''Republic Steel Strike Riot Newsreel Footage'' is a

1937 Events January * January 1 – Anastasio Somoza García becomes President of Nicaragua. * January 5 – Water levels begin to rise in the Ohio River in the United States, leading to the Ohio River flood of 1937, which continues into ...

newsreel A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a cinema, newsreels were a source of current affairs, inform ...

of the strike at

Republic Steel Republic Steel is an American steel manufacturer that was once the country's third largest steel producer. It was founded as the Republic Iron and Steel Company in Youngstown, Ohio in 1899. After rising to prominence during the early 20th Centu ...

Memorial Day Memorial Day (originally known as Decoration Day) is a federal holiday in the United States for mourning the U.S. military personnel who have fought and died while serving in the United States armed forces. It is observed on the last Monda ...

, May 30, 1937, which escalated into a massacre when Chicago police fired on protestors (

1937 Memorial Day massacre In the Memorial Day massacre of 1937, the Chicago Police Department shot and killed ten unarmed demonstrators in Chicago, on May 30, 1937. The incident took place during the Little Steel strike in the United States. Background The incident aro ...

). Ten protesters were killed by the police and thirty others suffered gunshot wounds. The police also used clubs and tear gas on the protesters. The film was produced by

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film and television production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the main namesake division of Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS). It is the fifth-oldes ...

for their

Paramount News Paramount News is the name on the newsreels produced by Paramount Pictures from 1927 to 1957. History The Paramount newsreel operation began in 1927 with Emanuel Cohen as an editor. It typically distributed two issues per week to theaters across ...

series. In 1997, the film was deemed "culturally significant" by the United States

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...

and selected for preservation in the

National Film Registry The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation, each selected for its historical, cultural and aesthetic contributions since the NFPB’s inception ...

. The footage contained in the newsreel was illegally banned from being shown in Chicago by the Chicago Police Department for fear of causing unrest, and later the

company agreed to refrain from screening it elsewhere. The editor of Paramount News described the footage as "not fit to be seen," and that allowing the public to view it in its entirety could "incite local riot." However, clips from the footage were edited and released as a newsreel that framed the strikers as a violent mob.

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* 1937 films United States National Film Registry films American black-and-white films Documentary films about labor relations in the United States Documentary films about United States history 1937 documentary films Black-and-white documentary films American documentary films 1930s American films {{hist-documentary-film-stub

See also

References

External links