The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906-10)

Mr Johnson and I claim to have made the first long picture in the world (W. A. Gibson 1920)

Mr. Gibson photographed, directed, developed and finally projected the picture [The Kelly Gang], such a record remaining unequalled even to this day. (Everyone's 1923)

Johnson & Gibson had some financial interest in the venture. (John H. Tait 1949)

It's long been suspected that the Taits may have overstated their contribution, though they probably had a partial financial involvement. (Fotheringham 1987)

.....all history is interpretation. (Bertrand 2007)

Contents

Introduction
Rediscovery
Gibson & Johnson's Pictures
Scenario / Script
Gibson's Film
What about Dan Barry?
The Case for the Taits
Intertitles
Facts
References
Acknowledgements

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1. Introduction

The Story of the Kelly Gang - the world's first full-length (5 reels) feature film - premiered in Melbourne, Adelaide and Hobart, Australia, on Boxing Day, 26 December 1906. According to contemporary records and reports, of which many are presented below, William A. Gibson (1869-1929) - "father of the Australian motion picture industry" - was the maker and director of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906 & 1910), assisted by his business partner and fellow producer and filmmaker Millard Johnson (1860-1946) and, to a lesser degree, roustabout Property Manager Samuel Crews. Gibson unequivocally stated this in the Theatre Magazine during 1920. Yet it remains unrecognized by archivists and historians, film buffs and the public at large, with Charles Tait in 2024 widely cited as director and given priority in the creation of this landmark movie. There is ample evidence to show that the St. Kilda firm of Gibson & Johnson (or Johnson & Gibson) was responsible for all the most significant aspects of the film's production, from conception to realisation and release. This included the actual filming, the direction of the actors, the implementation of the scenario, the allocation of actors, the preparations of sets, costumes and special effects, development of the film and editing, including the latter inclusion of intertitles and new footage, and finally, the actual screening.

The team of Gibson and Johnson were of course assisted in elements of the production by the firm of J. & N. Tait of Melbourne. The contemporary evidence shows that they (the Taits) provided, or received, the following:

A request for a "new film" following on the successful screening of the English 2-reeler Living London during the first half of 1906 by the two organisatons (Gibson & Johnson and J. & N. Tait). As a result, Gibson subsequently came up with the idea of a full-length feature film based around an adaptation of the Kelly gang story.
Finance - in addition to the initial £400 put up by Gibson, J. & N. Tait added £600 to the budget, bringing the final spend up to £1,000. This extra funding assisted the production in employing at any one time up to 60 people.
Locations - once again in addition to those locations and production elements initially supplied by Gibson and Johnson, including both interiors and exteriors, the Taits provided additional resources once production had commenced;
Support for re-shoots, including the provision of additional actors, which also included members of the Tait family, just as a member of the Gibson family also appeared. The majority of these performances (i.e. the actual identification of individual actors involved in the filming) went uncredited at the time.
Premiere season promotion, distribution and theatre direction of screenings was provided by the experienced theatre production firm of J. & N. Tait. The term "theatre direction" was applied to the film's presentation during its premiere season and the role of the Taits. The latter was necessary as in 1906-7 there were no cinemas as such, and the presentation of films of any length usually took place in local theatres, town halls and other suitable venues, as part of a program of music - often involving an orchestra - and stage performances by dramatic troupes, plus lantern slide shows which were popular at the time. As a result, the use of this term has, over time, been corrupted, to support the argument that the Taits "directed" the film. They did not. They were merely responsible for the "theatre direction" of its presentation.
The Taits secured from Gibson and Johnson the exclusive copyright to distribute the film The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906) for a limited period, which appears to have expired locally in May 1907, just six months after the premiere. Gibson and Johnson released their own version in 1910, though additional footage by them had been included from the middle of 1907.

Due to the film's international significance as the first full-length feature, and the financial success of its initial run across Australia, New Zealand and Great Britain, generating upwards of £25,000 over the period 1906-7, it seems that in the years since then the Tait family has expanded its claims to ownership, involvement in the production, and rights over most aspects of the film. They are listed as such within its Wikipedia page and various publications since the 194+0s, most notable of these being Viola Tait's A Family of Brothers from 1971, Andrew Pike's 1981 Australian Dictionary of Biography entry, Ina Bertrand and William D. Routt's The Story of the Kelly Gang booklet from 2007, and David Stratton's brief piece on the film in his 2020 Australian Cinema television series (Stratton 2020). This article presents the case for William A. Gibson and associates as primarily responsible for the creation of the film and its updated editions of 1907 and 1910, as against the Taits. Prior to his death in 1929, no public claims to directorship of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906-10) were made by anyone other than William A. Gibson and his property manager Samuel Crews. The latter could perhaps be allocated the modern-day title of Second Unit Director.

In regard to the role of the Taits, the present writer has not, for example, found any contemporary reference to Charles Tait's role as director of the film. In association with the New Zealand release, it was stated during 1907 that: The whole picture is the exclusive property of Messrs. Tait as the subject was planned and executed under their supervision. This claim to rights is not disputed, and was mostly likely associated with the extra money the Taits put into the production and promotion, to the amount of approximately £600. The aforementioned statement reflects the strong stance J. & N. Tait took at the time, as theatrical entrepreneurs and the front face of the project's production team, to make clear their local and overseas copyright over the specific property and claims to related profits arising out of the exhibition of the film. Those profits were to prove substantial. In carrying out this responsibility and making these statements, there has developed a perception that the Taits were the main players in the creation and making of the film. The information provided below will point to the fact that whilst the Taits played an important role in supporting the creation of the film and how it was dealt with upon completion, that process of development of the scenario and pre-production, filming, editing and supporting the process of projection across Australia and overseas was very much the purvue of Gibson and Johnson, who were perhaps the most experienced team in that regard operating in Australia at the time. The present author has found no evidence to suggest that the Tait's had any such experience in the making of such an extended film. The fact that The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906-10) was actually made and proved not only an unprecedented success but also an international landmark in the history of cinema, is due primarily to Gibson and Johnson. The success of its initial distribution is due in large part to the Taits working side-by-side with Gibson and Johnson.

David Stratton, The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906), Australian Cinema, ABC Television / YouTube, 16 November 2020, duration: 3.24 minutes.

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2. Rediscovery

In May of 2024 the present author once again came across the world's first full-length, narrative feature film, Australia's The Story of the Kelly Gang, also known simply as The Kelly Gang. He had purchased a copy of the DVD release back in 2007, but had not considered it in any detail since then, and could not even recall watching it. The film had premiered at the Athenaeum Theatre, Melbourne, during a matinee session on Boxing Day, 26 December 1906 after an earlier test screening in Footscray. The author's 2024 encounter with this classic of Australian silent cinema occurred whilst researching the Ogle family tradition that one of their ancestors was amongst the largely unknown cast of actors employed on the film during 1906, and perhaps subsequent to that up to 1910. As The Kelly Gang was internationally the first five reel cinematic feature, it was very much breaking new ground and, as a result, did not possess many of the elements which have become a standard part of the modern film production and release experience, such as provision of information concerning the cast and production details through the beginning or end titles, posters promoting the stars, large upfront contracts and residuals, identification of production crew, and promotional material outlining many of these aspects in detail, including ephemera and reviews. As such, there is a great deal of confusion around who was responsible for the creation of the film, who were the actors involved, and what were the precise technical details of the two distinct release cuts in 1906 and 1910 and versions released during the intervening period. This is complicated by the fact that the film, like the vast bulk of Australian silent era films released prior to 1930, is substantially lost, with less that 20 minutes of original footage (i.e. less than 20%) known to have survived, and some of that in a very much deteriorated condition.

As a result, and perhaps more than any other Australian film, The Story of the Kelly Gang has been subject over the years to contradictary commentary and claims to involvement and responsibility. Such commentary can be divided along two lines: (1) that presented by the Tait family, and (2) that pertaining to the role of the firm of Gibson & Johnson. In seeking to address this issue, and get closer to the truth, the present author has sought to prioritize the earliest information available from those involved, over later second-hand accounts and reinterpretations. Of course, some of the later accounts are important reminiscences by those directly involved, especially Gibson and Johnson, and these are significant.

Responses, or suggested responses, to many of the aforementioned questions regarding the creation of the film can be found in the numerous articles and newspaper and magazine items which have been published over the years since the film's release in 1906 and re-release in 1910. Undoubtedly the most useful of those is the small, 197 page booklet accompanying the 2007 DVD release of a restoration of surviving elements by the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia. That booklet was compiled by Australian cinematic historians Ian Bertrand and William D. Routt. It includes both discussion by the authors and, most significantly, reproductions of source documents, published or manuscript. It is therefore a vital resource in any study of the film. Unfortunately it is hampered by the limited distribution and small DVD-case size of the booklet and print therein. In addition, as Bertrand noted, the wealth of material is often conflicting and far from as comprehensive and definitive as the modern researcher would like. The findings are therefore subject to interpretation. A good example of this conflict and conclusions based on conflicting accounts can be seen when trying to discover the length of the original 1906 so-called director's cut.

Film length

.....the Kelly gang picture is over 4,000 ft in length and occupies nearly an hour and a half ... (Register, Adelaide, 22 December 1906)

According to a 1945 article on the film, we are told that the .....cameraman on The Kelly Gang was Mr. W. A. Gibson, who used up 10,000 feet of film in its production (Mcguire 1945). William A. Gibson was one of the proprietors of the Victorian firm of Gibson & Johnson. By 1900 they were operating as chemists at St. Kilda Junction. From 1904 they began screening biographs (i.e. moving pictures) and also a film exchange business, employing a number of staff and working with 35mm film in its exposure, development, editing and presentation for public screening. Their first big project was the ambitious "five-reeler" The Story of the Kelly Gang of 1906. A standard reel of 35mm black and white silent film was 1000 feet long (305 metres). At the time movie cameras were hand cranked at a standard speed of 16 frames per second (fps) during movie production. Each reel then ran for 20 minutes when projected at that speed, or 15 minutes at 18 fps. As there was no associated soundtrack on the film until sound was introduced after 1927, the film could be cranked fast or slow, according to the whims of the camera operator or projectionist. A five-reeler such as The Story of the Kelly Gang would theoretically have provided a run time at the 26 December 1906 Melbourne premiere of 100 minutes / one hour and forty minutes (or 85 minutes). Subsequent to that, it may have been run faster (or slower), subject to theatre requirements and screening schedule. In many cases of multiple-reel film presentation during the silent era, local theatres would fail to load a reel or two in order to fill the available time slot, or if the film became damaged. In the Bertrand & Routt booklet, a listing is provided of some of the known lengths reported during the premiere Australia season of 1906-7, varying at anywhere from 2,000 feet to over one mile (5,280 feet), which equates to Gibson's five-reeler. The listing does not include the "over 6,000 feet in length" noted of the British release during 1907, or the "some 3 1/2 or 4 miles long" version reported on 27 January 1907 for the Sydney premiere. The latter was obviously a misreporting. Nevertheless, as of 2024 only 17 minutes (at 18 fps) of actual footage remains of the 1906 film, and it is now generally reported to have had an original running time of from 40 to 60 minutes. This length, which is actually only half of what was historically reported, is perhaps based on a calculation of the length if the film is run on a modern sound projector at the standard speed of 24 fps (or 11 minutes per reel). This discrepancy in regard to premiere season length and run time is evidence of the "interpretation" Bertrand refers to. The actual discrepancies in the run times during 1906-7 can be put down to how many reels individual theatre owners or distributor's staff choose to show, or were forced to show, such as Gibson & Johnson employee Sam Crews who in 1907 toured the film through New South Wales on behalf of distributors J. & N. Tait.

The present author noticed this use of personal interpretation to other aspects of the film as the booklet and other sources were studied, following on the previous research into the Ogle family connection. That research had given rise to the view by the present author that William A. Gibson was key to the creation and ultimate release of the film in 1906, and more so its subsequent updated re-release in 1910. The present article is one such example of that process of interpretation of the historical information at hand. Why, you may ask? Because it questions the role of William A. Gibson and his associates as against the claims by the Tait family in regards to responsibility for production of the film. There is no doubt that as theatrical entrepreneurs, the firm of J. & N. Tait were the distributors of the film between December 1906 and May 1907. However, there does not appear to be evidence that, prior to the release of The Story of the Kelly Gang, they had any experience in film production and could have, out of the blue, come up with this landmark, five-reel feature. Subsequent to its release, and arising out of its success, they were quick in claiming their sole release rights and copyright, just as they were free in their statements about the film and its origins within associated promotional material. Due to the presence of a substantial amount of conflicting information, the case is now that everything else concerning the film, apart from issues of length as mentioned above, is open for discussion and, in many instances, debate. In bucking the trend towards identifying the film as the Taits, this article comes down on the side of William A. Gibson as the driving force and true creator of The Story of the Kelly Gang. In the opinion of the present author, he came up with the idea; he was a producer; he was chief cameraman; and he also appears to have been what would now be referred to as the director, following a script or scenario most likely based (at least in part) upon Hands Up!, or Ned Kelly and His Gang (1900), written by R. I. Cole of the Bohemian Dramatic Company. We know that Gibson secured actors from the Company for the filming. Whilst the case for Gibson forms the main part of this article, the case for the Taits is also presented in summary at the end of this article, thereby highlighting a confusion that may, in fact, never be resolved. Read on....

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3. Gibson & Johnson's Pictures

L.F. Reynolds, Portrait of W. A. Gibson, circa 1927. Source: National Library of Australia.

