Honoring Mack Sennett

How refreshing to read (Glendale Edition, Aug. 26) that Mack Sennett’s stage will be preserved! In today’s impersonal era of mini-malls, office high-rises, new apartment buildings, condominiums, it seems there will soon be nothing left to preserve!

However, this preservation is more of a tribute to Mack Sennett himself than to his famed studio. After all, Mack Sennett, born Michael (Mikall) Sinnott, was one of the true pioneers of filmdom, discovering such talents as Charlie Chaplin, Roscoe (Fatty) Arbuckle, Harry Langdon and famed director Frank Capra, to name just a few.

As befell so many others (i.e., D. W. Griffith), sound pictures and changing times heralded his downfall to obscurity, and he died a long-forgotten man.

My congratulations to Times Staff Writer Esther Schrader, the Cultural Heritage Commission, Marc Wanamaker and Jay Oren for allowing Mack Sennett’s name and fame to be read by untold numbers of people who had probably never heard of him.

EDDIE CRESS, Los Angeles