites, the restoration ar m ofParks Ca nad a on site, was engaged in docum enting and restoring half-a-dozen buildings,while the Klondike Visitors' Association was filling the fully restored Palace Gra nd an dDiam ond To oth G erties' with as much highlife, evoking the spirit of the place when thegold fever was a t its height, as the law and their budget would allow. It was, in fact, in thevacant lot just behind Diam ond To oth Gerties' (Canada's only legal gambling hall) tha tthe nitrate film strike was made.

The D AA A clubhouse an d arena had once occupied the s i te , and workmen test ing thesoil in preparatio n for the cons truction of a civic recreational centre-in Da wso n City aselsewhere the wheel moves full circle -first uncovered a few reels of film. Th ro ug h th egood offices of M ike Gates, Cu rat or of Collections at Klondike Natio nal Historic Sites,the find was bro ught t o the attention of the Nation al Film A rchives, and when a prelimi-nary e xplor ation indicated t hat there were dozens, if not hun dreds , of reels on the site, thedecision was made to excavate. There was not m uch t ime for debate as the bul ldozers werescheduled t o roll in a m atter of weeks. At this poin t, Kathy Jone s, Director of the DawsonCity M useum , too k charge of the project, persuaded the City M anage r to delay the start ofconstruct ion, and negotiated a contract with t he N ational Fi lm A rchives to underwrite thecost of the project, all in record time. U nder her sup ervision, a tea m was assembled andtrained in a set of procedures developed fo r the safe handling of nitrate film. M ike Gatessuggested the use of the ice house (tunneled out of the hillside) at Bear Creek MiningCam p, ano ther s i te under the restorat ion, as a temporary vault , and this turned ou t to bean ideal locat ion in the middle of August with tem peratures near25 C.

The swimm ing tank on thesite oft h e Dawson A mateur Athletic Association at the start o fthe dig . Pho tograp h by Kathy Jones, Dawson City Museum, Yukon.


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A reel of the Dawson Collection as it emer gedf rom the excavation.Pho tograp h by KathyJones, D awson City Museum, Yukon.

The first estimates, based on t he film that lay close to the surface, was that only afew ofthe reels cou ld be salvaged, and a t that only a small portion of each reel. The base was insurprisingly good shap e after nearly fifty years, but grou nd water seepage fro m the Springthaws h ad bleached m ost of the image, and the emulsion had been attack ed by chemicals

in the soil, and in part by chemicals released in the decomposition of the metal reels onwhich the film was m ounted , an d of the m etal transfer cases(6 to 8 reels to a box) in whichthe reels were packed. It was n ot until the end of August, after theKlondike Korner aDawson City bulletin, carried a n item o n the dig , that J on es and her crew realized thatthey were dealing with a sw imming tank full of film. On seeing the item, Clifford Th oms onwrote to Jon es to clear up the mystery of how the f i lm came to be buried, and to indicatethe extent of the find. A t the sam e time, the film emerging fro m below the surface wasproving to be in much better condition. Ma ny of the reels had leaders and titles in goodenou gh shape t o allow positive identification, an d som e even retained their censor bands(the strip of cardb oard that verifies th at the film h as been licensed fo r exhibition in thevariou s jurisdictions) an d their shipping instructions. The final count when the dig wasofficially terminated was 510 reels, althou gh a realistic app rais al wou ld place the numb erof salvageable reels (in whole o r in pa rt) a t some thing like425 reels . The nu mbers ar euncertain a t even this late date (31 M arch 1979) because there ar e new techniques stillbeing tested th at m ay allow the resto ration of reels which a re no w jelled in a solid mass,suffering from lateral as well as linear shrink age, or so brittle tha t the film snaps off, onefram e at a time, when an attempt is made to unwind it.