Any attempt to understand the history of the creation of The Story of the Kelly Gang requires a reading of numerous documents covering the period 1897, when film was introduced into Australia, through to at least 2007 when the Bertrand and Routt booklet was released. This is a mammoth task, and one which the present writer has only scratched the surface of. Nevertheless, in seeking to specifically identify the role of William A. Gibson from in amongst such an expansive archive, a number of documents are presented below. They both reveal his important connection to The Story of the Kelly Gang and broader association with the development of the early Australian film industry, arising out of his interest as a chemist in the new technology of film making and presentation; the serendipitous acquisition of a camera leading to his pioneering role, along with his partner and fellow chemist Millard Johnson in the presentation of moving pictures in Australia during the early 1900s; and the prominent role he played in the development of the industry leading up to his death in 1929. For example, one contemporary obituary presents a detailed account of the actual filming of The Story of the Kelly Gang, with an emphasis on Gibson's role. This information was not previously available to the public, in any form, either pro-Gibson or pro-Tait. Following his death, the development of the Tait case evolved, culminating in Viola Tait's 1971 book on her family, which consolidated their claim to the titles of director, script writers, producers and supply of actors. The following selection therefore focuses on the claims of Gibson & Johnson in that regard, and Gibson's statements which go against the claims of the Taits. One such claim by the Taits, for example, was that the film was actually shot in so-called Kelly Country, at the locations where the events actually occurred. This was not true, but mere promoter hyperbole and the spruiking of a theatre entrepreneur. Gibson and Johnson both noted that they shot the film in Ivanhoe, north-east of Melbourne, and on their business premises at St. Kilda and personal property. The Taits said it was shot at their Eaglemont or Chartersville Estates, at Heidelberg, Melbourne, which was roughly in the same locality. Kelly Country was to the north east, and close to the New South Wales border. It seems that, apart from the Kelly Country claim, it seems that both groups were correct, due to the fact of there being more than a single period of filming during the period 1906 through to 1910. The following references and extracts relating to the career of Gibson and Johnson, with an emphasis on Gibson, clarify some of this confusion.

By 1900 it appears that William A. Gibson worked as a junior chemist at William Johnson & Son, St. Kilda Junction, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria (Pike 1981). The elder Johnson's son Millard by this time had attained a Ph.D. as an analytical chemist and worked in the United States, specialising in aspects of milk production. From around late 1899 the firm advertised in the Melbourne newspapers that they supplied compressed oxygen for limelight illumination of theatres and in association with the new cinematic film technology. Limelight, as a chemical reaction, produced a bright, white, flickering light, especially when utilised for projection of still lantern slides or moving pictures. Electric arc lighting removed this flicker and was gradually introduced during the early 1900s. Their business in this area expanded and Millard led the way in securing overseas and local footage, often from the Edison firm in the United States, and presenting it during the period 1901-04. He was making use of electric light from early in 1903. Millard also worked as a chemical analysis consultant for various private firms and governmental agencies, and was well known in this role. It appears that W. A. Gibson had joined Millard in his evolving cinematic presentation and film exchange activities by May 1903. Following that, the two worked closely together through to 1912 when Millard moved to the United States as Australian representative for Australasian Films Ltd. and Union Theatres. In the interim they were to achieve much by the way of developing the local film industry and making films. Millard obviously possessed the technical expertise in areas of film production and projection, whilst William supplemented this with both practical experience as a chemist and artistic and managerial skills. The listing below of items from various contemporary newspapers and other publications provides a snapshot of some of their work leading up to, and following, their production of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906-10).

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Chronology

1890s

Cinema was a natural extension of the early 1890s glass slide limelight projection entertainment industry. It was introduced to Australia on 30 November 1894 with the opening of the Edison Kinetoscope Parlour in Sydney where patrons could view hand-cranked machines showing short film items. On 22 August 1896 Carl Hertz presented the first projected screening of a film in Australia at the Melbourne Opera House (Tivoli Theatre). During that year the first local film was made - that of a man on roller skates. During 1897 the Salvation Army set up a film studio in Melbourne. By the turn of the century the projection of film was becoming more common, especially in the big cities such as Melbourne and Sydney, and later through travelling picture show operations (Source: Australian Film and Television Chronology).

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1900

* 10 March 1900, The Age, Melbourne. The following is an advertisement which reveals the early involvement of chemist Millard Johnson in providing technical support to the evolving film industry and corresponding glass slide limelight presentations:

[For sale] Oxygen, for limelight, compressed up to 1,000 lb., with cylinder and regulator; 6d. per ft. Johnson, chemist. St. Kilda, telephone.

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1901

* 8 June 1901, The Age, Melbourne. Chemical and equipment support for limelight presentations. Also, at this stage, Millard Johnson is providing a film copying service.

[For sale] Oxygen, compressed; Limelight; all apparatus supplied; Bioscope pictures made to order. Oxygen Works, Millard Johnson, chemist, St. Kilda.

* 28 August 1901, South Bourke and Mornington Journal, Richmond. An advertisement for an Edison Projecting Kinetoscope presentation by Millard Johnson, under the business banner Edisonia.

* 7 September 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. Johnson is now selling films.

[For sale] Oxygen, compressed, limelight, all apparatus supplied, Bioscope Pictures for SALE, Oxygen Works, Millard Johnson, chemist, St Kilda.

* 30 November 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. Notice re lecture on Milk to be given by Millard Johnson, former Analytical Inspector of Milk Board Health, San Francisco.

* 30 November 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. Johnson is also providing a film presentation service.

[For sale] Oxygen, Edisonia Compressing Works, Limelight supplies, tableaux, animated Picture Entertainments given, Millard Johnson, chemist, St. Kilda Junction.

* 5 December 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. Evidence for the early involvement of Millard Johnson in the presentation of film shorts, most of which were obtained from the Edison company of America.

A display of 2,500 feet of films of animated pictures will be shown by Mr. Millard Johnson, many of which are new to Australia. They include several amusing items, the experiences of the Naval Brigade in China, and a number of scenes incidental to the South African war. Visitors to the ground are notified that the pictures can only be seen from the arena, or from the reserve in front of the grandstand.

* 14 December 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. A notice indication that Millard Johnson was providing a film exchange service.

Edisonia.— These Popular Animated Pictures are open for engagement; early application necessary. Millard Johnson, chemist, St. Kilda. Tel. 61.

* 21 December 1901, The Argus, Melbourne. Report on Millard Johnson presenting a program of 2,700 feet of film (18 different shorts) at a Melbourne Cricket Ground event.

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1902

* 1 January 1902 - Millard Johnson noted as a lecturer on chemistry and physics at the Veterinary College, Melbourne.

* 15 February 1902, Prahran Telegraph. Another Edisonia presentation, including a local film on Melbourne fire fighting.

During the evening Edisonia animated pictures were shown by Mr. Millard Johnson, amongst the most interesting being a series depicting the British, German, America, and Melbourne methods of fighting fire. These were received with marked approval.

* 8 March 1902, Prahran Telegraph.

Moonlight Concert

.....Under the weather conditions Mr. Edison's animated pictures by Mr. Millard Johnson were the most successful, and the audience appreciated the humor of such pictures as 'The Clumsy Waiter,' 'The Miller and the Sweep,' and others of a like character. The other pictures of an historical nature, such as 'Our blue pickets off to China, what they saw in China, and how they saved the mission station fro the boxers' were warmly received, and heartily applauded. They served to give those present a glimpse into brave actions in other lands, transcribed by one of the many wonderful recent discoveries in photographic and mechanical science.

* 19 April 1902, The Age, Melbourne. Report that Edisonia had been purchased by the Edison Phonograph Company from Millard Johnson and becomes the Edisonia Entertainment Company. Johnson still operates Edisonia Oxygen Works, St. Kilda and will continue to present Edisonia moving pictures.

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1903

* 3 February 1903, The Age, Melbourne. Millard Johnson presents a lecture on Milk, illuminated with Limelight views.

* 9 April 1903, The Age, Melbourne. Report on Millard Johnson and The Sacred Cinematograph Festival.

The full programme of the Sacred Concert and Royal Cinematograph Entertainment to take place on Good Friday night in Messrs. Wirth Bros. huge tent, lent for the occasion, is published elsewhere. Mr. Waller Kirby will appear for the last time prior to his departure on Thursday, next for England. The other artists are Miss Minnie Waugh, Miss Adelaide Bruce, Messrs. T. E. Jones, Arthur Hamilton, Charles, Walter, and William Bruce. The Passion Play, all moving pictures, will be produced, under directorship of Mr. Millard Johnson.

* 2 May 1903, The Age, Melbourne. Millard Johnson presents film of the recent 8 Hours Procession from Trades Hall. It is unclear who took this film. This may mark the beginning of Johnson's projection of locally produced films, though such films had been available since 1896.

* Monday, 4 May 1903, The Herald, Melbourne. An early mention of Johnson and Gibson working together in the presentation of film.

Sacred Concert.

It is estimated that fully 6000 people were present at the sacred concert held last night in Messrs Fitzgerald's circus buildings. Prince's Bridge. The programme rendered was much appreciated. Miss Emille Benson achieved a great success with her rendering of The Light of the World, and Miss Tyson, Messrs Howgate, Baylls and Walters were the other artists. The cinematograph pictures, under the able directorship of Mr Millard Johnson, assisted by Mr W. Gibson, were very fine.

* c. 1903 - Gibson purchases a second-hand "magic lantern" film projection machine for £40 and shortly thereafter begins showing 50 feet long lengths of film known as "kinematographics" on the roof of the Johnson chemists store at St. Kilda. This was likely a continuation of the earlier work of Johnson.

* c.1903 - Gibson moves his film projection project to St. Kilda Beach to facilitate public access. He eventually starts charging for attendance at the screenings.

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1904

* c.1904 - Messrs Gibson & Johnson set up a film exchange business, providing projection equipment, projectionists and film to theatres and groups. In association with this, extra staff are employed and regular screenings are subsequently carried out in and around Melbourne and as far afield as Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat.

* 19 March 1904, Independent, Foostcray. Report on the presentation of the Gibson and Johnson "Wonderful Ivanhoff Bioscope" and a series of foreign-made short films.

* 21 May 1904, The Age, Melbourne. Report on the showing of a new electric bioscope by Gibson and Johnson at the Athenaeum Hall during the Saturday evening Sixpenny Pops show. These presentations continue through to at least July.

* 23 May, 1904, The Argus, Melbourne. Report on the presentation of a series of bioscope pictures by Gibson and Johnson at the Temperance Hall, Russell Street, Melbourne.

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1905

* 18 February 1905, The Coburg Leader. Report on a bioscope presentation by Millard Johnson and W. A. Gibson at Coburg Cricket Ground.

* 16 March 1905, The Bendigo Independent, Bendigo. Comment on presentation of the 10 minute long US film The Bold Bank Robbery (1904).

The bioscope views shown by Messrs. Millard Johnson and Gibson were good, the long film depicting the "Bank Robbery" being much admired.

* 25 April 1905, Bendigo Advertiser.

Messrs Johnson and Gibson's Royal Electric Bioscope. Will throughout each night depict the Living World with the Latest Animated Pictures just received from London, Paris and New York.

* Johnson and Gibson continue to exhibit their electric bioscope presentations in and around Melbourne throughout the year.

* 3 November 1905, Rutherglen Sun and Chiltern Valley Advertiser, Victoria.

Messrs Johnson and Gibson, bioscope experts, of Melbourne, will give a fine exhibition of moving pictures, without the slightest flickering so noticeable in ordinary bioscopes, and have succeeded in filling the Collingwood Town Hall every Monday for the past 12 months, which alone gives us an idea of their entertainment.

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1906

* During 1906, the firm of J. & N. Tait, in collaboration with Gibson & Johnson, release in Australia the 1904 English four reel (80 minute) documentary film Living London. It proved a sensation, being seen by half a million people (Jackson 2009). The film premiered at the Melbourne Town Hall on Saturday, 27 January 1906. It was "a couple of thousand feet" long and contained 280 moving scenes of London. At the time it could only be shown in Melbourne during the evening, as there were difficulties in darkening the Town Hall for day time performances to accommodate old people and others. The film toured all Australian states during 1906, plus New Zealand and India. Gibson & Johnson provided the electrical projection equipment. Mains or portable power was also required, and it is unclear if the firm provided the latter to facilitate out-of-city presentations. Melbourne city centre had first been supplied with power in 1894. The venture was so financially successful that, by the middle of the year, the Taits were looking for a sequel or similarly popular presentation.

* 27 January 1906 - The firm of Johnson and Gibson exhibit bioscope pictures and are listed as electricians. This reflects their involvement in the technical side of the industry.

* 27 January 1906 - Living London premieres at the Town Hall, Melbourne. It is exhibited by J. & N. Tait in collaboration with Gibson and Johnson.

* 6 February 1906, Geelong Advertiser - Johnson and Gibson exhibit a series of pictures at a Kardinia Park concert.

* 13 February 1906, Amusements - Living London, The Express and Telegraph, Adelaide. Review of the Living London presentation in Adelaide, with Gibson as the projectionist, or "lanternist".

"Living London."

Last night at the Adelaide Town Hall, under the direction of Messrs. J. and N. Tait, a biograph entertainment styled "Living London" was presented to a full house, and received an enthusiastic reception... After the interval the pictures designed by the title "Living London" were thrown on the screen. They were throughout the entertainment devoid of the objectionable flicker which is so trying to the eyes... The picture was recently purchased by Mr. N. Tait who is at present in London, and his belief that it would appeal to every Britisher has been justified by results. The company's last engagement was a two weeks season in Melbourne, and the performance on the final night attracted a larger audience than any of the preceding ones. The views were brought to a close by a series of beautiful colored moving pictures showing fountains in the gardens of Versailles, France... The lanternist was Mr. W. A. Gibson (of Johnson & Gibson, Melbourne), and his work was performed smooth, and without a hitch. The company is to show for the next four nights. "Living London" will be displayed each evening, but in the other parts of the programme there will be complete changes at every performance.

