Movies, Sports, Guides: A Case Study of Film Distribution and Exhibition within the Sportsman’s Movement (presented at Circuits of Cinema, Ryerson University, Toronto, June 2017)
Abstract:
Penniac, New Brunswick is a tiny community about 10 kilometres north of the provincial capital of Fredericton. In the decade following the Great War, an unlikely celebrity travelled each year from his home in Penniac to Boston and New York City, throughout Pennsylvania and Ohio, and as far west as Wisconsin. Harry Allen, hunting and fishing guide, and President of the New Brunswick Guides Association, spent the offseason months entertaining audiences big and small with films of his home province. He drew crowds in the thousands and appeared in some of the largest and most important venues of the day.
This paper is part of a larger research project that seeks to situate the cultural practices of the New Brunswick guides and the promotional activities of Fredericton tourist association within the wider phenomenon of recreational sports hunting and fishing in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Because hunters were tourists, travelling from home to specific locales identified as hunting grounds, their activities were circuitous by nature. Over time, their travels formed routes that connected communities otherwise unlikely to ever associate. These, in turn, became pathways of promotion for an entertainer/guide like Harry Allen. By retracing his movements during the 1920s (primarily through the advertisements, announcements, and reviews of his appearances that were printed in local newspapers), I hope to identify new connections between disparate places that might reveal overlooked or forgotten circuits of cultural exchange.
Harry Allen’s Travels (mapped using MyMaps by Google)
Scott Preston 