In 1929 and 1936, for the purposes of nourishing the archive, 16mm moving images were taken of the public schools in Alexandria, Indiana. At the time Alexandria, covering not much more land than it does today, was a robust manufacturing town with no fewer than four factories employing hundreds of employees each. The community schools likewise, reflected this bustle of humanity. These films are like a peephole backward in time, eerie and suggestive of an era when this community was so energized that on a Saturday night people walked three or four abreast on the sidewalk in the downtown commercial district and some would have to move into the street to make progress against the rush.
In 1999, at a meeting of the Alexandria Historical Society these images of the schools were viewed by individuals who’d been there when the films were shot, some seventy or so years before. The films themselves had suffered through the years having been forgotten and then rediscovered in a damaged and confused state. They were salvaged and the surviving portions edited together and transferred to VHS. It was this that the folks at the Historical Society, led and hosted by a Mr. Murl Ray, viewed in February of 1999. Their comments and reactions were recorded on audiocassette as they watched.
I have had the pleasure over the last few weeks to work with this footage and audio. Blair Chaplin, of Chaplin Video, had recently transferred the films direct to DVD, achieving a greater fidelity in image quality and frame rate to the original 16mm prints. I have endeavored to marry the Historical Society Commentary track to the DVD image by digitizing both sources and speeding up Chaplin’s transfer to match what the individuals at the Historical Society would have seen. The result is a thirty-minute program of happy recollection and a humane document providing a unique perspective on a vital Indiana town at widely differing points in its life span.
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