* 9 May 1906 - J. & N. Tait secure(?) Johnson and Gibson to make a film of Melbourne on this day. It is subsequently released on 12 May as Moving Melbourne (Jackson 2009). This is the first known film to be made by Johnson and Gibson.

* 17 May 1906 - J. & N. Tait secure(?) Johnson and Gibson to make a film of Adelaide, on this day. It is subsequently released as Animated Adelaide (Jackson 2009).

* c. June-July 1906 - According to Millard Johnson (1923), due to the financial success of Living London, J. & N. Tait asked Gibson and Johnson to "make another." William A. Gibson decides to make a long film on the subject of the Kelly Gang. He states that he was driven to this when he noticed that people were more interested in attending theatre productions of the story of the Kelly Gang, than watching the then novelty and patriotic film Living London. J. & N. Tait would go on to act as distributors, provide additional funding and locations for use during the filming.

* c. July 1906 - Gibson uses £400 from his savings for the projected Ned Kelly film.

* post July 1906 - The firm of Messrs. Gibson & Johnson employ / utilise the following individuals and groups for the project (Mcguire 1944 & 1945, Percival 1949):

Actors - R. I. Cole's Bohemian Dramatic Company, on £1 per day
Cameraman - William A. Gibson
Production Manager - Mr. F. Marden
Property Manager - Samuel Crews / Crew / Cruise
Film developer - Mr. C. Byer-Coates

* 21 July 1906, Williamstown Advertiser, Victoria.

Johnston and Gibson’s bioscope drew a packed house last evening at the Mechanics’ Institute. A clever, varied and refined entertainment was given. Delightful music was played by an orchestra under the direction of Mr Weichard. Some first class comedy business was enacted and there were good songs and other items that would not fail to win appreciation anywhere. "Living London" and other bioscope novelties will be introduced next Friday evening.

* 23 October 1906, The Naracoorte Herald, South Australia.

Living London Pictures.

On Saturday evening the Living London Company paid a return visit to Narracoorte, and gave a capital exhibition of moving pictures to a good audience in the Institute Hall. In addition to the interesting pictures, of Ceylon and London, several new subjects were shown, which were greatly appreciated by the audience. The pictures were produced by an up-to-date bioscope with electric light attachments, and were almost free from flickering. The company will appear at Kaniya this evening, and at Border Town on Wednesday (to-morrow) night.

* 5 November 1906, The Northwestern Advocate and Emu Bay Times, Tasmania.

Picture's Worth Seeing.

On Wednesday and Thursday next Messrs Johnson and Gibson, who have been showing for the past six weeks at the Melbourne Athenaeum, will present the great Russian Bomb Outrage series of pictures to Burnie audiences for a two nights' season. Thrilling in the extreme, these pictures are specially interesting, dealing as they do with the internal troubles, plots, and riotings of unhappy, disorganised, autocratic Russia of the present day. One and all may read the news of plots, assassinations, and counter plots in the leading daily papers as they come to hand, and yet may not have any conception of the terrible scenes of cruelty, crime, and arrogance which are being enacted. The truth is clearly displayed by means of this interesting realistic picture, detailing and depicting faithfully the vengeful and corrupt system or the secret police, the mockery and miscarriage of justice, the brutality of the savage, uncivilised, ignorant Cossacks of the south-east provinces, who are invariably placed in charge of prisoners sentenced to Siberia, many of whom are abandoned by their ruthless guards to starvation and death in the snow. The system of the great Russian secret society of Nihilists, composed of all classes of the community, mostly headed by dissatisfied students and members of the middle classes, who have lately struck terror into the hearts of the aristocracy with their vengeance methods, is displayed in these pictures in every detail, from the drawing of the fatal number which denotes that the holder has to carry out to the letter the Nihilistic vengeance, or answer with his or her life. Many instances of self-sacrifice by women have lately been recorded, women who have become martyrs for the good of their unhappy contemporaries. Russia, at the present day, is an unhappy nation, and scenes of strife and internal troubles are of daily occurrence. A large up-to-date selection of moving pictures, including subjects of all descriptions, exactly the same as produced during the Melbourne season, will be introduced by the above company. The prices are the same as when the firm produced 'Living London' some few months back. A large selection of illustrated songs will be rendered by Brander Balfour, tenor, and the marvellous American skater, Fred. Norris, will appear in his specialty, 'Wayback on Wheels.' Mr Will Douglas attends to the musical part of the entertainment.

* 6 November 1906. Johnson and Gibson are present in Melbourne for the filming of the "Championship Boxing Contest - Squires versus Kling" held at the Ascot Race Course on Melbourne Cup Day. The following still from the surviving footage notes "Copy-Right J. Wren Esq / Cinematographed By Johnson & Gibson, Temperance Hall, Melbourne."

Source: National Film & Sound Archive of Australia.

It is highly likely that the title screen for The Story of the Kelly Gang was similar to the above, if not more refined.

Another still from the film shows Johnson and Gibson seated by the ringside, wearing a top hat and bowler hat. Gibson is looking towards the camera, as one of their staff operate the device.

Source: National Film & Sound Archive of Australia.

* 14 December 1906 - Official copyright registration of a The Kelly Gang letterpress poster, by Robert Hollyford and Dan Barry, Victorian Patents Office, Melbourne.

* Wednesday, 19 December 1906, The Age, Melbourne. Announcement regarding the forthcoming premiere of The Story of the Kelly Gang at the Athenaeum Theatre on Boxing Day, 26 December, with a separate screening that evening at the Melbourne Town Hall. A similar evening screening was also shown at the Adelaide Town Hall in South Australia. A breakdown of the nine segments was contained in The Age advertisement.

The Story of the Kelly Gang

Thy greatest story of Australian outlaws ever told. Modern science has harnessed photography, so that with the new biograph we are enabled to tell this thrilling story in its entirety over again. Told in highly dramatic scenes.

Section 1.—Shows the Kelly Homestead, where Dan is wanted for cattle stealing. Kate Kelly comes on the scene to warn them of Trooper Fitzpatrick's approach. Pistols are drawn, murder is nearly committed, and so the gang are outlawed.

Section 2.—Takes us into the inaccessible Wombat Ranges, where the police, all innocent of impending danger, are surrounded and shot down, with the exception of MacIntyre, who makes his escape.

Section 3.—The Gang proceed to Younghusband's station, which they stick up and make numerous prisoners, and then go to rob the bank at Euroa.

Section 4.—In the fastnesses of the Strathbogie Ranges, Joe Byrne's mother comes across Aaron Sherrit, a former friend of the gang, in the Police Camp.

Section 5.—Two of the gang follow up Sherrit and shoot him in his hut.

Section 6.—The gang capture the line repairers, and at the revolvers' point force them to tear up the railway line. The timely warning of the train by Schoolmaster Curnow.

Section 7.—At the Glenrowan lnn. The surprise. The gang at bay. Surrounded at the Glenrowan Inn.

Section 8.—Death of Joe Byrne. Father Gibney rescues the wounded. The hotel on fire. Death of Dan Kelly and Steve Hart.

Section 9.—Ned Kelly at bay. Clothed in his heavy armor the bullets of the police make no effect; at last they hit him in the leg, when be falls, and is captured.

The whole set form the most dramatic series of pictures ever put before the public. In order to secure a correct representation of this stirring subject, the services of skilled operators, &c., have been constantly required for the past six months, and the management claim that this series is one of the biggest undertakings ever accomplished in the art of cinematography.

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* Wednesday, 19 December 1906, The Register, Adelaide.

The Kelly Gang by Moving Pictures.

Messrs. J. & N. Tait, of Melbourne, are well known for introducing the latest and most up-to-date moving pictures to Adelaide residents, and it is said the entertainment to be presented at the Town Hall during Christmas week will be up to their best standard. The season will start on Christmas Night, and a specially selected programme of a semi-religious character will be shown for that night only. On Boxing Night a fresh programme will be, submitted, including a long moving picture showing the history of the Kelly gang of bushrangers, from the first exploits of the gang to the final scene at the Glenrowan Hotel. For six months skilled operators and others have been engaged on the Kelly gang picture working at the details and carefully studying the habits of the bushrangers. The result has proved decidedly successful, and the management claim that it will be the greatest moving picture yet secured by any biograph firm. Careful thought has been devoted to the whole subject, and the audience will be enabled to witness the whole of the stirring incidents of this exciting period when the Kellys reigned supreme in the north-eastern district of Victoria. The picture begins at Greta, the home of the Kellys, and quickly changes to the police camp in the wombat. Ranges, where the first incident of importance occurred. This view shows the bushrangers surprising the police and capturing the camp, and their subsequent departure through the mountains. Then follows the stacking up of Younghusband's Station, and Sandy Gloster, the hawker, whose wagon was used for the robbery of the bank at Euroa. The audience are next shown the gang robbing the bank, black trackers at work in the Strathbogle Ranges. While the party of line repairers are at work the Kellys appear, and compel them to pull up the railway line with the object of wrecking the special train, but the plucky action of Schoolmaster Curnow, who is seen running along the track, saves the train. The final scene is at Glenrowan Hotel, which is attacked by a strong force of police, who finally capture the ring leader, Ned Kelly. The Messrs. Tait have had great difficulty in preparing this work, the co-operation of the Victorian railways being necessary, also the engagement of a special train, in order to reproduce the destruction of the train.

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* 19 December 1906, The Mercury, Hobart. Article; Advertisement; c.f. 20 December 1906.

Dan Barry's World-Wide Wonder Show.

On Boxing night, Wednesday, December 26, and three following nights, Dan Barry will present in the Town-hall, Hobart, a colossal, unique, and up-to-date entertainment, with the comprehensive title of World-wide Wonder Show" The name at once suggests that the presentation will be replete with novelties gathered from all the corners of the globe, and will, amongst other multifarious attractions, comprise the latest and greatest moving, living pictures, seemed for Dan Barry by his agents in Great Britain, America, and the Continent All are promised to be of infinite variety and magnetic charm, some intensely thrilling, some redolent of historical reminiscences, some full of touching pathos, some most sensational, some vital with stirring adventures, some replete with picturesque romance some uproariously and irresistibly humorous and all calculated to awaken keenest human interest Besides the great array of moving pictures to be shown, a number of most charming picture songs will he rendered by popular vocalists, illustrated by slides said to be of surpassing loveliness, so that there will be a feast of beauty to delight the ear. During the performance there will also be given songs, sketches, and specialty acts by several clever vaudeville artists, who are amongst the company travelling with the show A special film, epic during Christmas pantomime and harlequinade is one of the striking for times This film shows beautiful coloured scones from the old fairy tales, and should prove interesting to old and young alike Scenes from the lives of the notorious bushrangers, the famous Kelly gang, will also be shown, and a life-like picture of the Melbourne Cup, 1906, will be reproduced.

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* Saturday, 22 December 1906, The Register, Adelaide.

The Story of the Kelly Gang.

Messrs. J. & N. Tait will present at the Adelaide Town Hall during Christmas week one of the most interesting moving picture entertainments yet shown in Adelaide. For Christmas night a carefully selected programme has been chosen, which will include a number of new films just received from London, and sacred songs and solos by approved artists. On Boxing Night a special programme will be submitted, the chief feature of which will be the introduction to Adelaide residents of the notorious Kelly gang of bushrangers by biograph. For six months over 60 people have been engaged on this work, and the result has proved successful. What is known as the Kelly country, the weird fastnesses of the Strathbogie Ranges, and the more peaceful, but none the less picturesque, surroundings of Euroa and Mansfield have been the scene of some strange and stirring happenings. Perhaps in all the realms of fiction no more romantic or sensational subject could be found for a biograph film than that of the startling episodes comprehended in the history of the notorious Kelly gang. Some idea of the magnitude of Messrs. J. &, N. Tait's enterprise may be gained from the fact that it has cost the firm £1,000. The production of the film has engaged the constant attention of several biograph experts and a large staff or assistants for months. The Kelly gang picture is over 4,000 ft. in length, and occupies nearly an hour and a half in representation. In addition to this film a number of entirely new pictures will be shown. Special holiday matinees will be given on Proclamation Day and New Year's Day. The plan is at Marshalls'.

* 24 December 1906, The Herald, Melbourne. The Taits secure rights to present the film.

..... Messrs J. and N. Tait, who have secured the exclusive right of a new set of pictures, entitled "The Kelly Gang," will afford the public the opportunity of seeing them at the Athenaeum Hall on Wednesday (Boxing Day) afternoon, and in the evening at the Town Hall. [Bertrand & Routt]

* 25 December 1906, The Mercury, Hobart. Notice of intended attendance of Governor Strickland and party at opening night on 26 December.

* Wednesday, 26 December 1906 - premiere of The Story of the Kelly Gang at the Athenaeum Theatre, Melbourne; Town Hall, Sydney; and Town Hall, Hobart.

The Story of the Kelly Gang [restored], 1906, YouTube, duration: 31.52 minutes. Copy of National Film and Sound Archive of Australia restoration 2006.

* 26 December 1906 - Program Booklet, 22 pages. Collection: NFSA. Synopsis Text:

The Story of the Kelly Gang By The Biograph (Copyright).

The Most Thrilling Moving Picture Series ever taken.

