In the spring of 1915, almost a year into world war i, american journalists world virulence cinematographer guy reads love chicago bound for berlin, germany. They traveled with the german army to the front lines, in east pressure and poland. They shot 25,000 feet a film, about five and a half hours. They returned to the United States in december of 1915, and in november released a 108 feature film on the firing line with the germans. The film received positive reviews and screened widely in the United States despite the fact that a presented a favorable view of the germans. Up next learn about how the once lost film was this discovered and restore by the labor of congress. Then watch the entire film. With commentary by two scholars who helped reassemble a movie that or become a jigsaw puzzle of fragments. This program is about two hours. My name is cooper graham. At the moment i am retired but i used to work at the library of congress and while i was here, among the fascinating things ive found buried in the vaults, and there is a lot of stuff,. ,. ,. ,. ,. , nobody knew what the contact was. Through contact with cooper, he gave me the magic key and the library of congress, buried in paper from the original copyright filing was a few small images from the original frames which allowed us to document the real content and in bringing in a coauthor, he brought in a lot of missed pieces of film who working with the library of congress encouraged them to recreate. When its george women. Im lee manager for the libra congress. Its been my job for the past 30 something years to take care of the nitrate film collection of the library of congress. What that means is these are the films made from the beginning of cinema on nitrate film stock. The reason that it is different is because nitrate tends to deteriorate and also even more importantly it is highly flammable. So it is very important for us to maintain not only the films but the atmosphere there stored in to give them a long life and keep them from blowing up. I am an enshrined cooper im a preservation specialist in the moving image section. My duties involves ensuring the physical integrity of the collection. Handling and storage standards i mainly concentrate on the safety side. Having many other duties including maintaining circulating fell loan program and, also assignments on special projects whether it is assisting in reconstruction and Research Inter projects. So on the firing line with the germans. Word that film physically come from . What are we still have . It its one of those Amazing Things that never happens from what i have learned. We acquired the film some years ago from the son of one of the original backers of the film. He had found it in his fathers wine cellar. There was some 40 reels of film. And have been sent to the library and been sitting on a shelf and several attempts have been made to try to put the film back together but there was no paperwork. There is no way of putting it together. So it just kind of sat there. The nitrate faults out of dayton ohio add to Patterson Air force base, i thought double where all these reels . What it what the heck is this . Im so glad that we were finally able to put it back together. It is one of the things that should not of survive. You know there was no reason for it to survive. A wine cellar is not an ideal environment to store any type of film, nitrate film or any other typical. And the fact that its survived all these years and probably was damp. Definitely dampen the amount of water damage. How do we get to the point that its sitting in storage to the now its available and we stored for the public to view . I think the library, people in the library had always wanted to see this phone put back together. I know annette coopers always been interested in form a viewpoint for myself just being a film that needed to be put back together. I never actually thought i would get to see. But when the script such as it was was put together by james cooper and presented to us thats when the time came plus the time had come when we were able to do high enough levels of scanning of these film reels that it could be edited together digitally, rather than having to try to make a phone copy and tried it edited that way. There is such a huge volume of material, the cost wouldve been astronomical to make phone prince of all these different pieces. By using a digital, it was much easier for us to put things electronically in their place i say heres a better version we can use this. So without tyndall technology i do not think this project wouldve happened. For us i guess it was about two years altogether . Thats just the physical putting it all together. That doesnt count all the prework. Takes a lot of time an effort to do Something Like. This what is the value in it for the American Public . Why is it worth it from your point of view . I would like to say one of my sort of Guiding Principles and all the years of leading film preservation. First place saw it was on the wall of the air force museum in dayton ohio. And its saying those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it. So i thought it was important for us to make this stuff available for people to see so that we learn from it. If we do learn from it, but i wanna make sure i do my part so people have the ability to see this other part of history that is not in the books you know. Whether be this film or a film about dairy work, a film about a laundry, or newsreels. Newsreels were so ephemeral, there are lots of interesting stories in the news reels beside the major ones. Just to see what we did, how we dressed, how we talked, how we walked, the car as we. Drove all these different things. So we dont forget. Because our society now is so disposable every part of it. We are getting to the point now it almost seems like people are disposable and its really sad. Want to make sure all that as much as we can carry is still there. I think particularly to the refugee sequences really reinforce this idea of history or the circle of history repeating itself. We are looking at these different scenes of the refugees and going home at night and watching the news and reading the paper with refugees again. Different refugees from different parts of the world but nonetheless, this