Newsfilm Cameramen

A pair of newsfilm television cameramen and a reporter all dressed up in the typical starched white shirts and ties of the era.

Hanford Views

A newsreel photog gets a close-up shot of a tank crew at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation on September 1, 1949.

Glass at War

Newsreel cameramen attached to the 4th Combat Photo filming a scene in France during World War Two.

1920s Stringers

A pair of early 1920s stringers with their gear.

The Mad Latvian

From 1906 to 1950, first with Pathe News and later Paramount News, John Dored filmed many of the major news events across the European continent. His colleagues nicknamed Dored “The Mad Latvian,” for he was able to obtain access to events and public figures that one would have to be “mad” to even attempt.

Among Dored’s scoops was the only foreigner to illegally film the funeral of Lenin – which earned Dored an arrest by the KGB and a stay in a Soviet prison. He was only released after intervention from both the British and US governments.

During World War Two, Dored was assigned as the cameraman for the USA newsreel pool in addition to his usual duties with Paramount News. Dored took his job very seriously as a letter he wrote to US Army Major Pelegrin in 1944 requesting transportation after another group of journalists took his car to flee a battle that was to take place shows.

Dear Major,

Usually I always try to get along with my work without troubling anybody, but this time I have to. Hope and expect you can help me out of my present difficulty. It is transportation difficulty. When I left your PRO coming up here, Capt. Hotchkiss said the car has not to return and I can use it as long as I want. Along with me came five journalists who also were supposed not to return to your PRO but would stick around until we all reached Paris. I hoped therefore we all had the same idea and working program and I would not run into transportation difficulties. What really happened, is this: on the very first evening reaching 36 Div. C.P., we all got a briefing and were told – a serious battle is going to take place. Seemingly some of the journalists got cold feed and wanted to leave the place. All five had a conference between themselves and the outcome was, they all left the C.P. half an hour later to an unknown destination and asked me what I intended to do. I had just one answer – I will remain here. Had to unload my equipment and they left in a hurry with the car and trailer and thus, absolutely unexpectedly I was left where I stood without any transportation. I had not seen those men since. As you know, dear Major, I am representing the USA Newsreel Pool and as such have a very great responsibility placed upon me. How can I work and do my duty in a proper way without transportation? Simply, it is not possible. I hope you realise that. The C.P. here is really very kind to me and does all they can for me, but they are very short of transportation themselves and cannot produce a jeep every time I badly need it to go to locations of interest to my film work. Thus, I am loosing very important material. It simply can’t go on like that. I must have transportation, and, with no journalists on board to share it. I trust, you will find a way to satisfy my legitimate request.

Expecting your urgent and kind reply and decision, I am,
Respectfully yours,

John Dored
Paramount News and Newsreel USA Pool

Dored retired from Paramount News in 1950 and spent his remaining years living in his wife’s native Norway.

Years later in his memoirs, Dored summed up his career in two sentences – “I’ve always felt limited by scripts and staging, I always yearned for freedom. I became a film reporter to shoot footage of those things for which our Father in Heaven writes the screenplay.”

1918 Media Credentials

1918 Mutual Film Screen Telegram newsreel photographer’s credentials issued to Gordon White of San Francisco, California.

Mutual produced their newsreel from March to November of 1918 when the reel itself was acquired by Hearst and folded into the firm. Information on Mister White’s career after the Hearst purchase of the Screen Telegram is unknown.

I Witness

Norman William Alley.

News photographer for Universal Newsreel, MGM News of the Day and CBS News.

The last of my books, photos and notes have been finally packed for the move to the South, as such, there will be no more blog posts until after the 1st of the year.

Lenslinger will be shortly receiving a copy of Alley’s autobiography, and its a safe bet that modern day photog over in the Tar Heel state will be blogging about his legendary predecessor as soon as he finishes reading…..so watch over there to fill the void.