Synopsis:

SCENE 1. – The Kelly Homestead – Mrs. Kelly at Home – Kate Overhears the Troopers Discussing the Warrant for Dan’s Arrest, and Rides off to Warn them, Followed by the Police – Kate Arrives with the News that the Police are after Dan – The Trooper Rides up to Arrest Dan for Cattle Stealing – He Produces a Warrant for Dan’s Arrest and is Repulsed by Mrs. Kelly, whom he Handles Roughly – Kate Rushes to her Mother’s Assistance – The Trooper Asks for “Just One Kiss, Katie, Dear, and I’ll Let Dan Go?” – Ned Comes to Katie’s Assistance, and Shoots the Trooper in the Wrist – First Blood – He is Held at Bay by Kate with a Loaded Revolver.

SCENE 2. – Police in Camp on the Wombat Ranges – Kennedy and Scanlon Leave the Others to go in Search of a New Camp – MacIntyre and Loneragan Left in Charge Amuse Themselves by Shooting Parrots – The Surprise – The Police Surrounded – “Up with Your Hands, or We Fire!” – “Mind, MacIntyre, if you Run I’ll Drive a Bullet Through You – The Gang take Afternoon Tea, when Hart Rushing in to say the Police are Returning – Troopers Kennedy and Scanlon Arrive on the Scene, When They are Shot Down before They Can Take Proper Cover = Ned Kelly remarks, “If we had not Shot Them, they would have Shot Us. We had to do it” – Constable MacIntyre Jumps on Kennedy’s Horse as it is Rushing By, and Escapes. The Gang Fire Many Shots after him, but Without Effect – The Gang Leave the Scene of the Fight – Outlawed, and a Price Upon Their Hands – The Government Issue a Proclamation Offering a Reward of £8000 for the Apprehension of the Gang.

SCENE 3. – The Gang Stick Up Younghusband’s Station – All the Hands are Rounded Up and Forced in the Store Room, where They are Kept Close Prisoners – Ned Kelly Instructs Steve Hart to Go Through the Pockets of All the Men – The Ladies are Unmolested, Ned Kelly Remarking in a Jocular Manner that “We Do Not Rob Ladies or Children;” – Arrival of Sandy Glosier, the Hawker, with His Van – Sandy Gloster is Compelled to Bail Up, Very Much Against His Will; but, Finally, Does So – “Ha! Ha! Some New Togs, Boys, at Last!” “A Box of Cigars! Good Enough” – “Get Behind the House, Dan and Steve. Here Comes a Trap, with Four Men in it” – Arrival of Four Sportsmen, who are Immediately Made Prisoners with the Rest – Mr. Macauley, the Station Manager, Rides Up on Horseback, and at the Point of the Revolver. He is Compelled to Dismount – Disguised in the Borrowed Clothes, the Gang Depart to Stick up the Bank at Euroa – Joe Bryne Left on Guard at Younghusband’s – Bailing up the Bank – The Clerks are Discovered Shutting the Bank at Three O’Clock to Depart for Their Homes – When New Kelly, who Feigns to be a Customer, Prevails on Them to Open the Door, as They State That They Want to Deposit Some Money – The Manager, When Brought in, Refuses to Hand Over the Keys, and is Threatened with Instant Death if He Refuses – The Gang Make a Good Haul of Gold and Notes, and Force Their Prisoners into the Van, and Drive them back to Younghusband’s – On Arriving There, Ned gives Steve Hart Bag of Money, When He Mounts and Rides Away with it.

SCENE 4. – Kate Kelly, Acting as a Bush Telegraph, is Chased by the Police – Black Trackers at Work in the Strathbogle Ranges – Mrs. Skillian Lead the Police on a Wild-Goose Chase, and Finally Fools Them with a Dummy Parcel Filled with Empty Bottles and Stones – Mrs. Byrne Discovers Aaron Sherritt with the Police Ready to Give Information about the Gang – She Informs Kate and Mrs. Skillian, who go to warn Them – They Are Chased by a Trooper, and to Lose Him, Ford a Billabong – Joe Byrne and Dan Kelly Capture Farmer Wicks, whey They Handcuff and Lead to Aaron Sherritt’s Hut, and Compel Him to Call Out that He has Lost His Way – Aaron is Seen Conferred with the Police, who Rush into the Bedroom, when they Hear Farmer Wicks’ Voice – Sherritt Goes to the Door, when Joe Byrne, his old Schoolfellow, Steps into the Doorway, saying, “Death to all Traitors” and Shoots him Dead – The Policemen Become Panic-Stricken, and Two of Them Get Under the Bed, and the Others Keep Mrs. Sherritt in the Room for Their Own Safety. This is the Only Blot on the Police.

SCENE 5. – The Gang Meet and Capture the Platelayers, Whom They Drive at the Point of a Pistol and Make Them Tear up the Rails – Scenes at the Glenrowan Inn – Schoolmaster Curnow, to Win Confidence of the Gang, Tells Ned Kelly that Mr. Stannistreet, the Station Master, has a Loaded Revolver on Him, which they Compel Him to Give Up and Treat him Rather Roughly – Curnow Gets Away and, Hastening Home, Gets a Red Scarf and a Candle. Thus Taking his Life in his Hands, he Proceeds Along the Railway and Stops the Pilot Engine, and, Thank God, he Saved the Train – The Gang Surprised at the Glenrowan Inn – The Police Surround the Hotel and Fire Into It - The Gang Fire in Return; but Ned Kelly, Weighted Down with His Armour, Finds it Awkward to Handle His Gun – The Police Resolve to Set Fire Gibney from Going into the Burning Building – The Brave Priest to the Rescue – Death of a Mrs. Jones’ Little Boy, Shot Down by a Stray Bullet – Joe Byrne, whilst Standing at the Bar, is Shot Dead – Father Gibney Carried Out the Wounded Plate-Layer to a Place of Safety – Dan Kelly and Steve Hart, Seeing that the Game is Up, and that They Have no Chance of Escaping, Decide to Die by Each Other’s Hands.

SCENE 6. – The Closing Scenes – Ned Kelly, who Had Successfully Made His Escape in the Night, Being Heavily Weighted with His Armour, Decides to Come Back at the Break of Day to See If he Can rejoin His Comrades – His Is Seen Approaching from the Bush, and the Troopers Fire Shot After Shot at the Tall, Silent Figure; But the Shots Seem to Take no Effect, Except to Cause His to Stagger – He is Wounded in the Left Hand, and, Owing to the Armour, Cannot Take Straight Aim – Ned Kelly at Bay – He Fights Hard for His Life – The Police Find His Vulnerable Spot, and Fire into His Legs. They Bring Him Down at Last – He Begs the Troopers to Spare His Life – Thus Falls the Last of the Kelly Gang, and, With the Fall of Ned Kelly, the Last of the Bushrangers.

The whole series of Pictures [i.e. the film] were taken by Messrs. Johnson and Gibson, for Messrs J. and N. Tait and are copyright throughout the world. [Bertrand & Routt]

* Thursday, 27 December 1907 - The Kelly Gang, The Register, Adelaide. Review of the film.

The Biograph Company at the Town Hall, under the direction of Messrs. J. and N. Tait, true to promise, showed the films of pictures illustrative of the adventures and death of the Kelly Gang on Wednesday evening. There was a large attendance. Describing the production of these the management said:—"In order to carry out this great biograph undertaking it was necessary to keep employed sometimes as many as 50 people at a time, and it even necessitated the co-operation of the railways and the engagement of special trains to reproduce the attempted destruction of the train. The authentic records of the Kelly incident were carefully studied in order that a faithful reproduction of the story of the Kelly Gang might be shown to the public. This picture should be of exceptional interest to the Australian public, as almost every man, woman, and child in Australia knows of Ned Kelly and his fellow-bushrangers, and it is probably one of the most stirring incidents in Australian history." The effect on the house on Wednesday night justified the efforts of the management. The pictures were strikingly clear and true to life. The mulga and tea-tree scrub translated the spectators from the Town Hall to the aboriginal bush. The story of the Kellys almost every Australian knows. The gang comprised Ned Kelly, Dan Kelly, Joe Byrne, and Steve Hart, and perhaps Kate Kelly (one of the causes of the outlawry, and a great helper to her brothers) ought to be included. The string of incidents began when the trooper went to the Kellys' house with a warrant for the arrest of Dan for cattle stealing. Mrs. Kelly and Kate repelled him, and in a foolish moment the trooper offered to "let Dan go" if Katie would give him "just one kiss." This roused the indignation of the gang, who were unseen listeners indoors, and the trooper was shot in the wrist. Kate held him at bay while the four men escaped. After that there could be no peace while the gang were at large. They attacked part of a police force which was out after them, and which was encamped in the Wombat Ranges, and here committed the first of their actual murders by killing three of the troopers. McIntyre, the fourth constable, escaped, and at once the whole of the police force available was sent out. The pictures, with commendable attention to detail, carried the spectators through the scenes of the sticking up of Younghusband's Station, the robbery of the Euroa National Bank, and the attempted wrecking of the train. Through the heroic action of a schoolmaster, Mr. Curnow, who with a red scarf and a candle just reached the destroyed portion of the railway track in time to avert a threatened disaster, the scheme of the gang was thwarted. This was the turning point of the rebellion in favour of the police, and shortly afterwards they stormed the Glenrowan Hotel, where the gang was caught at bay. The fight was short but sharp, and the police succeeded in firing the wooden building. Father Gibney implored them to desist from this plan, as there were women and children inside, and when he could not prevail on them, the brave priest entered the burning house in time to rescue a wounded inmate. Meanwhile Byrne had been shot at the bar of the hotel by a chance bullet, and Steve Hart and Dan Kelly, realizing that their game was up, shook hands and shot each other. Ned Kelly attired himself in armour, and managed to escape. The troopers, however, secured him in the bush, and after they discovered his unprotected part (his legs) they soon finished the unequal combat. The spectators cheered each thrilling situation, and were divided in their favours between natural feeling for the police and sympathy for the daring of the outlaws. The management also showed several pictures of a comic nature, and the film which especial ly pleased the people was that entitled "The adventures of the lovesick serenader, also father and his bulldog." The company will continue their show during the week.

* 28 December 1906, Mount Alexander Mail, Castlemaine, Victoria.

Messrs J. and N. Tait, copyrighted proprietors of the great biograph film, The Story of the Kelly Gang," now being produced at the Town Hall, Melbourne, request us state that they are the sole holders of the original pictures, recently taken for them at enormous expense and that unless submitted under their direction the same are not genuine. This intimation is necessary in consequence of moving pictures purporting to be genuine being advertised under Messrs Tait's title, selected by unauthorised persons.

* 29 December 1906, Tasmanian News, Hobart. Following this presentation, the film toured Tasmania.

Town Hall - Dan Barry's Worldwide Wonder Show.

.... To-night will be the last night on which this mammoth entertainment will be given. A special programme abounding with good things is promised. These will be new films of sensational or humorous order. The main film will depict scenes from the career of the most notorious bushrangers known in the annals of crime in Australasia - the Kelly Gang......

* 29 December 1906 - The Mercury, Hobart. This appears to suggest that an extended version of the film would be shown that night, in comparison to that which premiered three days earlier. It also suggests that Johnson and Gibson may have produced for Barry, on order, a Ned Kelly film different from the Melbourne version, though utilising their footage:

Dan Barry's World-Wide Wonder Show.

In our advertising columns will be seen the announcement of the last night of the above entertainment in the Town Hall. For this occasion the management have decided to produce a biograph picture of the lives and adventures of the notorious Kelly gang of bushrangers, who created such a reign of terror in Australia over twenty years ago. This picture should prove interesting, and judging by the excellence of the series fellow n during the season, should draw a crowded house.

The Mercury, Hobart, 29 December 1906.

* 31 December 1906, The Advertiser, Adelaide. Advertisement regarding end of season on 31 December and mention of the length of the representation as being an hour.

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1907

* Tuesday, 1 January 1907, Daily Telegraph, Launceston. Advertisement for last night of the Dan Barry presentation.

* 1 January 1907, Sydney Sportsman. It is unclear what is meant in the following by the "fake film of The Kelly Gang." This may simply mean that it is not a documentary, but a semi-fictional account.

Theatrical Tit Bits

The professional actors and actresses who were recently engaged for a fake film of The Kelly Gang, which was taken in the bush, with horses and cattle, etc., received 6s a day and their grub. The affair was quite a novelty to them.

* 21 January 1907, Advertiser, Bendigo. Story regarding the employment of Mr. C. Byers-Coates to develop 20,000 feet of film for Gibson & Johnson, including for The Kelly Gang film. [Bertrand & Routt]

* 27 January 1907, The Sunday Sun, Sydney.

Messrs. J. and N. Tait will shortly exhibit in the Palace Theatre a "Kelly Gang" series of living, moving pictures. The whole of the career of the bushranging gang is shown, from the start of Constable Fitzpatrick's visit to their home until the capture of "Ned" encased in armour. To get this series of pictures, which is some 3 1/2 or 4 miles long, Messrs. Tait engaged some forty actors, actresses, and children to dress and enact their parts for the purpose of making a correct film, and when these people were fully rehearsed, they were taken to the exact localities where the different events occurred, and thus a replica of the different events was secured. Mr. George Buller will be Messrs. Taits' manager and representative.

* 4 February 1907, Story of the Kelly Gang, The Australian Star, Sydney.

* Friday, 8 February 1907, The Telegraph, Brisbane.

The Story of the Kelly Gang.

