This Yesterday’s Newsreel film (episode 48) offers the viewer “television highlights of the news of yesteryear” by providing vintage clips of famous people and events from the first half of the 20th century. The episode begins with a short bio on “Hollywood’s First Lady,” Mary Pickford. Pickford signs the contract creating United Artists Corporation with D.W. Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, and Douglas Fairbanks. There is a short clip from her film Rosita. Pickford climbs into a plane to deliver a propaganda film to President Woodrow Wilson. She returns home from her honeymoon with Fairbanks in 1920. The two walk through the grounds of their Hollywood estate, which hosts the 1922 wedding of Pickford’s brother, Jack. Pickford is shown on the set of The Thief of Bagdad watching an eclipse (03:27). She uses a pick to dig a hole to plant a tree on Arbor Day. Pickford and Fairbanks are shown aboard the liner Olympia; they arrive in Alexandria, Egypt and leave the ship. The segment ends with Pickford posing for a painting (05:15). The next segment takes viewers to Chicago’s Gunther Building on 10 February 1930. The building is on fire and a woman jumps from a window onto a safety net held by firefighters. In “1925: Personalities,” Peggy Hopkins Joyce returns to the U.S. from Pairs (06:32), Academy Award Winner Wallace Beery sits in a car (06:45) and then is shown being made lieutenant commander in the Navy Reserve, and Grace Moore takes piano and voice lessons. The next segment shows viewers the underground “ditch” being dug for the Queensboro subway line (07:40). That is followed by the 1927 Dancing Masters’ Convention in New York City, where attendees dance the kinkajou, lindy whirl, yankee prance, and a waltz. In the aviation update, French ground crews in World War I unfold an observation balloon and fill it with gas (09:30). The balloon is anchored to an armored car as it is used to scout enemy positions before being brought back down. “Fashions of the Day” takes viewers to 1921 Chicago to see the stylish but floppy galoshes. In the final segment, Tommy Hitchcock and his San Carlos Goalmakers play an international polo match in California against a team from Australia (11:19). The episode ends with footage of Wilbur Shaw winning the 1937 Indianapolis 500.

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