human effect of political actions that caused the regular populace to endure and figure out and deal with and this is end up repeating itself. Almost 100 years to the day, we were looking at the same scenes we were seeing on the news every night. That was really shocking. This is still bros durham is film. A scene the first segment he had a lot of energy and. It only came about because of his initiative durborough. They asked him to go abroad. There isnt a. This is peterborough i think you can sense a kind of hard charging tension about him this is early guy reese. He was the camera man because durborough was train is a still photographer, a little bewildered but game. Both guys had a cigar habit. He looks affable so here we are on the streets of chicago. Doing a closeup a guess. And this and this really documented his trip to europe. Durborough trip to europe. So how did the project come about . Who funded it, . Dirt burrow was turned on by the san antonio news, a man he was commissioned to moonlight as on as he paid for any of the extra cost and he got some chicago businessmen and convince them to fund it and then one about purchasing cameras and equipment and here is going abroad. This is about the time the lusitania was sunk, so submarines were very much on everybodys mind. And the only line that ran where the dutch ships between new york and holland at the time. Here is the famous stats bear cat. Durborough we bought a stats bear cat. This is a lamborghini of his. Time a wonderful car. One just sold in california think for 595,000 dollars. And unmatched durborough turbos. Personality it was a hot car. I think he realized the film in the car would help him get access to the individuals he wanted to film an interview. As i said he was very good at protecting his persona. He had a definite flamboyance to it. So was world war i a really big news item in newspapers at the time in the in the United States . It was. Obviously the official position of wilson was neutrality. Up we had a tendency since washingtons time to stay out of foreign affairs, at least European Affairs which always seem to be totally mixed up. And there was concern about trying to get involved by several different groups of the citizenry. What are we seeing here . This is ambassador gerard. He turned out to be very pro british. A controversial figure. President wilson did not very much like him. He did a very good job of getting americans out of germany once we started the war. But frankly wilson controls on Foreign Policy investors were only to give him put, i seniors and, to implement whatever was put into play. France max was interesting especially here when the war was over in the kaiser left germany, prince max was the first leader who set up the rhineland republic which a lot of people never forgave him for, but he was a good fellow i think. Why would do borough and a chicago paper cover the war from the german side at this point . In the midwest, there was a lot of pro german sentiment. I wont say everybody in the midwest was pro german but the rollout of germans and scandinavians who were pretending to be on the pro german side. There is a large irish voice in chicago in some of the big cities, milwaukee, and so the feeling in the midwest was very different than it was in the east coast which tended to have more pro allied. And one of the reasons that they got funding was so that germans side of their story could get told because they didnt feel like the New York Times were doing much for them and german propaganda was not very good. By the time of seven months into the war, there was a large number of casualties, blind soldiers, amputees and whatnot, you will see some of that in this film here. Henry had a set up this home for the blind and did a lot of hospital work, she became very famous and she was married to a famous architect. She was originally italian and at lidia we had just at the war on the allied side. But nevertheless, she did work for the german wounded. Here is jane adams. Alice hamilton, in chicago. There she is on the right next to durburough, first one on the faculty of medicine. Three extremely powerful women. We it is funny, as jim said, that shot you just saw is probably the most famous shot that has come out of this reconstruction. So jean adams . Who was she briefly . Jane out pat adams, jane adams ran whole house which was four european immigrants to get health educated and integrated into our society. And she did a large amount of effort of the peace movement, her reputation was so important that she was invited to be the cochair of the peace conference at the women organized. This is visiting data hospital . This is very interesting. This sort of shows the dark side as becoming more and more evident in this period, as i say this summer of 1915. This is not frivolous footage. Interesting weighing, cigarettes became much more prominent in the trenches, i guess, couldnt drink in the trenches so i think smoking became more popular. But i guess premade cigarettes really grew in popularity among the army. Why do you think they decided to film things things . How did that happen . I dont know. Its easy to put durburough down as a frivolous guy, but some of the footage in this film, like this with a soldier died 20 minutes after this picture was made. You have to think that he was very aware of the tragic side of all of this. He wanted to capture the civilian perspective and show it justice he could see in the film lens. There is an interesting little shot, i will get there, but the other thing is it is a godsend that durburough could travel to the front and was stuck in berlin. And he got these incredible shots of berlin and wartime, i think. He has this nice little portrait of a city thats beginning to suffer. And he would not have gotten that if he ate gone swanning off to some battlefield. The correspondence in the beginning would go out to the front, officially they should have gotten permission and they go on their own in a train up to the front. And they connect out there. This is rather famous. This is shot later in the film. This is shot at the workshop of a professor who became very famous for working with prosthetic devices for soldiers. You see this shame shot in a Scientific American and three or four newspapers in the