THIS WAS HOLLYWOODLAND

The Golden Age is any age that seems better than the one you're in.

Yet another piece of the treasure trove we picked up in Denver last year, This Was Hollywood is a compendium of anecdotes and photos from the supposed Golden Age of Hollywood. We say “supposed” because the magazine was printed in 1954, and at that time the 1920s and 1930s were the Golden Age. Today of course, the Golden Age is considered to run from the 1920s all the way to the early 1960s, and we can only assume that eventually the ’70s and ’80s will be considered part of the Golden Age, and we’ll all be sitting around saying how they don’t make movies like C.H.U.D. anymore.

This Was Hollywood was put together by Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky, the guy many say coined the term “Oscar” to refer to the Academy Award statuette. This particular issue of This Was Hollywood has about 80 pages, so moving forward we’ll be posting them a few at a time. Today we have five images—the front and back covers, plus three pages of shots of John Gilbert, Greta Garbo, John Barrymore, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, and Dolores Costello. Much more from this publication later.

Hollywood, This Was Hollywood, Sidney Skolsky, John Gilbert, Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, John Barrymore, Dolores Costello, cinema

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

December 4

1918—Wilson Goes to Europe

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sails to Europe for the World War I peace talks in Versailles, France, becoming the first U.S. president to travel to Europe while in office.

December 4

1921—Arbuckle Manslaughter Trial Ends

In the U.S., a manslaughter trial against actor/director Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle ends with the jury deadlocked as to whether he had killed aspiring actress Virginia Rappe during rape and sodomy. Arbuckle was finally cleared of all wrongdoing after two more trials, but the scandal ruined his career and personal life.

December 3

1964—Mass Student Arrests in U.S.

In California, Police arrest over 800 students at the University of California, Berkeley, following their takeover and sit-in at the administration building in protest at the UC Regents’ decision to forbid protests on university property.

December 3

1968—U.S. Unemployment Hits Low

Unemployment figures are released revealing that the U.S. unemployment rate has fallen to 3.3 percent, the lowest rate for almost fifteen years. Going forward all the way to the current day, the figure never reaches this low level again.

December 2

1954—Joseph McCarthy Disciplined by Senate

In the United States, after standing idly by during years of communist witch hunts in Hollywood and beyond, the U.S. Senate votes 65 to 22 to condemn Joseph McCarthy for conduct bringing the Senate into dishonor and disrepute. The vote ruined McCarthy’s career.

December 1

1955—Rosa Parks Sparks Bus Boycott

In the U.S., in Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city’s racial segregation laws, an incident which leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott resulted in a crippling financial deficit for the Montgomery public transit system, because the city’s African-American population were the bulk of the system’s ridership.