- Amanda

Al Mingalone goes for a ride

“Lawn Chair Larry” Walters wasn’t the first man to take flight via balloons. Walters had an accidental predecessor a few decades earlier in the small town of Old Orchard Beach, Maine on September 28, 1937.

A company by the name of Dewey & Almey of Cambridge, Massachusetts, recently got into the business of manufacturing latex balloons that can be inflated to a diameter of ten feet and were designed for weather observation. The public relations rep of Dewey & Almey sent a press release about the new balloons to Phil Coolidge, a photographer with Paramount News and the wheels started spinning in Coolidge’s head over the possibilities of these balloons and how they could be used in a story.

Phil Coolidge along with his son and fellow newsreel photographer, Jake Coolidge, hatched up the idea that sending a photographer aloft with a few of these balloons would make for a novel angle for shooting film of the local scenery – “house hopping with weather balloon” was the name of the special feature, and thus he needed a shooter who was both small and light.The plan was to attach a dozen or so of these balloons to a harness, and then send the photog aloft to a height of 100 feet, with the harness and balloons being ultimately anchored to the ground via a rope tied to a car bumper.

The person Phil Coolidge chose for this assignment was Al Mingalone. Mingalone was young, small and crazy enough to go along with the stunt. But he also was married with three small children at the time, and took one look at the original location chosen – Old Orchard Beach alongside the Atlantic Ocean, and promptly vetoed the location. If something went wrong and he went sailing off over the ocean, the next dry spot of land was Europe. The location was then moved three miles inland to the golf course.

At the golf course, Mingalone was strapped into a harness tied to a bumper of a car with a hundred feet of line and Phil Coolidge started to inflate balloons and tie them to Mingalone. One balloon at a time was attached and after twenty-seven were tied on, Mingalone still could only jump about twenty-five feet into the air – not high enough to shoot the footage needed for this feature, he needed to be 100 feet up. It was cold, wet and the harness was starting to chafe and Mingalone was getting tired.

One of the spectators at the golf course was the priest of a local church, Father James J. Mullen. Jake Coolidge had invited Father Mullen to come watch since he was interested in aviation and newsreels. Much ribbing went on and Mingalone was told there was nothing to worry about since a priest was present. While they were kidding, they didn’t realize how true their joking was to be.

“The devil with it”, said Mingalone in exasperation, “this time lets put on a load for a decent jump and get it over with.” Coolidge inflated five more balloons and tied them to Mingalone’s harness and he jumped and started to rise.

As Mingalone rose above the country side, he wound up his eyemo and started to roll. Seconds later the rope he was tied to pulled taut and snapped. Mingalone kept on rising. Mingalone recalls what happened during his ascent:

“I’d entered the lower bank of a quick rising fog, and couldn’t see a thing. I tried to pull myself up the ten feet to the balloon lines. Part way, cramps grabbed me and I stopped. A sudden squall struck. I was jerked backward and dropped to the end of my harness. My camera fell free. Having lost twelve pounds of ballast I shot skyward again. My clothes were wet. The air was cold and raw. I must have been about 700 feet of the ground.”

Father Mullen, who happened to be an expert sharpshooter, ran to his car along with Jake Coolidge and headed to the church to grab his rifle and they sped off after Mingalone. Near Wells Beach, they caught up with Mingalone and Mullen fired several shots at the balloons. Mullen’s aim was good and the balloons started to slowly leak and lower the frighten Mingalone to the ground, some thirteen miles from the golf course where he originally ascended into the sky.

Mingalone, without a scratch from his adventure, quickly ripped off the harness and watched it ascend into the fog clouded sky. As they watched the balloons going skyward, Mingalone began to grieve that he didn’t wait until the men had arrived before he let the balloons go, as he wanted to take four of them home to his kids.

Twenty years later, Mingalone would find himself on the streets of New York City as a television news cameraman for ABC Telenews, reminiscing the less hectic days of a newsreel cameraman.