United States. Same guy, same workshop. Evidently, he was very famous. Durburough was a horsemen and you will see a bit of emphasis on the horse activities and opportunities for foam. Did he go into this project with a plan about what would happen with this film and he got back . No, i dont think so. I think you just wanted to record his trip and gave enough good footage so it would be able to be shown in theaters around the u. S. As a profit maker, essentially. But also, i think, to drum up some sympathy for germany which was already unsuccessful largely in its propaganda. But i dont think the syndicate had that is the motive, it was just that there is a Large Population are market for showing the german situation. That is true. That is true, of course. They werent pro german, you can argue about wilson but they were businessmen. They wanted to make money. We durburough wanted to make his name, he wanted to get out in front of the camera. He is in 25 of the film scenes here. The second most seen is the start switches and 10 of the film scenes. I will mention this, the germans like to take your correspondents and cameramen to the prison camps. They also may have visited other once. It was a safe trip, the germans like to do it because they had control over what correspondence saw or what they saw. No one was likely to get hurt. And also give the germans a chance to show that they were treating the prisoners well, getting them enough to eat. Like the shots, there may be an element of parity, but these guys do seem happy enough in some ways. Probably they are very happy to not be in the trenches. And obviously it is a place and time where theyre putting the best foot forward. To be fair, as a neutral he did watch out over the allied prisoner war camps and he did get credit for improving the conditions which were pretty bad later on. Do you know if these camps were close to berlin . One camp was very close to berlin. And it was put there, it was a major Army Training field. It is hard to know if they are trying to the prisoners are trying to make the germans happy but it looks to me like they are. Not unhappy to be warm and dry. You will see surety and later on in warsaw, the film was a new commodity. It is like getting featured, being filmed, it was a novel experience. I think that was the thing that stimulated them, while everybody, to want to get in front of the camera. Maybe it was a way, somebody from the family might see the footage and say, hes all right. Things were still pretty rough in that way. Especially for the russians. They recruited prisoners to help them repair the roads and farms, the ones without the tools were going to the farms which already had tools. The ones with shovels and stuff or fixing the roads. These look like british. You sort of get the impression that there are many journalists going around with them. Was this almost like a media tour in some cases . These trips to prison camps were generally more than one correspond it, they would get a bus or take ten people. It would be a group trip. They controlled them pretty well. You will see in a bit, waiting to go to the front, they are in uniforms. Initially they did not have uniforms, they did not have good control, they arrested many journalists who didnt have her mission and went out on the road. And they caught and roll shot as spies, they decided from then on they would give them official uniform so that they could be recognized and escorted from berlin by an officer. What are we seeing here . The band is leading the soldiers out towards the train station to go to the front. That is the hotel avalon, one of the most Famous Hotels is about a block away. Its right to the left here think. Actually they couldve popped out of their hotel and the couldve shot this right in front of his hotel marquee. These guys are headed east or west, i could not tell you. Anyway. They are coming from the tee garden area so they are heading east. East, okay. At this time in the war, the german army looks happy but what was the situation . They were not thrilled but again, one of the reasons for this film was there was a huge drive in the summer of 1915, starting in may, as a matter of fact these guys may be part of those headed toward the battle front which was designed to check the russian army out of poland. There was awaiting from the south, with austrian and german troops, and then there was a northern weighing which was headed towards warsaw. The so, the germans were very happy with the situation as they envisioned it in the summer. One of the reasons that durburough might have been invited to do this is because they wanted witnesses and they wanted it filmed. I never could quite evidently, this is his footage buttocks extremely privileged. He didnt just search shooting the royal families at 20 paces. How he got this, or got it from someone else, i dont know. I am pretty sure he did get to the castle, yes. I think that they said about so he would be able to film us impressive ceremony. Impressive, indeed. We are seeing, who are we seeing . That is the kaiser. They are talking to this was a review for the kaiser. This was his favorite unit. Indeed, burn already led through the arc de triomphe. Now i did not know that. But who are we seeing here . That is the kaiser, the wife of the kaiser. The daughter, victoria louisa. The hospital we saw was named for her. She was the only daughter of the kaiser, i think he had five sons. Some of the sons were appointed to head of armies, not the top person, and some were relieved later after they did not do too well. The elder son, the one that is in the middle, he was in charge at the army of are done. But he was not the expert. The hotel again, this is where all the correspondents state waiting to get permission to go to the front. Durburough is over in the left with the goggles on. He has some type of fedora hat. Notice they were wearing a uniform with the brown belts . Yes. You mention in your essay about this and speaking german and durburough not speaking german. This part of the trip is actually, durburough is with a bunch of correspondence and got sent east precious. One of the correspondence was the guy on the left in his name was arthur from the new yorker and he spoke fluent german. That is general bernardhenri who was an