Go forth and download
Aug. 18th, 2007 07:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
womzillaArchive.org was originally just the Wayback Machine (sic), a repository of saved web pages. It has, over the years, turned into a public domain archive.
I was just made aware, through rasff, that it currently contains high-quality versions of two of the famed Bell Science films from the 1950s--Gateways to the Mind, about cognition (and which I don't think I've ever seen), and Frank Capra's The Alphabet Conspiracy, about linguistics (which I saw in Mr. Greenland's sixth-grade class at Ephesus Road Elementary School in 1977 and haven't seen since).
The Bell System Science films--of which there were nine, according to this list on the IMDB--are one of the high points of pedagogy. They're combinations of live-action and various forms of animation and/or puppetry, explaining interesting aspects of the world in some detail, high levels of accuracy, and tremendous grace. Of course, the science is only as advanced as its time--I remember when I revisited Hemo the Magnificent in the 1990s how stunning it was that the filmmakers had to shy away from the details of cellular respiration. And then I realized that Peter Mitchell's chemiosomotic hypothesis wasn't published until nine years after Hemo was released. Shame on them for not guessing, in advance, one of the most important scientific discoveries of the century!
Anyway, the films are up on Archive.org and listed as "public domain"--which is possible, but unlikely. If you want to see them, you should probably act quickly.
I was just made aware, through rasff, that it currently contains high-quality versions of two of the famed Bell Science films from the 1950s--Gateways to the Mind, about cognition (and which I don't think I've ever seen), and Frank Capra's The Alphabet Conspiracy, about linguistics (which I saw in Mr. Greenland's sixth-grade class at Ephesus Road Elementary School in 1977 and haven't seen since).
The Bell System Science films--of which there were nine, according to this list on the IMDB--are one of the high points of pedagogy. They're combinations of live-action and various forms of animation and/or puppetry, explaining interesting aspects of the world in some detail, high levels of accuracy, and tremendous grace. Of course, the science is only as advanced as its time--I remember when I revisited Hemo the Magnificent in the 1990s how stunning it was that the filmmakers had to shy away from the details of cellular respiration. And then I realized that Peter Mitchell's chemiosomotic hypothesis wasn't published until nine years after Hemo was released. Shame on them for not guessing, in advance, one of the most important scientific discoveries of the century!
Anyway, the films are up on Archive.org and listed as "public domain"--which is possible, but unlikely. If you want to see them, you should probably act quickly.
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no subject
Date: 2007-08-18 11:50 pm (UTC)Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2007-08-19 02:52 am (UTC)Reminded obliquely that another friend had an early Alvin book where the chipmunks weren't drawn like their TV incarnation. (That in turn reminds me that there's a stunning Mexican cover version of "My Friend the Witch Doctor" -- heard it from one of those vintage LP sites.)
no subject
Date: 2007-08-24 02:58 pm (UTC)I'm not sure the WABAC spelling is ever used in the cartoons--there's no label on the machine.