Silent Hall of Fame

The Mission of Silent Hall of Fame is to engage classic film lovers worldwide in an effort to preserve the names of distinguished silent movie stars for future generations by educating the public about their great artistic legacy and working tirelessly to bring them the full public respect and recognition that they all deserve. We are a dedicated team of volunteer silent movie enthusiasts committed to bringing the names and legacy of many forgotten pioneers of motion pictures back from oblivion. We work tirelessly long hours without pay to promote this mission. We also believe that the public has the full legitimate right to see the lost and forgotten masterpieces of the Silent Era. We will defend and promote this right by doing everything possible to recover these masterpieces from the hidden vaults, bring them out into the open, and show them to the world audiences, where they rightfully belong. 95% of silent films have been lost or destroyed, so discovering a long lost silent film is a very rare event, bordering on the miracle. We believe that when films made in the USA, which are not available in this country, are discovered overseas, we all owe it to the future generations of Americans to make an extra effort and bring back home for preservation these silent treasures. Silent Hall of Fame is engaged in a major effort to repatriate rare silent films that are available in single copies in foreign archives. Silent Hall of Fame discovered that the British Film Institute has the only copy in the world of the film Fools of Fashion (1926), but it has refused to make a copy for us. It is willing to exchange the film for another one in an American archive. We asked the Library of Congress to make such an exchange, which would allow a copy the film to be acquired for preservation on US soil, and for us to buy it and show it to the public for free. The Library of Congress responded that the film is not in their priorities. Silent Hall of Fame also discovered that the EYE Film Institute in the Netherlands has the only copy in the world of the film Under the Black Eagle (1928), but has asked for $8,000 to make a digital copy on DVD. The EYE Film Institute specifically stated that it is willing to "talk to our colleagues of the Library of Congress about a possible collaboration on this matter". We asked the Library of Congress to enter into a collaboration agreement with the Dutch for making a copy of the film for repatriation to the USA. The Library of Congress responded that the film is not in their priorities. We need help to fund the repatriation of this film so that we can show it to the public for free. Silent Hall of Fame is researching domestic archives for rare silent films as well. The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) has the film College Days (1926), which is in the Public Domain. They require $2,500 to make a copy for us. We need help to fund the purchase of this film so that we can show it to the public for free. Warner Bros. has the films Rookies (1927) and Detectives (1928), but they refuse to make a copy, although they don't intend to release a DVD to the public. Writing to Warner Bros. may help persuade them to issue these films on home video or make a copy of the films available to Silent Hall of Fame so that we can show them to the public for free. The Library of Congress has the film The Jazz Age (1929), which they are willing to copy for us for a fee of about $1,200. We also have to pay all licensing, access and copyright check fees. The Library of Congress also has the film Trent's Last Case (1929) and they are willing to make a copy for us for a fee of about $1,200. We need help to fund the purchase of these two films so that we can show them to the public for free. A firm in Paris, France has a nitrate copy of the film The Wall Street Whiz (1925). We don't know if we will be able to buy a copy and show it for free on our website, because they only mention "serious amounts of money", without quoting a number. Because we don't know how much it could cost to bring this film home, we will not ask for funding for this film at this time. All these finds were the result of our limited initial research on 30 silent films from the period 1925-1929. As we expand the scope of our investigation we expect to locate many more lost and misplaced masterpieces. Going forward we will need help to fund the purchase of many other films, for which archives holding single copies sometimes charge exorbitant fees. We will also need help to fund the repatriation from foreign archives of other masterpieces created in the USA, if we are lucky enough to find surviving films there.