The influence exercised by certain pictures is exemplified by some of the answers Mrs. Bartlett received.
A sixth-grade child said, “A child that goes in and sees exciting pictures comes out excited and starts playing what we saw and becomes wild.”
“Western pictures sometimes make youths go out West to become cowboys and run away from home.”
“I like where men has a wife and three children and the wife has a fellow.”
“I like where the husbun’s go an play pool and then when there money is gone they go home and take their wife jewels and leave them and never come back again.”
“If a person goes to a show he goes to laugh and not to cry, for he has so many troubles at his home.”
“I like love-making picture best. It is exciting when two men want to marry the same girl.”[23]
A study of moving pictures has been made in other cities by women, and all over the country they are giving serious attention to the problem of securing the exhibition of high grade films only. Upon the suggestion of club women, the Board of Education of Parsons, Kansas, has undertaken to give two free moving-picture exhibits each month to the school children. The films are selected by the superintendent of schools assisted by the manager of the theaters and the subjects are confined to history, geography and science.
The Mayor of Wichita, Kansas, has asked the club women to appoint a board of three members to serve without pay as censors of moving-picture shows, inspectors of theaters, reading rooms and street cars. Suggestions for correction of evils will be received and acted upon by the Mayor. The board is to be permanent.[24]
In Pittsburg, Kansas, the club women are working out a censorship plan for moving-picture shows, which is proving successful. Mayor Graves appointed a commission of women, headed by Mrs. Harvey Grandle, president of the Pittsburg Federation of Clubs, which confers with the managers of all five- and ten-cent vaudeville and moving-picture shows. A most cordial spirit of coöperation is reported upon the part of these managers, in eliminating all films depicting scenes of crime, drinking scenes, and suggestive “love scenes.” If all mayors would appoint similar commissions, whose work would be as successful, it would not be long before the manufacturers of moving-picture films would take the hint, and cease to put out films of the tabooed classes. Wichita is working out a similar plan through a commission, and this seems the most practical plan. A commission, being clothed with authority, is received with courtesy and acting in coöperative not antagonistic spirit, receives the assistance of the managers. Local federations or clubs should make it a point to bring this work before their city council or city commission.[24]