The first exhibition of Messrs. J. and N. Tait's successful biograph film, entitled "The Story of the Kelly Gang," will take place to-morrow (Saturday) evening at the Centennial Hall. The pictures are said to be a remarkable production, and were taken by highly experienced operators. Every important incident which characterised the lives of the Kellys is said to be vividly shown. Messrs. J. and N. Tait, who hold the copyright of the pictures, state that they have spared no expense in the production, so that an exceptional treat in animated pictures may be looked forward to. Operators, actors, actresses, and auxiliaries to the number of about 50 in all, and several horses were engaged in preparing and presenting the scenes. The performance will commence at 8 o'clock sharp. Day sale tickets are obtainable at Mrs. Tatton's, Centennial Hall; box-plan at Paling's.

* 10 February 1907, Music and Drama / Kelly Gang Pictures / New Artists at the Tivoli, The Sunday Sun, Sydney.

* 16 February 1907, Hamilton Spectator, Victoria.

The Kelly Gang by Biograph.—

The eagerly anticipated production by Messrs. J. and N. Tait of the now famous "Story of the Kelly Gang" will be given at the town hall on Monday and Tuesday next. Referring to the new Australian industry of biograph film manufacturing, a metropolitan journal reporting upon this particular venture says: - What is known as the Kelly country, the weird fastnesses of the Strathbogie ranges and the more peace full but none the less picturesque surroundings of Euroa and Mansfield - has been the scene of some strange and eerie happenings during the past six months or so. We have all been regaled by sensational biograph films of the American, type, wherein Red Indians, cowboys, and train thieves play a paramount part, and all of which savour, more or less, of fake and theatricalism. But it has been left to the discernment of that enterprising firm, Messrs. John and Nevin Tait, to perceive an infinitely better and more interesting theme much nearer home.

Perhaps in all the realms of fiction no more romantic or sensational subject could be found for a biograph film than that of the startling episodes comprehended in the history of the notorious Kelly gang. All these have the advantage of being well authenticated and within the memory of most living Australians. Some idea of the magnitude of this project may be gained from the fact that it has cost the firm around £1000. The production of the film has engaged the constant .attention of several biograph experts and a large staff of various assistants for months past. The various characters have been enacted by experienced people, all of whom had become thoroughly versed in the history of the famous outlaws and in touch with their parts. Messrs. Tait, who have the exclusive registered copyright of these pictures, have now three of them on tour through the states and New Zealand, and a brisk demand has already manifested itself from English and American film exchanges through advance prospectuses supplied to them."

* 17 February 1907, Truth, Brisbane.

The expression "good enough" is not an invention of late years. According to Messrs. J. and N. Tait's story of the Kelly Gang, Ned Kelly had a great partiality for "good enough." Over all the confusion and noise may be heard Ned's voice crying in the wilderness, "good enough / come on boys." No doubt he declared he had a "bonser time."

* 26 May 1907, Sunday Times, Perth.

The Busker - Grease Paint Patter Burnt Cork Chronicles

Watch for a crop of tea-and-sugar bushrangers after the Kelly-Gang-play and bio have moved on.

Character of Aaron Sherritt in "The Kelly Gang," as depicted by Albert Lucas, stands out as a cameo of artistic merit. Lucas put an excellently large amount of meat into the part and scores hugely as the traitorous German.

Apropos of the present boom in Kelly Gang dramas, it was the present Roman Catholic Bishop who, when plain Father Gibney, broke through the cordon of police at Glenrowan and ventured into the flaming ruins of Jones's hotel. Ned Kelly had by that time escaped and had gone back into the bush for his armour. Dan Kelly, Steve Hart, and Joe Byrne were by that time dead or dying, and, rushing through the blinding smoke and heat, the gallant padre saw the three bodies roasting in the bar where they had fallen. In spite of his cloth, thepolice kept up an intermittent fire, when Father Gibney appeared, carrying the old cripple who had been lying in an outhouse. During the same siege the Vic. Government made a huge mule of itself by actually sendmg a cannon up to blow the Kellys ont of their refuge in the stringybark shanty. Someone with a sense of humor, however, stopped the artillery half-wav up and it was sent back to the St. Kilda barracks disguised as Benalla butter.

No less than-seventeen bio's are filming the exploits of the Kelly Gang around Australia.

Kelly Gang Bio, run by Tait and Co. proves conclusively what might have been done by not spoiling the show for a ha'p'orth of nature. Within 20 miles of Melbourne are replicas of the magnificent forest country wherein the Kellys ranged. Within that radius the bio. camera men could have procured pictures which might have been taken in Glenrowan or Mansfield. Instead' of that the bushranging episodes fairly good in themselves, were arranged and filmed open park country around Heidelburg and Merri Creek. So we get the shooting of Sergeant Kennedy in frowning ranges of the shooting gaalery; gum trees and gullies that are second cousins to the front gardens of suburban villas. In Ned Kelly's Last Stand the best pictures were obtained, the shooting and disarming of the Boss Bushranger being a fine realistic piece of work. Actors engaged in depicting the outlaws were nevertheless dreadful persons of the Howard-Edie type, who with bent knees and melodramatic scowls pranced and posed through the turgid clap-trap in a manner recalling the days when writer and his juvenile mates played backyard editions of Uncle Tom's Cabin in the maternal wood yard.

* 17 July 1907, Referee, Sydney.

Messrs. J. and N. Tait are sending the biograph film of "The Kelly Gang" to England, and it will be shown in London early in September. A biograph representation of Diver Hughes' rescue of the entombed miner, Varischetti, is also being exhibited.

* 30 July 1907, Goulburn Evening Penny Post, Goulburn, New South Wales.

Electric Moving Pictures.

On Monday and Tuesday next at the Oddfellows Hall the Globe series of electric moving pictures will be shown under the direction of Messrs. Johnson and Gibson, represented here by a member of the firm, Mr. Finlay. This firm are said to be the biggest importers and manufacturers of moving pictures and biograph machines in the Commonwealth, and were the producers of most of the big biograph entertainments starting out from Melbourne, such as "Living London," "The Kelly Gang," and many others. Hitherto they have simply leased their films, engines, and machines to others. Now they intend touring the Commonwealth on their own account, and this present trip is the initial one. Messrs. Johnson and Gibson hold direct contracts with the English and continental picture-producing firms for the delivery in Melbourne of the very latest and most sensational films, and all those are projected by a powerful eight-horse power engine and dynamo, with an output of 10,000 candle power.

* 3 August 1907, The Mirror, Perth.

J. and N. Tait have sent their Kelly Gang biograph films to London just to let the English folk see that we can beat their Robin Hood.

* September 1907 - British tour of the film to commence in London.

* 18 September 1907, [Finlay's] Globe Moving Pictures, The Scrutineer and Berrima District Press.

* 30 November 1907, Rutherglen Miner and Howlong and Wahgunyah Times, Victoria.

Biograph Entertainment

Owing to the regulation issued by the Chief Secretary, the promoters were prohibited at the last moment from showing the Kelly Gang pictures.....

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1909

* 18 June 1909, The Ballarat Star. The Kelly Gang to be shown by Messrs Johnson and Gibson at Her Majesty's Theatre.

* 27 July 1909, Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, Queensland. Large 2-page poster with an outline of the life and times of the Kelly gang, along with photographic stills from The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906). Being a report associated with the William Anderson Great Production Company presentation of the play The Kelly Gang.

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1910

* 13 June 1910, The Herald, Melbourne.

....The star picture was the new version of the adventures of the Kelly Gang.

The Story of the Kelly Gang, [1910], Dead on Arrival, YouTube, 12 May 2013, duration: 21.51 minutes. Source: Unknown.

[Comment: This Internet Archive version of the film is in many instances different from the NFSA 2006 restoration which is presented as the 1906 film. It includes a number of the J & G intertitles.]

* 13 June 1910, The Age, Melbourne.

Messrs. Johnson and Gibson's new theatre, Coventry-street, South Melbourne (named by popular vote The Lyceum), was opened on Saturday night before an audience of some 2000 people. The entertainment of moving pictures included a new version of the Kelly Gang story. The performance was well received. The building is a fine, commodious one.

* 31 October 1910, Lithgow Mercury.

A new copy, taken by Messrs. Johnson and Gibson, Melbourne, of that wonderful picture, "The Kelly Gang," and only released Sept. 3rd last, will be shown at the Colosseum on Saturday and Monday next. The film, is beautifully clear, and the length is nearly 3000 feet, taking up one half of the programme.

* 21 November 1910. Poster for The Story of the Kelly Gang. Source: National Museum of Australia, Canberra.

* 27 December 1910, Geelong Advertiser, Geelong, Victoria.

Johnson and Gibson's Pictures.

A special holiday picture show was given at the Mechanics' Hall last evening by Johnson and Gibson. There was a good house. Some good views of naval training in the homeland were shown; a remarkably unique faked picture showing a thief in an electrically guarded house was very diverting and a charming American drama, "Out of the Past," was one of the best shown in Geelong by the firm. A new pictorial version of the doings of the Kelly Gang won general approval. The country setting of the piece is greatly improved, and the characters better represented than in previous films. .... With the exception of the Kelly Gang pictures, all the films will be new.

[Comment: It would seem from this article that the new version of the film, as created and released by Gibson & Johnson, contained different footage and, in some instances, different actors, whilst still being the same basic film.]

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1916

* 9 February 1916, Winner, Melbourne. Extracts.

Picture Profiles in the Olden Days

Random Reminiscences by W. J. Lincoln

OPEN AIR DISPLAY

Local enterprise in film handling may be said to have seriously started shortly after the Boer war, and to Messrs Millard Johnson and W. A. Gibson belongs the credit of being the first to enter upon the task of putting picture showing on a permanent basis. Mr Johnson was at that time a well-known St. Kilda chemist, and, in conjunction with Gibson, imported occasional films from abroad, which were displayed upon a screen fixed above his shop near what is known as the Junction, St. Kilda. These open-air displays were viewed by hundreds of people, and as time went on it was noticed that there were indications of sustained interest on the part of the public in this form of relaxation.

THE FIRST EXCHANGE

With the view of stimulating this interest, Johnson, and Gibson rented an office in the city, and, extending their purchases abroad, set about establishing what was virtually the first Victorian film exchange. Up to this time the chief makers of films had their studios in France and England, the Americans as yet having taken no really important part in the business of picture production. Johnson and Gibson made a feature of equipping suburban and touring showmen with programmes which were displayed in public halls and other buildings rented for the purpose, and in a comparatively short time the exchange would sometimes supply pictures for as many as 60 shows in the one night—Saturday, of course ......

"BEST AND BAKER"

Messrs. J. and N. Tait at this period occasionally joined forces with John son and Gibson, and, under the trade name of Best and Baker, displayed films at the Athenaeum Hall, Melbourne, as well as in other interstate capitals. Best and Baker's Pictures soon became an important part of the year's round of amusements. The wider field of selection afforded by the increasing number of films imported by the principals enabled well-balanced programmes to be presented, with, of course, changes at shorter intervals than had hitherto been possible. The production of films at oversea studios had improved in many important directions, with the inevitable result that public patronage was attracted by the extended range of subjects filmed....

A MONEY-SPINNER

Meanwhile the little exchange established by Messrs Johnson and Gibson was making steady progress. Their clientele was growing, and the enterprising pair were laying a solid foundation for the extensive business which the future held in store. It was not long after the conclusion of the tour of the Russo-Japanese war films that one of those extraordinary happenings which occasionally figure in theatrical practice occurred. By this I mean where a show which gives promise of no more than ordinary payable returns proves a phenomenal money-spinner. An Urban film, known as Living London, and which was merely a collection of scenes taken in and around the world's metropolis was imported by Johnson and Gibson, who decided to send it round the States. This proved to be a big prize, for inside 12 months a net profit of £10,000 was realised. Messrs. J. and N. Tait were also interested in this venture....

BUSINESS METHODS IMPROVED

At this time the proprietors of picture houses on both sides of the river made their own arrangements for the supply of films. J. D. Williams was in touch with leading American exchanges, Mr. West was buying in England, and Johnson and Gibson were importing largely. This led to what might be termed overlapping, and set up a condition of affairs which had nothing to recommend it either to the showmen or the public. It was common to see an important film showing at the same time at two or three city houses, each buyer having received a copy. This really meant that the interests of the public were not well served. One copy was sufficient; the money spent on the other copies could be better devoted to securing other features, and each house could then have a strong drawing card of its own in the weekly programme. The outcome of this unsatisfactory condition of things was the formation of the big film exchange known as Amalgamated Pictures Ltd., and the wasteful methods that had hitherto obtained were dropped. Since that time other important exchanges have materialised, among which may be mentioned the Co-operative Film Exchange, Australian Films Ltd. and Clement Mason Ltd.

"HOME-MADE" FILMS

Up to this stage my remarks have been concerned with the showing of imported films, but a number of locally-made pictures had also been handled by showmen, and of these I have one or two things to say. Local enterprise in the matter of film production dates back a number of years, and was far more extensive than is generally known. For instance, a number of pictures were filmed here for Pathe for showing abroad, and which were never screened in Melbourne. At the outset Messrs Johnson and Gibson encouraged local production in every way, as did also Messrs J. and N. Tait, who, during their occupancy of the Glaciarium, screened probably a score of Melbourne films. The Kelly Gang was one of the first pictures made here. It was directed by Mr Sam Crews, who, by the way, worked without a scenario, and pieced the story together as he went along. Most of the outdoor locations were around Alphington and Heidelberg, and the scene depicting the attempted train wrecking episode was taken on the Outer Circle railway.

VICTORIA PRODUCES FIRST "FEATURE."

