In Search of George Scott Jack of All Trades, Motion Picture Pioneer, World Explorer Robert G
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Document generated on 10/01/2021 4:43 a.m. Ontario History In Search of George Scott Jack of All Trades, Motion Picture Pioneer, World Explorer Robert G. Clarke Volume 112, Number 1, Spring 2020 Article abstract In the first decade of the twentieth century George Scott established a motion URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1069008ar picture firm in Toronto. He filmed the “Great Toronto Fire” of 1904, attempted to DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1069008ar show movies on Toronto Island, and took time out to open a “theatorium” in Peterborough, Ont., in 1907. Scott worked in the budding filmmaking industry in See table of contents London, England, in Europe, and in Toronto, New York, and Hollywood. He also shot film around the world: from the South Pacific, Australia, Southeast Asia, and Japan to British East Africa. He died in Los Angeles in January 1929. Scott had a Publisher(s) motion picture career of global proportions, but he is almost entirely known only for having produced one of the first films shot in Toronto. This article traces his The Ontario Historical Society life before and after his time in Toronto. ISSN 0030-2953 (print) 2371-4654 (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article Clarke, R. G. (2020). In Search of George Scott: Jack of All Trades, Motion Picture Pioneer, World Explorer. Ontario History, 112(1), 1–25. https://doi.org/10.7202/1069008ar Copyright © The Ontario Historical Society, 2020 This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ 1 In Search of George Scott: Jack of All Trades, Motion Picture Pioneer, World Explorer* by Robert G. Clarke Big Toronto Fire in Moving Pictures... Splendid Entertainment Given at the Colloseum, 432 George Street. The moving pictures this week at the Colloseum, conducted by Mssrs. George Scott & Co., 432 George street, are the best in this line ever seen in the city and last night the hall was crowded all evening . Peterborough Examiner, 9 April 1907, p.10. ne day in the year 1906 a young on the city’s northwest fringe. He might man named George Scott ar- well have gone to the Grand Opera House rived at the train station in Pe- on September 7 or 8 to see the travelling Oterborough, Ont., and checked into the Archie Shepard company’s “sweeping” Munro House hotel. He had recently variety of dramatic and comedy moving established himself in the relatively new pictures.1 He probably walked around motion picture business in Toronto and the downtown looking for a vacant store- was looking for a place to exhibit films in front space that he could take over for his the smaller city. own purposes. Most likely Scott wandered the Pe- Scott was in Peterborough only terborough streets a little, chatted with briefly. His stay coincided with the estab- downtown merchants, and contacted a lishment of a short-lived penny arcade number of local businessmen. He may (which included motion pictures viewed have taken in the motion pictures that through a peep-hole machine), and it were playing to huge crowds outdoors in seems likely that he played a part in that summertime evenings in Jackson Park, venture: he had the necessary knowledge *Many people helped in the research and writing of this article. I particularly want to thank Paul Moore, David Pfluger, Luke McKernan, Raphaël Millet, Amanda Crocker, Ruth Kuchinad, the anonymous reviewer for Ontario History, and, as always, Ferne Cristall. 1 Peterborough Evening Examiner, 7 September 1906, 1; 8 September 1906, 8; Peterborough Evening Review, 8 September 1906, np; “Grand Opera House Was Opened for the Season,” Examiner, 7 September 1906, 5. Ontario History / Volume CXII, No. 1 / Spring 2020 2 ONTARIO HISTORY Abstract In the first decade of the twentieth century George Scott established a motion picture firm in Toronto. He filmed the “Great Toronto Fire” of 1904, attempted to show movies on Toronto Island, and took time out to open a “theatorium” in Peterborough, Ont., in 1907. Scott worked in the budding film- making industry in London, England, in Europe, and in Toronto, New York, and Hollywood. He also shot film around the world: from the South Pacific, Australia, Southeast Asia, and Japan to British East Africa. He died in Los Angeles in January 1929. Scott had a motion picture career of global proportions, but he is almost entirely known only for having produced one of the first films shot in Toronto. This article traces his life before and after his time in Toronto. Résumé: Au cours de la première décennie du XXe siècle, George Scott a fondé une entreprise ciné- matographique à Toronto. Il a tourné le « Great Toronto Fire » de 1904, il a tenté la diffusion de films sur l’île de Toronto et il a pris le temps d’ouvrir un « théatorium » à Peterborough, en Ontario, en 1907. Scott a ensuite travaillé dans l’industrie naissante du cinéma à Londres en Angleterre, en Europe, ainsi qu’à Toronto, New York et Hollywood. Il a également tourné des films autour du monde : dans le Pacifique Sud, en Australie, en Asie du Sud-Est, au Japon et en Afrique orientale anglaise. Il mourut à Los Angeles en janvier 1929. Scott a eu une carrière cinématographique d’en- vergure mondiale, mais il est aujourd›hui surtout connu pour avoir produit l›un des premiers films tournés à Toronto. Dans cet article, nous allons retracer sa vie avant et après son séjour à Toronto. and connections, and a number of local This home of “Automatic Vaude- businessmen had the money. In any case ville”—“The Latest Amusement he soon established, seemingly on his Place”—was the initiative of a previously own, a short-lived business on the very unknown entity called the Peterbor- same premises—in the form of what ap- ough Amusement Company. The local pears to have been Peterborough’s first newspapers did not name any of those standalone motion picture theatre, or “local capitalists,” but it turned out that “theatorium,” as they were often called in several of them were associated with the those days. After a short while he disap- city’s Evening Examiner. Given what peared from town, leaving few traces— later transpired, and his appearance in all of which raises the questions: where town sometime in 1906, George Scott, did he come from, and what happened to of George Scott & Co. of Toronto (a him after that? capitalist, perhaps, but not a local one), may well have been a behind-the-scenes n autumn 1906 a Peterborough news- partner from the start. Ipaper reported that an enterprising The penny arcade opened its doors group of “local capitalists” was opening to the public on Saturday, 3 November a penny arcade in a vacant storefront on 1906. The ground-floor space at 432 the main street.2 George Street was located towards the 2 “‘Automatic Vaudeville’ the Latest Amusement Here,” Evening Review, 1 November 1906, 4. george scott: motion picture pioneer 3 top of the city’s small main-street business the most refined, special attention be- and commercial area, on the east side of ing paid to ladies and children.”4 Their George north of Hunter—hemmed in by cautious approach reveals a couple of a jeweller’s shop and a “merchant tailor.” factors: as local businessmen they had a The new amusement spot sported sense of their potential audience, of what twenty-five coin-operated devices, most would be acceptable; and they were most notably ten “moving picture machines.” likely working with a knowledgeable The equipment included “a picture post- partner from outside who could supply card vendor, lifter, fortune-tellers, punch- the product. ing bags, pneumatic punches, weighing It was not that people in Peterbor- machines, electric shock machine, gum ough were short of other attractions machine, and music machines.” The to draw them in. The penny arcade had company had plans for eventually intro- significant competition that particular ducing another twenty-five of the box- Saturday. The city’s Grand Opera House, like standing contraptions. (For decades three blocks south, was advertising The after, similar attractions could be seen in Man of Her Choice, a play with “four midway tents at summer fairs and exhibi- acts and seven scenes.” That little-known tions; indeed, very early on these arcades drama, touted in the ads as a “melodra- were described as “imitations of the old- matic sensation,” apparently drew good time circus ‘side show.’”)3 audiences on Saturday afternoon and According to a newspaper account, evening. It featured a young actor and the “auto-stereoscope or picture ma- singer named Julius Marx in its cast. At chines—exhibit, automatically, after one the time not quite fifteen years of age, lit- cent has been dropped in the slot, a set tle Julius would later go by the name of of 15 pictures brilliantly illuminated.” “Groucho.”5 To allay community worries, the own- Despite the presence in town of nas- ers promised, “Everything refined”— cent comedic genius, it was the penny and, even better, “Admission Free.” The arcade that proved, according to reports, entrepreneurs made their lofty inten- to be “the most popular place in Peter- tions clear: “The management wish it borough” that day.