Ther e were form idable problems to solve, however, before any restoration w ork couldtake place. The key one was moving the film from Dawson City to the National FilmArchives (NF A) restoration facility in Ottawa. Nitrate film is highly flammable an dclassed as a hazardous substance that cann ot be openly shipped on a c omm on carrier. TheN FA had close to one ton of film, after it had been packed, and n o means of transporting itsome 2,800 miles. The answer, after interminable frustra tion and d elay turned out to be atwo stage operation. With the aid of a sympathetic trucker who was prepared to tur n a


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The Butler and the Maid . Aframe showing the eflects o severe water damage upon thefilm s emulsion, coupled with the possible start of nitrate decomposition. Enlargementfrom the Edison Com pany production, 1912. Public Archives of Canada)


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blind eye on the manifest, the film was moved 350 miles sou th to W hitehorse. When allelse had demo nstrably failed, an appe al was mad e to the Dep artmen t of National Defense,and in due course of time, a nd after the film had been repacked in woode n crates lined withtin to comply with regulations, and Air Force H ercules transport lumbered t o a stop at

Uplands Forces Base and disgorged the Dawson Collection.The first task was to review the Collection in order to segregate the material into

categories base d on physical condition. All the film was excessively m oist du e to the veryhum idities it had experienced while buried, an d the emulsion was encrusted with particlesof debris an d coated in m any cases with chemicals which would eventually atta ck theimage. Th e first step, therefore, was t o rewash all the films that offered any prospects thatthey could be successfully transferred t o safety stock, and thus at tem pt to stablize theimage. T he film would then be dried which would elim inate the excessive moisture a s well,and the best means of effecting a transfer could then be determined. Film that demo n-strated only minimal shrinkage could be contact printed a t a reasonable speed, but filmthat was shrun k beyond the limits of standa rd laboratory equip ment (and this was the casewith the vast bulk of the D awso n Collection) would have to be optically printed on e frameat a time (a m uch slower and m uch more expensive process), or re-dimensioned throughthe use of a vacuum tank and chemical treatment so that i t would conform to the s tandard,or as is the case with a high percentage of the Dawson Collection, both processes.

It was o bvious th at even 400 reels would tie up the NFA's limited resto ratio n facilitiesfor a year o r more (an ou tput of less than one reel a working day is not uncom mon withfilm in an advanced state of decomposition). H elp was needed, a nd in the traditio n of theInternat ional Federat ion of Fi lm Archives (FIAF), to which the NFA and the otherorganizations belong, the Library of Congress and th e American Film Institute offeredtheir assistance. AFI's Larry Karr started the lab orious process of checking to see if theprints o n the Daw son Collection were already held elsewhere, a fact that would obviouslydro p a title way down on the list of priorities. Library of Congress' Paul Spe hr offered totransfer some 190 reels of U.S. production s, titles th at w ould be valuable addition s to thenatio nal collection. Th e work w as started in the Library's ow n resto ratio n facility, but is

now being carried on at the National Archives Laborator y while the Library of Congressrelocates its facility.

It may well be another year before the value of the D awson Collection can be properlyassessed. W hat is now clear is tha t it represents a cross-section of the films in theatricaldistribution between 1910 and 1925. The vast majority ar e Hollywood production s, whichis not surprising in view of the alm ost com plete dom inati on of the industry enjoyed by thecompanies located there in that period. Th e material ranges over one reel comedies o rdram as from such pioneer comp anies as Edison , Biograph, Vitagraph, Thanhou ser, Blue-bird an d Selig-Polyscope, throu gh serials an d newsreels, to feature films. M any of thenames ar e well established (D.W. Griffith, Sam uel Goldwyn, Maurice Tourne ur, Mac kSennett) as producers and directors, many more would have undoubtedly been betterknown if more of their films had been available when the histories were written.

