Motor City Movie Culture, 19161925 is a broad textured look at Hollywood coming of age in a city with a burgeoning population and complex demographics. Richard Abel investigates the role of local Detroit organizations in producing, distributing, exhibiting, and publicizing films in an effort to make moviegoing part of everyday life. Tapping a wealth of primary source materialfrom newspapers, spatiotemporal maps, and city directories to rare trade journals, theater programs, and local newsreelsAbel shows how entrepreneurs worked to lure moviegoers from Detroit's diverse ethnic neighborhoods into the theaters. Covering topics such as distribution, programming practices, nonfiction film, and movie coverage in local newspapers, with entr'actes that dive deeper into the roles of key individuals and organizations, this book examines how efforts in regional metropolitan cities like Detroit worked alongside California studios and New York head offices to bolster a mass culture of moviegoing in the United States.

Richard Abel is Professor Emeritus of International Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Michigan. He is author ofAmericanizing the Movies and "Movie-Mad" Audiences, 1910-1914, andMenus for Movieland: Newspapers and the Emergence of American Film Culture, 1913-1916, editor of theEncyclopedia of Early Cinema, and co-editor ofEarly Cinema and the "National"(IUP, 2008) andThe Sounds of Early Cinema(IUP, 2001).

AcknowledgementsList of AbbreviationsIntroductionEntr'Acte 1:The Michigan Film Review1. Mapping Circulation in Detroit's Movie MarketEntr'Acte 2: Detroit Area Picture TheatersEntr'Acte 3: John H. Kunsky and George W. Trendle2. Movies, Live Acts, and the Theatrical Experience: Programming Practices in the Motor CityEntr'Acte 4: Detroit-Made FilmsEntr'Acte 5: The Metropolitan Film Company3. "Detroit-Made" Newsreels and Other Short Nonfiction FilmsEntr'Acte 6: Star Gazing4. Motor City Newspapers, Menus for Movie FansAfterwordBibliographyIndex