An important point arises in connection with this picture, in that through it Victoria can justly claim to have produced the first "feature" film ever made, as up to that period, and for some time after, oversea films of three or more reels were unknown. I do not claim for the Kelly Gang that it could be compared with the beautiful productions which we now see, but to my mind it was a wonderful feat to produce it all. The principal characters were played by the promoters and their relatives, who certainly made no pretensions to nay great histrionic talent. In stead of the 100,000 dollar studio used by the oversea producer of today, these pioneers worked behind a light frame lined with pine, with ordinary common window glass let in for lighting, and a floor of packing case battens. Yet with these poor improvisations, and no experience to guide them, a five-reel photo. play was successfully evolved and subsequently screened at the Athenæum Hall to good houses. Such facts disarm criticism, and whether that film was good, bad, or indifferent, as judged by present-day standards, matters but little. It was an expression of the purely Australian capacity for making good in spite of all obstacles—it was, in a minor degree, the spirit of Anzac. And this spirit is, I think, yet going to bring Australia into her rightful place as a producer of films which will one day set a standard for all the world to follow.

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1920

* William A. Gibson, [The Story of the Kelly Gang], Theatre Magazine, 1 June 1920. [Bertrand and Routt 2007]

Mr. Johnson and I claim to have made the first long picture in the world - "The Kelly Gang". Up to the time we did this, there hadn't been screened in Australia, nor had there anywhere been made, a picture over 3,000 feet in length. When we set out to make "The Kelly Gang," I found as I went on taking it (which I did myself) that it would run into about 6,000 ft. Everybody told me I was mad - that nobody would sit it out. I was really beginning to feel that they were right. When finished, the picture was shown at the Athenaeum Hall (Melbourne), and despite all my friends had said the people did see it through. So very much was this the case that "The Kelly Gang" has to be credited with making more money in Australia than any other film - Australian-made or imported. One of the original copies of the picture was shown in Melbourne last week. As I induced Mr. Southwell to make "The Kelly Gang" he is now showing I thought it only fair that I should stop the exhibition of the copies over which I had control. Hence my action with regard to the one that was recently being exhibited in Melbourne.

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1923

* 7 February 1923, Everyone's, Melbourne.

The Father of the Australian Moving Picture Industry

THE story of Mr. W. A. Gibson, general manager of Australasian Films, and one of the directors of Union Theatres, is made interesting because of the position he holds in the 'history of the Australian motion picture industry. It may truly be said of him that he is the “father” of pictures in this country, and that claim is substantiated by his record, which is one of hard work and endless endeavour from the time that the first “flicker” was screened in Australia to the present day. The industry, in common with every other organisation which has grown from infancy to maturity in a comparatively short number of years, has many claimants for the honour of being the earlier pioneer, but Mr. Gibson’s career in the days of experiments marks him as the man with the undeniable right to say that he truly fathered the business. Born in England, he migrated to Australia when a young man, and has been associated with pictures from their very inception. In the year 1906 the world was witnessing the rapid advancement of cinematography and the achievement of the man who made 3000 feet features Was considered a triumph. In America and elsewhere pictures of this size were constructed, and shown as the acme of a decade’s work. But while other countries were enthusing over this class of picture, Mr. Gibson was making pictures, in this country, seven reels in length. Of these perhaps the most popular and best known is “The Kelly Gang,” and others are “The Mystery of the Hansom Cab” and the “Squatter’s Daughter.” The former was responsible for the initial introduction into the business of many men who have since grown to big and responsible positions in the organisation that has superseded the old order of things. Amongst these men figure E. J. Carroll, Jimmy and Charley McMahon, the Taits, and others. The “Kelly Gang” was shown at the Athenaeum Hall, Collins St., Melbourne, for four weeks, and was a great success. The'most novel part of the whole story, however, is the method in which the picture was filmed. Mr. Gibson photographed, directed, developed and finally projected the picture, such a record remaining unequalled even to this day. The popularity of this style of picture was then at its zenith, owing to the big importation of cowboy films from the United States, and the open expanses of Australia lent itself to this class of story. “A Squatter’s Daughter,” based on somewhat similar lines, as far as the locations were concerned, and a story teeming with heart interest of special appeal to Australians, had a most successful run. At Bondi Junction, on the spot now occupied by Olympia No. 2 theatre, the open-air show was crowded to such an extent that people were seated around the top of the barriers, and in every conceivable spot from where they could get even a glance at the picture.

W. A. Gibson, O.B.E.

After a series of film subjects, including ‘‘Robbery Under Arms,” and ‘‘The Bells,” Mr. Gibson left producing in order to handle the Kinema-Colour pictures which were then new to this country. These were a gigantic success, and, in the year 1910, caused quite a stir amongst professional men and public alike. It was remarkable, however, that the people responsible for this innovation did not extend their activities beyond the scope of out-door subjects. Had they devoted some time to the filming of drama, there is no doubt that they would have made history in a greater degree than they did. For two or three years Mr. Gibson gave considerable attention to exploitation of Kinema Colour pictures, but, in the meantime, the firm of Johnson and Gibson had grown to such magnitude that it was found necessary to form a company, and out of the negotiations evolved Amalgamated Pictures Ltd. They built the Majestic Theatre, Flinders Street, Melbourne, and the first Victorian suburban show at Elsternwick, which they called Elsternwick Theatre. They also controlled the Glaciarium, Melbourne, which was a spacious structure, and found very convenient to hold the big crowds that surged in to witness the growing entertainment. In those days it was necessary for theatre organisations to have travelling shows, and Amalgamated Pictures Ltd, had its share of movable theatres. At this time West’s and Spencer’s realised the possibilities that lay in the direction of amalgamation, and consequent negotiations resulted in these two firms, together with Amalgamated Pictures and J. D. Williams, forming one concern known as Union Theatres Ltd. On the film side, certain interests in conjunction with Harringtons Ltd. formed Australasian Films, an organisation for the handling of pictures from all sources. Speaking of the future, Mr. Gibson said: “I believe in moving with the times, for that is a necessary adjunct in the film business. Things move rapidly in that sphere. It was within recent years that A.B. Films, Edison, Kalem, Selig and Triangle were the general favorites and to-day not one survives. ‘‘Our policy is to secure, for the theatre patron, the very best that the independent markets of the world have to offer. Included amongst recent special purchases are ‘Theodora,’ an Italian film; ‘Missing Husbands,’ a French picture; and ‘The Bohemian Girl,’ which comes from England; and ‘Lorna Doone’ from America. These, and other special productions, will, of course, be released by us in addition to our regular 104 Master features during the year. Our organisation for the distribution of these goods is extensive and far-reaching. We have offices in every State of the Commonwealth, in New Zealand, and in the Far East, including Java, Dutch East India, China, Japan and India. It is to visit these outlying posts that I am departing on the 13th inst., and will be away some months.” Asked about the future of the industry, Mr, Gibson ventured the suggestion that the war was primarily responsible for a back, and if it could have been avoided, or at the most delayed, we would now be witnessing those things that to-day only prophets talk about. “I believe,” said Mr. Gibson, ‘‘that in the very near future the pictures will be in natural colors, and with the improvements to natural voice reproduction machines, people outback will be "able to see and hear the concerts, grand opera or recitals exactly as they take place in the largest cities of world. That, to my mind, is the next step that men of science are striving for. At any rate, the chief point is to strive to better the industry generally, and the obvious duty of those men who are able is to encourage and help all they know the men who are seeking to advance what is undoubtedly one of the greatest industries of the world.”

* 1923 - Millard Johnson, Early Days in Australia, Film Daily Yearbook 1922-23, New York.

A few particulars regarding the early introduction of long feature pictures in Australia by Millard Johnson, American representative of Australasian Films, Ltd. In 1900 the present King and Queen of England came to Australia and about 10,000 feet of negative was taken for the Australian Government by Mr. J. Perry, depicting the ceremonies, processions, etc., when Australia became a nation. I bought about 4,000 feet and made a feature of over 3,500 feet long and toured Victoria and Tasmania with this, supplemented by other short subjects, but lost money. This is the first record of a long feature. In 1903 [1904] Charles Urban made a four-reel feature called Living London without any titles. Mr. W. A. Gibson and myself, in conjunction with the Taits, exploited this through Australia and India [during 1906] and did enormous business. So much so that in 1904 [1906] Taits asked us to make another and we produced in 1905 [1906] The Kelly Gang, a 5 reel feature life story, the first ever made and even now no picture has reached the great financial success of this in Australia. Every six months we made another of these, including Robbery Under Arms, Mystery of the Handsome Cab, Called Back. The Bells and others. Each of these were over six reels long and represented a whole night's entertainment. These cost about [US]$2,500 [Aus£540] to make and we shot 7,000 feet of negative and showed 6,500 feet of positive. I am therefore justly entitled to be ranked amongst the very earliest in the world who introduced and saw the great possibility of the long six reel feature. For "The Bells" Mr. Gibson and myself engaged Arthur Steyn, Melbourne's leading actor, and hired all the stage scenery from Williamsons for our production. Mr. Spencer produced about 1908 "Sweet Nell of Old Drury," paying Miss Nellie Stewart about $5,000 to act her leading stage role, which was considered an enormous salary in those days. When I arrived in America in 1913, long pictures were absolutely unknown, no orchestras of 24 and 30, but these were very common in Australian picture shows, and pictures of 30 to 35 feet diameter were the usual size there. I personally contracted with Adolph Zukor for his first year productions at their earliest commencement, but my firm had previously bought in London Bernhardt's "Queen Elizabeth" before it was shown in America. The Nordisk Biograph with Asta Neilson made the best 5 reel features in the earliest times prior to 1912.

* The Armidale Chronicle, 26 May 1923. This is an account by Normal Campbell of the filming, from the perspective of one of the major actors involved. It is the first detailed first-hand account of the filming process. An expanded 1925 version is reproduced here.

Outlawed. Bushranger's Confession. Career of Crime.

(By Norman Campbell, in the "Sun").

So many years have passed since I embarked on a mad career of crime that my confession cannot injure anyone now. At least, I hope not. Ah, those wild, lawless days of long ago! I was led into it. Like Peter Doody, I sighed for a short life and a gay one, and I got it at last as a bushranger on wages, with a price on my head. Mark Twain has left it on record that from innocent childhood to manhood's prime, he always yearned to be a pirate. Similarly, from the time when in the lower fourth I played at "Kellys," I had longed to be a bushranger.

My chance come in Melbourne, when a chap knew I could ride, and so my friend introduced me to the heads of a cinematograph firm. The producer explained that he wanted riders who were sufficiently villainous-looking to personate bushrangers, and he was kind enough to add that I was the exact type required. So, having agreed to the modest salary he proposed, I was duly sworn in as one of "The Kelly Gang." I was to be Steve Hart, but in the end I was also (1) a policeman at Jerilderie, Euroa, and, Glenrowan; (2) Aaron Sherritt, an informer; (3) a hawker, and several others, whose operations, if any, I have forgotten. In those days a cinema actor, like a Prime Minister, was expected to hold more than one portfolio simultaneously.

Our lawless gang journeyed by train to a little country town where wild, rugged scenery was easily accessible, and we proceeded at once to business. We all stayed at the local pub, kept by a more experienced bushranger, I remember, and there we made-up and dressed. I recall with a flush of pride the sensation we made as, mounted on excellent horses, we first clattered through the one street of the little place. We of the gang were top-booted, red shirted, and slouch hatted within an inch or our lives, and we were armed to the chin with lethal ironmongery. We were accompanied by a posse — isn't that the word? — of mounted cinema constables, with the camera man - the perdoocer - following in a spring-cart.

That day every school kid in the district, male and female, wagged it; and they never returned to their studies till we left the town a week later; another damping instance of the demoralising influence of "the pictures" on the minds of the young. Those youngsters used to trail over miles of rough mountain country every day, in order to see the fun, and be in at the death of a policeman or two.

Our first exploit was the sticking up of the police camp at Stringy Bark Creek, in the Wombat Ranges, and the murdering of the troopers. You remember the dear old song of other years —

They'd grub and ammunition for to last them many a week. So two of them set out next morning, leaving Maclntyre behind, all to explore the creek.

And again —

'Twas shortly alter breakfast, Mac thought he heard a noise. So, gun in hand, he sallied out to ascertain the cause.

And so on, through 20 verses or so. Well, we did all that, and more. A tent was pitched, a fire lit, and after a few rough and ready rehearsals we committed our first murders, with the camera on us, to the satisfaction of the exacting perdoocers. Their greatest embarrassment was due to the unfortunate fact that Ned Kelly was an indifferent horseman. He said he loved horses, and certainly when we fired our revolvers and his neddy promptly stood on his hind legs, Ned clasped the animal very lovingly round the neck: but when we shot our first policeman Ned's steed emptied his redoubtable rider into a clump of bracken, spoiling several yards of film, besides damaging Ned's beautiful new whiskers.

We lunched at the pub afterwards in all our warpaint, and rode off on another lawless enterprise in the afternoon, followed by our faithful retinue of school kids. We did some amusing things. By permission of the commissioners, we tore up the railway line, previously loosened by an obliging ganger, and we stuck-up a "really truly" train, to the intense joy of our juvenile audience. Dan Kelly, after many ineffectual attempts, managed to scramble up a property telegraph pole and chop down the wires and insulators with an axe. Once we fearlessly attacked the local bank, and then burned a heap of property, books, and papers in the bank manager's garden. On that occasion Joe Byrne got a smack in the face from the banker's pretty house maid because of his too gallant attentions. (She wasn't afraid of bushrangers!) One day Ned Kelly and I stuck up the police station and interned the Jerilderie Johns in their own lockup.

