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Exhibition Reel of Two Color Film (ca. 1929)

An experimental color short in Brewster Color, preserved by George Eastman House and presented on the More Treasures DVD set.

NATIONAL FILM PRESERVATION FOUNDATION AWARDS FILM PRESERVATION GRANTS TO 26 ARCHIVES

Contact: Barbara Gibson (415-392-7291, barbara@webbnet.com)

San Francisco, CA (March 26, 2002)—Harold Lloyd's 1918 short The Tip and footage clandestinely shot on board the Exodus as it carried Jewish refugees to Palestine (1947) are among the 39 films that will be preserved through grants announced today by the National Film Preservation Foundation. These federally funded awards will help 26 archives across the country save American "orphan" films that are not preserved by commercial interests.

Other culturally significant films slated for preservation include: The Bargain (1914), William S. Hart's first Western feature, shot on location at the Grand Canyon; Bermuda to Baltimore (1937) celebrating the inaugural flight of PanAm's Bermuda Clipper; the earliest films by a native Alaskan filmmaker; documentaries about artists Jean Tinguely and Nikki de Saint Phalle; a 1932 industrial short explaining how to sell Palm Beach suits; home movies by the Ansel Adams family in New Mexico in 1929; White Water and Black Magic (1938-39) documenting the Amazon expedition that learned the secret of the anesthetic curare; and avant-garde works by John and James Whitney, Stan Brakhage, and Robert Beavers.

"Films are the living record of our country's history—the day-to-day lives of ordinary people, recorded in a fashion not possible before the 20th century. We need to help libraries and museums save as many of these treasures as we can," said Richard Wesley (Writers Guild of America, east), who served on the review panel as the National Film Preservation Board representative.

The grant recipients are:

  • Anthology Film Archives (New York)
  • California Pacific Medical Center (California)
  • Cleveland Museum of Art (Ohio)
  • East Tennessee State University (Tenneessee)
  • Framingham State College (Massachusetts)
  • GLBT Historical Society of Northern California (California)
  • George Eastman House (New York)
  • The iotaCenter (California)
  • Japanese American National Museum (California)
  • Library of Congress (District of Columbia)
  • Louis Wolfson II Media History Center (Florida)
  • Maryland Historical Society (Maryland)
  • Menil Collection (Texas)
  • Minnesota Historical Society (Minnesota)
  • National Center for Jewish Film (Massachusetts)
  • National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution (District of Columbia)
  • Nebraska State Historical Society (Nebraska)
  • New Mexico State Records Center and Archives (New Mexico)
  • Northeast Historic Film (Maine)
  • Pacific Film Archive (California)
  • San Diego Historical Society (California)
  • St. Vincent Medical Center (California)
  • University of Alaska Fairbanks (Alaska)
  • Utah State Historical Society (Utah)
  • Wayne State University (Michigan)
  • Whitney Museum of American Art (New York)

These federal preservation grants are funded through The National Film Preservation Act of 1996 and secured through appropriations to the Library of Congress. The NFPF will award more preservation grants this summer, including grants of preservation services contributed by public-spirited laboratories.

The National Film Preservation Foundation is a nonprofit organization dedicated to saving America's film heritage. Created by the U.S. Congress in 1996, the NFPF is the charitable affiliate of the National Film Preservation Board of the Library of Congress. For more information on NFPF programs and a complete list of grant recipients, please visit the NFPF web site: www.filmpreservation.org.

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