I recently readMental Hygiene, Classroom Films 1945-1970 by Ken Smith, which was a very entertaining book. The author writes that it’s unknown how kids during this time reacted to these films (apparently, he didn’t spend much time interviewing the people who saw them). Did they laugh at the (now) delightful hokiness?
Did poor Kay’s depsperate and humiliating search for a date inspire snickers from the back of the class? Or were there knowing nods at the films insistance for the need for utter comformity, and the * 1984- * style constant group activity (beware the kid who spends too much time reading alone)? Was there really a * need * for films on the importance of changing one’s underwear, and washing your hair once a week?
Were teens really frightened by the abstinence films in which all teens who had sex ended up with syphillis, or pregnant? How much trust was put in films on how to make friends which stressed how important it was to conform with, agree with, and go along with, the crowd? Did the message of different= bad take hold?
FTR, many of these old educational health/mental health/interpersonal relations of teens films can be legally downloaded from www.archive.org , in the Prelinger Archives:
A lot of those films are now preserved as shorts', or things less than movie length the MST3K actors heckled and laughed at. You can buy videos full of just shorts off of Rhino, who currently controlls distribution, and sometimes shorts are included before the main feature in more normal’ tapes.
Well, my junior high school occasionally featured filmstrip versions of these in the mid-1960s (with the narration and sound track on an LP, where it goes “ding!” for the next picture and the teacher turns the knob), and what I remember is the whole class sitting there with glazed looks on our faces, mouths hanging open, in a kind of stupor. Nobody clapped, or booed, or snickered–I don’t think we even processed the information that was being presented on the screen. We just sat there and waited for it to be over. A few people doodled in their notebooks, but most of us just sat there.
I don’t recall seeing any dating ones,but I distinctly remember a cartoon type about prejudice,where the song went something like-
If Thomas Jefferson were born across the sea,
He wouldn’t be Thomas Jefferson,but Thomas Jefferski–
Or Jefferoff,or Jefferwitz,or maybe Jeffercu–
This in the late 40s when a cartoon of any kind would get my attention.
What made me remember the jingle at the time was,I didn’t know what country a cu was from,all the rest were in my neighborhood.I found out much later it’s a Romanian suffix.So I guess that one did something for me.Tho I still liked Polack jokes
In addition to the archived ones online, old educational short films are available from specialists A/V Geeks on VHS and DVD <http://www.avgeeks.com/>; Fantoma Films on DVD <http://www.fantoma.com/>; and Something Weird Video on VHS <http://www.somethingweird.com/>. (To find Something Weird’s selection, click on “Search Titles by Letter! Click Below!” on the right, then click “Scare Films” and scroll down.)
I’m a bit younger than DDG, and instead of an LP, we had a tape that went DING! and the filmstrip (was supposed to) automatically move to a new frame (it usually didn’t)
Another resource: The Academic Film Archive of North America is the only institution in the U.S. dedicated to documenting and preserving the history of academic film. They have regular free screenings in San Jose & St. Louis.
Funny, I was in HS 1950-54 and I never saw these films. We had “hygiene” which was usually a gym teacher talking about good hygiene or sex ed. In the latter, we were shown stills of people with syphilis and given warnings about that and pregnancy as well as advice about masterbation (I still remember the football coach suggesting it was probably a bad idea to slam a window on it). All-in-all, it was all quite reasonable and we took it as it was intended. This was an all boys school. (No longer, although the companion all-girls school is still there.)
I was in high school in the late 50’s. My friends and I thought all that stuff was b.s., and we made fun of it and ignored it for the most part. Of course, that was our approach to school in general, so maybe I’m not a reliable reporter. As I remember, we didn’t think the kids in the movies were nerds - we just thought the topics were stupid and boring. Some of you may have heard of Bob and Ray - a wickedly subtle comedy team, who once did a bit on “Urpee Classroom Films.” It was right on the money. As to filmstrips - those are, alas, now a thing of the past in classrooms. As a teacher, I found them valuable, for certain instructional reasons, but they have long since been replaced by video technology - tapes, discs, etc. xo CC
Filmstrips are a thing of the past? Huh. I just graduated high school in 2000, and we would watch filmstrips all throughout my school “career”, even in senior year AP English. Many of these had the manual advance and yes, even had a record player for the soundtrack. :eek:
'Course, I went to Catholic schools that had to use what they had as long as possible before buying new ones.