My own great achievement was the slaying of myself by myself, and then successfully eluding the police pursuit, in which, as a mounted constable, I enthusiastically joined. It was this way: As Steve Hart, I came around the corner of Aaron Sherritt's house, and lured that miserable wretch to open the door, when I shot him, and escaped. It seems a difficult feat to be both homicide and victim, but the interior scenes, which only concern the victim, were taken in Melbourne more than a week later.

We had a great time when we attacked the Glenrowan Hotel. We were all troopers that day, Ned Kelly included. A wooden shanty, standing back from the main road, was commandeered, and conspicuously labelled "The Glen Rowan Hotel," while straw and rubbish were burned inside to make a smoke, as the place was supposed to be on fire. We sprawled on the ground at 50 yards range, and blazed away with our Enfields. Just as we were getting busy, a solitary horseman came down the road. He paused irresolutely at the unusual sight of a platoon of armed police lying on their stomachs in the public highway. Presently we fired a deaftening volley, and the stranger waited for no more. He turned tail and galloped off in a cloud of dust. Perhaps he was a real bushranger. We had some mad gallops over the countryside, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Our last exploit was the capture of Ned. He was cooped up and encased in the actual armor worn by the original outlaw (there are more than half a dozen genuine suits of Ned Kelly's armour in existence, I believe), and everybody else was a policeman or a railway guard. Ned put up a great fight, with a revolver in each hand, and a frill of them around his equator: but he was at last overborne by numbers. About half a hundredweight of good gunpowder was exploded, but the only casualty was the perdooser, who had a neat disc cut out of his riding breeches by an ill-directed wad of candle grease. All the interior scenes we did later on in an open-air studio in Melbourne (making movies is full of paradoxes), but our adventures there were very tame in comparison with the bush stunts.

The oddest thing of all was to see ourselves acting. The tryout of the picture took place at a movie establishment at Footscray. We — the gang — dead-headed in the reserved seats. It was a very thrilling, bloodthirsty, picture, and Footcscray loved it; but after it was over I swore a great oath that never again would I act in front of a camera. I have kept that vow, and consequently have only been a film star once. There is another sufficient reason for my continued retirement from the screen. Having seen my only effort in the "Kelly Gang" picture no producer is now optimistic enough to offer me another job as a picture actor; and so Doug and Wallace, and all the Clarences and Wilburs and Harolds, and the lulu peaches of Los Angeles have it on their own.

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1925

* Punch, Melbourne, 10 December 1925. A more fulsome account by Norman Campbell of the making of the movie from the actor's perspective. Reproduced here.

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1926

* 27 August 1926, The Herald, Melbourne. Making and Showing Films - Mr. W. A. Gibson Announces Plans. [NB: There is no significant reference to the Kelly films in this article.]

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1927

* 6 January 1927, Table Talk, Melbourne.

Prominent Personalities

A PIONEER OF MOTION PICTURES - W. A. GIBSON

Written bv C. R. Bradish. Illustrated by L. F. REYNOLDS

Some twenty or more years ago fate did a handspring and landed in the middle of a modest little chemist shop at the St. Kilda Junction. To the somewhat surprised proprietors, Messrs Gibson and and Johnson, there was nothing particularly exciting about the visitor disguised as an Englishman, and to the pill-makers there was something substantially English in the name of Stevenson. They had, of course, heard of Robert Louis Stevenson, but to them the newcomer had none of the big novelist's characteristics. They didn't look close enough. If they had, they would have discovered that the stranger shared one magnificent quality with the writer. He had a romantic imagination and to prove it, produced a queer machine which when set in motion gave an amazing illusion of movement to certain little figures projected on a screen. That was the first motion picture machine to reach Australia. It was known as a Lumiere, and is now an historic curiosity. Compared with the present-day recorder of plot and stratagem, it would feel like a javelin beside a Big Bertha. Its limitations may be judged by the fact that it could only carry fifty feet of film — a length insufficient nowadays to record a full-grown smile by Harold Lloyd. But Stevenson believed in it. It was a novelty, even if it recalled the toyshop, and he hoped to interest Melbourne in its possibilities. But the public was not attracted. The number that stayed away from this demonstrations suggested that the Melbourne Cup was a current nocturnal competitor. All this time Stevenson had been going to W. A. Gibson for the necessary oxygen to light his lantern. He got all the gas he wanted, but his in return was far more exhilarating to Gibson. Hereabouts Mr Gibson should be depicted in a pensive attitude, meditating on a future, two decade's away — a future of glittering electric, sign-lit foregrounds, full of picture palaces, and melodious spruikers. The subject would make a very pretty film and the study of the great man with his visions pictorialised as they left his brain would lack nothing, except veracity. To end a promising want of populace around his pay boxes, he thought of nothing more than exhibiting the machine as other showman have exhibited the Montenegrin Twins or Alphonsine, the Bat-faced Girl. Frankly, he wanted to get back his original outlay, £40 and a mature in his conclusions regarding popular indifference. Gibson put up a screen on the St. Kilda Beach, and there asked the hoi polloi to behold the fascination of Miss Fuller in actual movement. Only an invitation to free counter lunch in Bourke Street could have yielded a larger response, and so Gibson realised that there was possibly more money in the scheme than he had originally considered possible. Having craftily advertised the film with gratis displays, he settled on the device of enclosing a section of the beach, naming it Paradise, and charging for admission. The result was so satisfactory that he send his partner, Millard Johnson, to buy up all the films and machines that he could, and send them out in the quickest possible way. This was an example of Gibson's judgement, new ripening rapidly under the stimulation of a new idea, and destined almost to confound himself on many occasions in after life. With the acquirement of new films and improved machines, the young firm of Gibson and Johnson set about hiring suburban halls, and became the pioneers in the movie enterprise. About this period another equally young firm, J. and N. Tait, seeking advancement and profit in modest, unlimelit way, became also enamored of the pictures, and bought the Australian rights of "Living London," then a marvel to those who had seen the shivery ghost of Lois Fuller. Gibson and Johnson joined in with the Taits for the tour of Australia and New Zealand by "Living London," and thus was born a partnership that was later to blossom into Amalgamated Pictures Ltd. Just after "Living London" had finished putting cash in the several money-boxes, Gibson had his great idea of filming the story of "The Kelly Gang." The difficulties were considerable, but Gibson set about the enterprise with his customary zeal. There was — and still is — much secret sympathy with the Kellys, who have been freely remodelled in the shape of angels by numerous moron imaginations; wherefore Gibson and the Taits were sure of strong support could they produce a film that would give a certain amount of romantic flavor to the bandits without reviving old enmities or lowering public respect for the police. Judged by present day standards, the subsequent film was a sad affair, but it put Gibson, Johnson and the Taits on their financial feet. We have no room to detail the lucrative Hollywood processes that turned William Alfred Gibson into a magnate, and furnished him with a commanding position in the movie industry in Australia. He rose, as they all have risen who went into the business early, and he would be the last to regret that there was anything reprehensible in selling his birthright:— a drug store training — for forty pieces of gold. Today he is a rich man, counting it another million, as sundry rich men do, to be numbered among the O.B.E.'s. He is a little white at the temples, a little precise as to speech, and the dignity of a magnifico has settled upon him, to invest his native simplicity with just a wee touch of egotism. But he is a good fellow, and when he stands up in his grave and kingly office apartment assuring one that the films have a great educational future, that they are noble and uplifting, and so forth and so on, who would deny him the pleasure of the moment? Certainly not I, though I am no movie fun, and, indeed, habitually dodge such entertainments for fear that Mr Gibson's conclusions may be true.

* 4 September 1927, The Sun, Sydney; 6 December 1927, The Riverina Herald, Moama.

In Movieland - Echo From Past.

Where "The Kelly Gang" Stood.

Twenty-one years ago Australia produced the world's first 5-reel photoplay. Based on the exploits of the Kelly Gang, the picture cost £400 and earned thousands. A few scratched feel of it are in existence still, a few feet that jerk unwillingly through a projection machine, filling the screen with ridiculous and romantic ghosts of yesterday.

BUILDING BIG.

The picture was produced by Mr. W. A. Gibson, O.B.E. Mr. Gibson lived in St. Kilda, Melbourne, and the quarter acre behind his home served as a studio. Sensational things occurred there. Just near the wash house the Glenrowan Hotel was burned down, a mighty conflagration that turned out the fire brigade. Men with axes and hoses dashed in. Movies were new to them. They had no idea that one burst of water would wipe out the costliest scene in the picture and send Australia's infant industry down a drain. That catastrophe was averted. All that is left of "The Kelly Gang" was seen recently in the projection room of Australia's most modern studio, where "For the Term of His Natural Life" and the new spectacular dramatic achievement "The Adorable Outcasts" were brought into being. 'The walls of the Glenrowan Hotel shook in the wind until old-time beer advertisements nearly fell from their hooks; slain troopers carefully shaded their eyes from the sun after death; Ned Kelly's whiskers — or were they Steve Hart's? — flowed so freely in the breeze that once they came unstuck; and not one of the players could be remembered by name. For its day, "The Kelly Gang" was a masterpiece. Seen twenty-one years afterwards, its claim to recognition is that it founded the fortunes of several Australian theatrical amd film magpates. Screen history here, teeming with coincidences, and none more surprising than the cycle of events which "The Kelly Gang" started and which will culminate next year when Sydney becomes the world's first Cinema City. After the picture had been made, no Sydney theater was available for the presentation. Mr. Gibson eventually secured a vacant area in the Haymarket, fenced it in, built bleaches seats that would hold 3,000, and showed the film in the open air. Crowds! Dazzling prospects of a long season. On opening night 3,000 paid more than £100 for their seats. But next morning it commenced to rain. By Monday the stall-benches were adrift. By Friday lead line soundings were taken, and for eight more weeks the deluge washes patrons, prospects and profit away. That area was actually the first "theatre" built specifically for pictures. The site's hoardings were torn down to make room for shops and offices, and by a unique chain of circumstances these are now being demolished to give way to the Capitol Theatre, a new great movie palace which will introduce atmospheric marvels to Australia.

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1928

* 9 June 1928, The Australasian, Melbourne.

MOVING PICTURES.

Early Australian Films.

On this page is a picture showing a scene in an early film story of the Kelly gang. Several films were made with this title by Mr. W. A. Gibson, now of Australasian Films Ltd., and others, and it is not certain whether the picture comes from the first of these, which was made more than 20 years ago, or from a later version. Dr. Brooke Nicholls, whose photographs and articles are well known lo readers of "The Australasian," recounts interesting reminiscences of the early days of moving picture production in Australia. One of the first Australian films showed the visit of the Duke and Duchess of York (now the King and Queen) to Melbourne in 1901. This was taken by Mr. Perry, of the Salvation Army, who later retired from the Army, joined Amalgamated Pictures Ltd., and assisted in the production of "Called Back" and "The Mystery of a Hansom Cab." Before this he had made the first of the Kelly gang films. Mr. H. Hearult, who was afterwards killed on active service, made 10 propaganda films for the Commonwealth Government in the early years of the century. Mr. Hearult belonged to the Melbourne branch of Pathe Freres, a firm which has made films in many parts of the world. It was for Pathe Freres that Mr. Maurice Bertel in 1900 made 13 short "dramas," each 1,000ft. in length. They were shown by Cole's Dramatic Company. These "one-reelers" included "The Cowboy's Romance," "Buffalo Bill," and others. Those were the days. Mr. Bertel, who was the pioneer of film laboratory technique in Australia, later produced for the Lincoln Cass Company moving pictures with the following hearty titles:- "The Sick Stock Rider," "The Remittance Man," "The Corsair," "The Road to Ruin," "Moondyne." Mr. Bertel, says Dr. Brooke Nicholls, taught Captain Frank Hurley, Messrs. Cross, Siegenberg, Jackson, and Dr. Brooke Nicholls how to use a motion picture camera....

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1929

* 7 October 1929, The Herald, Melbourne; 10 October 1929, News, Adelaide.

Making Movies

The First "Kelly Gang" Picture

Completed in Six Days

The late W. A. Gibson [who died in Melbourne this week] was the pioneer of moving pictures as an entertainment in Australia. Harry Rickhards had shown a few flickering scenes as an item of interest in his vaudeville show at the Opera House in Bourke Street, the uncovered projecting lanterns being operated from the front row of the dress circle, and Mr Gibson became interested. Down at the St. Kilda Junction Messrs Johnson and Gibson conducted a chemists shop, and there the first experiments in local movies were made, but neither of the partners had any notion that there was any commercial value in the new photography. Their interest was scientific. But gradually the idea of a new field of entertainment took shape. Johnson and Gibson began to give exhibitions and these proved popular. They trained operators, and soon they had a staff of 35 who were hired out with their machines.

Crude Apparatus

Gibson himself would operate at two shows on a Saturday night, one at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and one at the Temperance Hall. The risks run with the crude apparatus and the exposed celluloid films was enormous, but nobody suspected that there was any danger. From these early beginnings Gibson was encouraged to produce an Australian photoplay - a whole evening's entertainment of a 5-reel motion picture. He engaged a company of actors who went out to Mitcham where the various scenes of "The Kelly Gang" were shot. There was the murder of the police at Stringy Bark Creek, the murder of Aaron Sherritt — at a Mitcham cottage — the local bank was stuck up and some account books burnt in the garden, the Commissioner of Police allowed the Mitcham lock-up to be used as the scene of another of the Kelly's exploits, the telegraph wires were cut, and a railway line was torn up and a train was stopped — by permission of the railway authorities.

