Silent-Era Filmmaking in Santa Barbara

by Robert S. Birchard

Overview

Between 1910 and 1921, the American Film Company was one of the fledgling movie industry's most successful studios, with production facilities in Santa Barbara and business offices in Chicago. Nicknamed for its distinctive winged "A" logo, the "Flying A" produced nearly 1,200 films, starring such favorites of the day as Mary Miles Minter, J. Warren Kerrigan, Wallace Reid, and King Baggot. The company's rather patriotic motto invited patrons to "See Americans first." The studio's films also documented the picturesque and developing Pacific seaside community of Santa Barbara and served as a training ground for some of Hollywood's greatest directors, including Allan Dwan, Henry King, Victor Fleming, Frank Borzage, George Marshall, William Desmond Taylor, and Marshall Neilan.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780738547305
Publisher:	Arcadia Publishing SC
Publication date:	06/27/2007
Series:	Images of America Series
Pages:	128
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.31(d)

About the Author

Author Robert S. Birchard, who selected these rarely or neverseen photographs from his personal collection, is an awardwinning film and video editor whose books include Cecil B. DeMille's Hollywood and King Cowboy—Tom Mix and the Movies. A guest curator for an exhibit on the "Flying A" studio at the Santa Barbara Historical Society Museum, Birchard has appeared on television's History Detectives and in the documentaries Cecil B. DeMille: America Epic and The Woman With the Hungry Eyes—The Life and Films of Theda Bara.