Almost Hollywood: The Forgotten Story of Jacksonville, Florida

(Paperback)

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Blair Miller tells the story of the motion picture industry as it developed in Jacksonville after the turn of the twentieth century. Almost Hollywood reveals the meteoric rise of Jacksonville in early silent films. Home to over thirty studios employing actors, directors, and stagehands, Jacksonville became touted as the winter film capital of the world by 1915. A myriad of factors contributed to Jacksonvilles rise and then fall by the mid 1920s. What were the reasons why Jacksonville missed out as the next mecca for filmmaking Blair Miller tells the story through primary sources from that remarkable period.

Reviews

What caused this abrupt reversal of fortune forcing the film industry out of Jacksonville and into Hollywood To answer this question, Blair Miller has resurrected the forgotten story of the rise and fall of the motion picture industry in Jacksonville. He provides us with a compelling view into the intriguing political climate, social issues, and global events that contributed to Jacksonvilles meteoric rise and fall that took place in just a few short years. Through painstaking research, compilation of contemporary news articles, and personal research in Jacksonvilles archives, he reveals this story by recounting the history of a dozen or so studios, including Thanhouser, which bet on Jacksonville as the next mecca for filmmaking, while weaving through it the political maneuverings of civic leaders who forfeited Jacksonvilles chance at becoming what we know today as Hollywood. -- Ned Thanhouser, president, Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc.

Author Bio

Blair Miller has had a lifelong interest in silent film comedies. His previous book, American Silent Film Comedies: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Persons, Studios and Terminology (1995), is considered a reference in the field. He currently lives in Rochester, New York.