The Curious Course of a Major Hollywood Archive

There is no excuse for the lack of knowledge or research displayed by the staff of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History in the story on its film-related holdings (“Hidden Among the Dinosaurs,” by Valerie J. Nelson, Nov. 16).

Back in the 1930s, when there was only one county museum in Los Angeles, a dedicated curator named Earl Theisen gathered this unique collection. It was he who corresponded with Edison associate W.K.L. Dickson (not Dixon, as reported). When the county museum split into two--art and natural history--it was decided that film belonged under natural history, a somewhat questionable determination but understandable in that natural history covers the history of Los Angeles County, of which film is a major part.

In 1970, curator John Dewar (who also set up the William S. Hart Ranch) created a marvelous Movie Gallery at the museum, containing much of its film-related holdings. Within a year, the museum bureaucracy decided that film did not belong on display there and the gallery was dismantled. Dewar and his successor, Norwood Teague, did the best they could to safeguard and preserve the collection. Despite the efforts of the administration and bureaucracy at the museum, it was certainly not forgotten or ignored. A complete record of the paper holdings, including the Florence Lawrence Collection, can be found in Linda Harris Mehr’s “Motion Pictures, Television and Radio: A Union Catalogue of Manuscript and Special Collections in the Western United States.”

When I was with the American Film Institute in the early 1970s, I arranged for the considerable film holdings of the museum to be transferred to the Library of Congress. Among that collection was a 16-millimeter short of Theisen’s original film exhibit in the 1930s, a unique record of the first attempt to create a Hollywood museum.

ANTHONY SLIDE

Studio City

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I was stunned to see Nelson’s impressive article, particularly since I was the designer along with John Dewar, curator of Western American art, of the Movie Hall at the Natural History Museum in 1970.

This hall was an attempt to renew interest in the extensive and languishing collection of motion picture material, and spark the possibility of a future and more ambitious project at the museum or elsewhere in Southern California. Unfortunately, with the advent of a new chief curator of history several years later, interest and support for the hall and its future were unwisely lost.

I can only hope that the resurfacing of awareness, once again, of this magnificent collection will lead to a permanent and worthy home for a priceless legacy.

JERRY CAMPBELL

Los Angeles