If there ar e any unacknowledged masterpieces in the Dawson Collection, they have notyet made their presence know n. few lost films of note such as PO LL Y O F T H ECI R CU S (1917), with M ae M arsh (Sa m Goldwyn's first independ ent production), a ndW IL D FI R E (1915) with Lilian Russell and Lionel Barrymore (Miss Russell 's only screenappearan ce), have turned u p, and others, perhaps, remain to be identified. Fo r somereason, the Collection is very strong on serials (THE CRIMSON STAIN, (1916), withMaurice Cestel lo; THE GIRL AND THE GAME (1915-16), with Helen Holmes;P E A R L OF THE ARMY (1916) , wi th Pear l Whi te ; THE NEGLECTED WIFE(1916-17), with R uth Rolan d) although we are not certain a t this stage exactly how manyof the chap ters are in the Collection. As more a nd m ore of the unidentified reels are re-conditioned a nd transferred each serial is becoming more a nd m ore of a cliff-hanger as we


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Immigrants arriving ar Ellis Island ew York. Frame enlargement from British-Can adian Pathe News, c. 1920. (Pub lic Archives of Can ada )

finally d etermin e whether or n ot the last chapter , where the villain is unmask ed a nd all isexplained, is a victim or a survivor.

T o the film scho lar, the fa scination of the C ollection may lie in the possible significanceof little known productions by established figures (PRINCES VIRTUE, with MayMurray; BLISS, with Harold Lloyd and Bebe Danie ls ; TH E SCA ND AL M ON GE RS,written and directed y Lois Weber; THE INSPECTOR'S DOUBLE, directed byWilliam Beaudine), but t o the archivist and historian the appeal is probably the unknow nquan tity represented by som e75 reels of newsfilm. Pro du ced prim arily between 1913 an d1922 und er such titles as Universal Screen Magaz ine, Gau mon t's The Reel of RealNews , Universal Animated Weekly, Pat h6 Anim ated Gaz ette, Universal Cu rren t Events,and British Can adia n P at ht News, these actualities, as their titles suggest, range far andwide fo r their subject matter. Th e majority were produced during the war years (1914-18)an d, alon g with the several reels of British Gov ernm ent Official News in the Collection ,provide coverage of that conflict and the impact it was having in Can ada, Engiand, F ranceand the U.S. The editions of British Canadia n P ath6 News that turned up in Dawson Cityare of particular interest because this assemblage of original Canadian 'items' and itemsdraw n fr om Path6 Frkres world-wide network was one of the few successful attemp s tointrodu ce Cana dian co ntent into the theatrical newsreel. P roduced in Montre al by ErnestOuimet, a pioneer e xhibitor and distributor, between 1919 and 1923, no com plete editionshad been kn own to exist prior to this find. The reels are thus a significant contribu tion tothe study of Canadian film history quite apart from their content.

No-one familiar with the considerable resources now accessible throug h the work offilm archives throug hout the world would seriously argue tha t the Daw son Collection, or


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an y on e cache of early film, will lead to a w holesale re-write of the histories. Nevertheless,we have learned over the years tha t, given the harsh reality tha t mo re than half the filmstha t were produced in the world prio r to 1930 are not k now n to exist and every film fromthe silent era is a valuab le piece of the mosaic, even when it is at least partially com plete itwill constitute a vital segment of ou r com mo n cultural history.

Arrival of Viscount Byng of Vimy at Quebec Cityto ake up hisappointment as GovernorGeneral o Canada 12 August 1921. Fram e enlargement fro m Bri t ish-Canadian PatheNews, 1921. (Public Archives of Canada)

The Daw son Collection is a som ewha t bizarre but nonetheless effective reminder thatby n o mean s all the early film tha t has survived has been recovered. If the permafrost ofthe K londik e can yield up a significant collection after half a century , what treasures maystill be locked away in the attics and basem ents of the n ation, and in the forgotten cornersof th e film industry s vaults?

Sam KulaNational Film Archives

rchives in the Kitchen

Although I didn t know it at the time, began researching ut o Old Ontario Kitchenswhen first learned to cook on the hearth. had litt le instruction and fended for myselfwith f i rewood which dem anded smoking embers , heavy and clumsy iron pots , doughwhich refused to rise an d utensils whose function a t first was mys terious. few years later,entrenched in libraries and archives poring over cook bo ok s and coo king experiences,Iwas thankful for having had the management ofa nineteenth century kitchen. I had a

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Rescued From the Permafrost