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Documents from the Paramount Antitrust Case, 1938-1949
List of Original Defendants in the Paramount Case
Subsidiaries and Key Executives Indicted Along with Studios - July 20, 1938
When the Justice Department filed the antitrust suit against
the U.S. film industry, eight studio defendants were indicted. The "Big
Eight" are listed below (ranked according to size):
The Big Five (theatre owners)
- Paramount
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Loew's)
- Warner Bros.
- Twentieth Century-Fox
- RKO
The Little Three (non-theatre owners)
- Universal
- Columbia
- United Artists
Unsatisfied with the unsuccessful attempts to curb the power
of the studios, the Justice Department included in the suit all of the major
executives and owners associated with the majors. The list includes a number of
giants in film and American industry including: Adolph Zukor (once the
undisputed czar of Hollywood), David Sarnoff (broadcast pioneer of RCA), Louis
B. Mayer (co-founder of MGM), and John D. Hertz (today a household name due to
his car rental company).
Film aficionados will recognize some other names of more
obscure interest, including George Winkler (a key figure in the distribution of
Walt Disney's early cartoons) and Charles B. Mintz (famous as the man who
"stole" Walt Disney's creation Ozwald the Rabbit, thus prompting the
events that caused Disney to invent Mickey Mouse).
The list is significant in that it includes many names that
were later associated with SIMPP, including Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford,
Samuel Goldwyn, Loyd Wright, Leo Spitz, William Goetz, Jules Levy, Gradwell L.
Sears, and Charles R. Rogers. Some of these individuals were associated with
United Artists, and later petitioned to have their names removed so that they
could join the side of the government. Others would later defect from the major
studios to join SIMPP. It was a frustrating experience for Chaplin, Pickford,
and Fairbanks, as their names were the most recognizable on the list, and
received the most publicity in the national news in July 1938.
The Defendants Other Than the Major Corporations in United States v.
Paramount, et al.
Paramount News, Inc., Paramount Pictures Distributing Company, Inc.; Barney
Balaban, Adolph Zukor, Henry Herzbrun, John W. Hicks Jr., Austin C. Keough,
Walter .B Cokell, Stanton Griffis, Stephen Callaghan, Duncan G. Harris, John D.
Hertz, Harvey O. King, Charles A. McCulloch Harvey D Gibson, A. Conger Goodyear,
Earl I. McIntosh, Maurice Newton, Norman Collyer, Harold A. Fortington, and
Ernest V. Richards Jr. - all of the Paramount group.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Corporation, Metro Goldwyn-Mayer Distributing Corporation
of Texas; Nicholas M. Schenck, Arthur M. Loew, J. Robert Rubin, Edward A.
Schiller, Edgar J. Mannix, Al Lichtman, Sam Katz, David Bernstein, Leopold
Friedman, Louis B. Mayer, William F. Rodgers, Isidore Frey, Charles C.
Moskowitz, John R. Hazel, William A. Phillips, David Warfield, George N. Armsby,
William A. Parker, and Harry Rapf - all of the Loew group.
RKO Radio Pictures, Inc., Keith Adbee-Orpheum Corporation, Pathe News, Inc.;
the Van Beuren Corporation; RKO Proctor Corporation, RKO Midwest Corporation,
Leo Spitz, Ned E. Depinet, William Mallard, William H. Clark, Jules
Levy, George
N. Armsby, Cornelius N. Bliss, Maurice Goodman, James G. Harbord, Edward W.
Harden, DeWitt Millhauser, David Sarnoff, Frederick Straus, Lunsford P. Yandel,
Courtland Smith, Merlin H. Aylesworth, Malcolm Kingsberg, and Leon Goldberg -
all RKO defendants.
Vitagraph .Inc., the Vitaphone Corporation, Warner Brothers Circuit
Management Corporation, Harry M. Warner, Albert Warner, Jack L. Warner, Sam E.
Morris, Herman Starr, Stanleigh P. Freidman, Robert W. Perkins, Joseph Bernhard,
Gradwell L. Sears, Samuel Carlisle, Waddill Catchings, Charles S. Guggenheimer,
Morris Wolf, S. Charles Einfield, and W. Stewart McDonald, all of the Warner
group.
Movietonews, Inc., Twentieth Century-Fox Corporation of Texas, Twentieth
Century-Fox Distributing Corporation, the Chase National Bank of the City of New
York, Joseph M. Schenck, Sidney R. Kent, William C. Michel,
Darryl F. Zanuck,
Felix A. Jenkins, Sidney Towell, William
Goetz, H. Donald Campbell, John R.
Dijon, William P. Phillips, Herman G. Place, Seton Porter, Daniel O. Hastings,
Truman H. Talley, Spyros P. Skouras, A. S. Gambee, H. C. Cox, John P. Edmondson,
and Herman Webber - all of Twentieth Century-Fox.
Columbia Pictures Corporation of California, Ltd., Screen Gems, Inc.,
Columbia Pictures of Louisiana, Inc., Columbia Pictures Distributing Company,
Inc.; Harry Cohn, Jack Cohn, A. Schneider, Charles Schwartz, Abe Montague, Saul
Bornstein, Jack Kerner, Leo M. Blancke, Mendel B. Silberg, William S. Holman,
Charles B. Mintz, George Winkler, and Theodore J. Elias - all of Columbia.
Universal Pictures Company, Inc.; Universal Film Exchange, Inc.; Big U Film
Exchange, Inc.; J. Cheever Cowdin, Charles R.
Rogers, Samuel Machnovitch, James
P. Normanly, Nathan J. Blumberg, Peyton Gibson, Paul G. Brown, William Frieday,
Daniel C. Collins, Ottavio Prochet, Adolph Ramish, Budd Rogers, Daniel Sheaffer,
William H. Taylor Jr, Matthew Fox, William A. Scully, and Joseph H. Seidelman -
all of Universal.
The United Artists defendants are Attlio H. Giannini, George J. Schaefer,
Harry D. Buckley, Arthur W. Kelly, Loyd Wright, Harry J. Muller,
Mary Pickford,
Douglas Fairbanks, Charles Chaplin, Dennis F. O払rien, Edward Raferty and
Samuel Goldwyn.
MORE: Documents from the Paramount Antitrust
Case
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