Fast Work

Then a cottage standing back from the White Horse Road was selected as the "Glenrowan Inn." A suitable sign was erected over the verandah and the police, comprising every man in the company — including Ned Kelly himself, in police uniform and with his beard discarded - attacked the inn. Ned Kelly's capture was also staged. All these exciting incidents, which completely thrilled the residents of Mitcham, occupied six days only. The necessary interior scenes were filmed in one day in the back-yard of Johnson and Gibson's chemist's shop at St. Kilda. The resultant picture was a crude production, but it was tremendously successful as an attraction and was shown all over Australia and New Zealand. It had its first try-out at the Royal Hall, Footscray. N.C.

* 7 October 1929, The Sun News Pictorial, Melbourne.

FIRST MOVIES IN 1896

Late Mr. W. A. Gibson Made One Here

ON KELLY GANG

Early in 1896, at the old Opera House - now the Tivoli Theatre - a Melbourne audience saw life-like figures move across a white screen for the first time. It was a representation of traffic on London Bridge, and, incidentally, the introduction of moving pictures to Melbourne, the date of which was asked by a correspondent to the Fifty-Fifty column of The Sun News-Pictorial yesterday. On the same program was a short film of traffic outside the Bank of England, both pictures being part of the act of Carl Hertz who was billed as a magician. Each film was about 50 feet long, and took a little more than five minutes to screen. They were projected from a weird combination of the magic lantern and early type of cinematograph machine, fed with gas light, and, even at this stage, capable of diffusing one scene into another at the end of a reel.

How Mr. Gibson Started

About the same time, a young Englishman, Stephenson, approached the late Mr. W. A. Gibson, who, at the time of his death yesterday, was managing director of Union Theatres, but who was then in business as a chemist at St. Kilda, for oxygen to light the lantern of a moving picture machine he had brought to Melbourne. It was the Lumiere, now an historic curiosity. Mr. Gibson bought the machine for £40, and, intent on regaining his outlay, tried out an impression of Lois Fuller, the dancer, on a bed sheet rigged on the roof of his shop. Later a site on the beach, where St. Kilda Yacht Club now stands, was occupied. Wondering crowds gathered to see the overseas dancer in action, although she had never visited Australia.

First Australian Film

After a few years Mr. Gibson, in conjunction with J. and N. Tait, filmed the story of the Kelly gang for the screen, 6,000 feet of which was developed in Mr. Gibson’s bathroom. It was the first movie made in Australia, and although its producers were unaware of the fact, the first 6,000 ft. film produced in the world.

* 8 October 1929, Evening News. [Comment: The article uses an interview with William A. Gibson, apparently taken from a previous 1927 interview published in the trade magazine Everyone's.]

When Australia Made 'The Kelly Gang' — World's First 5 -Reel Feature — £1 a day for Ned Kelly — Film Pioneer Passes.

By Gayne Dexter

Twenty two years ago a man drew £400 from his savings in a Melbourne bank and produced not only the first Australian screen drama, but the first, full-length feature the world has known. "The Kelly Gang" ran to the astounding length of 6,000 feet. It made a fortune for William A. Gibson, OBE, whose death on Sunday removed one of the most picturesque characters in motion pictures, and the man who founded the film business In Australia. On my desk lies a small spool of film clipped from the original "Kelly Gang." I ran it through a projection machine yesterday as a requiem to Mr. Gibson, who started so many motion picture theatre owners on the road to prosperity. The scenery swayed in the breeze; a bush ranger clutched wildly at his beard, after being shot dead, to prevent it falling off; the drama turned to burlesque after 22 years; and yet these crudities represented the birth of the spectacular motion pictures we know to-day.

ACTORS REAL "BUSHRANGERS"

The £400 Mr. Gibson drew from his bank was a lot of money to gamble in films then. The industry, or what there was of it, laughed at his project. Nothing seemed more absurd than to film the exploits of "The Kelly Gang," not as a super-feature in one reel, taking 20 minutes to show, but as a five-reeler - a whole evening's entertainment. Having no studio, Mr. Gibson built his sets in a paddock outside Melbourne, and left them standing at the end of each day. Sometimes rain soddened them or wind flattened them overnight, and in the morning he had to put them up again. His players were recruited from Cole's Dramatic Company at £1 per day. Asking that salary 22 years ago was bushranging indeed! "While they were good actors," Mr. Gibson used to relate, "when it came to horsemanship they were rather partial to merry-go-rounds. They commandeered chairs to mount their steeds, and in the middle of an exciting chase I remember my Ned Kelly galloping past the camera, yelling: "What do I do when I want to make my horse stop?"

EARLY DAY REALISM

Nominally, the job of property master, wardrobe-man and scenic artist fell to Sammie Cruse; and there was nothing he would not try to do. When the Glenrowan Hotel had to be burned down (the mighty conflagration took place in a back yard) Sammie volunteered to light smoke-bombs in the building. The camera cranked; the priest made heroic attempts at rescue, according to the scenario; but the man who needed rescuing was forgotten. Right at the thrilling point of the blaze, however, Sammy staggered out and fell unconscious - suffocated by his own smoke bombs. Next to that, the most realistic piece of acting in "The Kelly Gang" was put up by a band of roughs who were engaged for a drinking scene in the Glenrowan bar. Their technique in pouring down pints was perfect. At this point one of the actors pushed in, but by mistake knocked a bucket of water over Sammie. Sammie objected, and the rest was chaos. The toughs joined in. A wonderful fight! Gun-play - plenty of it! In the thrill of the moment they pulled their revolvers and fired point-blank, then gasped at one another when a man who was fairly riddled, failed to fall. Their sense of decency was outraged when they remembered that their cartridges were blanks.

SUBMARINE SENSATIONS

Those were the days when news made movies. An event which stirred the country, or the little human episodes which crept almost unnoticed into print, could be converted into motion pictures. Australia thrilled then to stories of Diver Hughes, who descended a flooded shaft to a West Australian mine with food for a trapped miner. Its pictorial aftermath was a 500ft. special in which the episode was reproduced. Mr. Gibson erected a tarpaulin tank and hired diving apparatus to show the frantic miner in a cavern being rescued by the diver at the last moment. An actor named George Coates played the diver, and he was kept at the bottom of the tank by heavy weights attached to his legs. Frank Marden, who until recently was studio manager for Australasian Films Ltd, took charge of the air-pump and commenced to turn. His impression was that a man under water needed all the atmosphere which could be forced through a pipe. Mr. Gibson cranked the camera. Then, with a tremendous splash, a huge balloon shot to the surface. It contained the gallant rescuer with his suit so inflated that hundredweights of lead could not keep him under water!

SNAKE-CHARMER STARS

A humorous incident in the Melbourne news prompted another picture. A deliriously drunken snake-charmer had been arrested, and when the station sergeant ordered him to open his bag he protested: "Berrer not—ish fuller shnakes!" The officer winked knowingly, unlocked the bag - and bolted, leaving the charmer and his reptiles in command of the station. That was good for a screen comedy, and Mr. Gibson signed up the snake man. He arrived at the studio with 100 venomous examples, but when shooting finished they all escaped. Down they wriggled beneath the floor. "Get them back - do something," Mr. Gibson ordered. "Sorright," said the snake-man. "I won't charge you for them. I can easy catch some more." He walked off, but for months there was no peace around the studio. Tender love-scenes of later pictures always finished in hysterics for the heroine when a snake or two wriggled on to the set.

WHEN THE TAITS ACTED

If "The Kelly Gang" made history in the production field, it created box-office history, too. Melbourne scrambled to see it; but in Sydney no theatre was available. Eventually a location was leased in the vicinity of the Haymarket, where the Capitol now stands. "The Kelly Gang" opened there one Saturday night to about 3,000 people in the open air. With such a start, no one can blame the sponsors for believing their fortunes were made; then on Sunday morning it commenced to rain and never stopped for nine weeks. It is generally believed that E. J. Tait and his brothers - the powerful Taits of J. C. Williamson. Ltd. - acted in "The Kelly Gang." This is not so, but the picture opened their eyes to the possibilities of local production, and they became associated with Mr. Gibson in a later cycle, which included "The Luck of the Roaring Camp" - yes, an American western picture made in Australia

E. J. CARROLL AND THE FULLERS

E. J. Carroll, who had never thought of pictures before, travelled from Brisbane to Melbourne to convince himself that the stories he heard of "The Kelly Gang's" success were true. He saw crowds waiting to get in at all hours. He bought the Queensland rights, and went on to become a power in the Australian entertainment world. Without knowing it, Sir Ben and John Fuller paid the entire cost of these later pictures. They were operating in New Zealand. A print of each film was sent to them without any price stipulating the producers were willing to take whatever the Fullers' thought the Dominion rights were worth. And the Fullers paid from £350 to £450 for each picture, which was actually more than the productions cost.

£70,000 FOR TWO PICTURES

Three years ago, as a managing director of Union Theatres, Mr. Gibson decided that another attempt should be made to establish Australian production. He authorised the expenditure of between £40,000 and £50,000 on "For the Term of His Natural Life," and although heading the great circuit of picture theatres throughout the Commonwealth, he appeared as a warder in one of the scenes and drew his £1 for one day work as an extra. Later, he spent another £30,000 to make "The Adorable Outcast," determined that Australia should gain a place in the world-market; but while these two pictures have recouped their cost from the Commonwealth and New Zealand, possibly the biggest disappointment of his life was that they were not successful.

* 20 October 1929, Sunday Times, Perth.

W. A. Gibson Dead

Union Theatres' Leader Passes

The death occurred in a Melbourne private hospital, a short time ago, of William Alfred Gibson, O.B.E., managing director of Union Theatres Ltd. Mr Gibson's entry into motion pictures took place 25 years ago, and was a chance introduction. Gibson was partner in a chemist and pharmacy business and one day an Englishman called in on him to purchase some material for a projector. Gibson became Interested and soon bought the machine for a modest £40. With this apparatus Gibson entertained his friends with pictures on the roof at night time, but curious crowds in the streets soon made the further performances impossible. Turning over pharmacy. Gibson took on an agency for cinematograph supplies and with the services of trained operators the business grew rapidly. From open air to tin sheds, to the huge cinema halls of to-day marks the change and growth of the firm industry. Mr. Gibson's part In pioneering Australian production began with making "The Kelly Gang," considered the first five-reel feature the world had known. It cost £400 and earned a fortune. Twenty years ago, that vast sum to be spent on motion pictures was thought sheer waste, but just as successful a gamble as the £40,000 spent on "The Term," in 1927.

* 24 October 1929, Western Mail, Perth.

The News Reel.

Death of Mr. W. A. Gibson.

The death has occurred in Melbourne of Mr. W. A. Gibson, who had been a leader among moving picture exhibitors and distributors in Australia since the establishment of the industry more than 20 years ago. In the early days Mr. Gibson organised primitive picture shows in the open air and was his own projectionist, but the organisation with which he was associated grew rapidly as the moving picture increased in popularity. The building of the Majestic Theatre, Melbourne, adjoining which Mr. Gibson had his offices until his death, was a great achievement in its time as great an achievement, perhaps, as the building last year by Union Theatres, Ltd., of the State Theatre and the engagement of leading legitimate theatres for conversion into talkie houses. In later years the exhibiting side of the group of companies in which Mr. Gibson had a large interest was controlled by Union Theatres, Ltd., and the distributing business was conducted by Australasian Films, Ltd., which also has done notable work in the production of films in Australia. Many, many years ago Mr. Gibson, in conjunction with J. and N. Tait, filmed the story of the Kelly gang for the screen, 6,000 feet of which was developed in Mr. Gibsons bathroom. It was the first movie made in Australia, and although its producers were unaware of the fact, the first 6,000ft. film produced in the world. Mr. Gibson had great faith in Australian productions, and as chairman of Australasian Films, spent more than £200,000 on "The Adorable Outcast" and "For the Term of His Natural Life."

* 15 November 1929, The Daily News, Perth.

GIBSON'S KELLY GANG

Early Australian Films Some little-known incidents in the early history of film making in Australia were recalled by the death recently of Mr. W. A. Gibson, O.B.E., who made 'The Kelly Gang' 22 years ago. It was the world's first five-reeler, and cost £400. It returned a profit of £17,000. As only befitted a movie dealing with the Kelly Gang, there was plenty of hard riding performed for the screen by the members of a dramatic company. They used chairs to mount their horses, and falling off was the only way they knew of dismounting. The success of 'The Kelly Gang' encouraged other men to produce films, and one of these was suggested by the antics of a drunken snake charmer at a police station. After the film had been made the snakes escaped, and wriggling up through the floors at various times were the bugbears of the studio. When Mr. Gibson produced 'The Kelly Gang,' one-reel pictures were in their prime, and 5,000ft. films were unheard of. It was an epoch-making picture and started many theatre owners on the road to prosperity. Twenty-two years ago it was a thrilling spectacle, but viewed in the light of today's movie sophistication, it was a flickering burlesque. The scenery sways in the breeze, and in one scene a bushranger after being shot dead clutches wildly at his beard to prevent it falling off. Mr. Gibson's studio was a paddock outside Melbourne, and the scenery he erected was often blown down over night. He drew his stars from Cole's Dramatic Company, and paid them £1 a day. Compared with the fortunes that are paid every week to screen stars in Hollywood now, their pay is a mere pittance, but then it was a magnificent sum for actors who had descended as low as the movies. The firing of Glenrowan Hotel was filmed in all its magnificence in a back yard, smoke bombs adding realism to the scene, these were lighted by the property master, and in a smother of smoke the priest, as the scenario demanded, proceeded to rescue the stricken occupants. But the only man who needed rescuing was forgotten. He was the unfortunate property master. At the height of the blaze he staggered out of a door and fell unconscious before the camera, suffocated by his own smoke bombs. It was a realistic piece of work, and the camera recorded it all.

UNEXPECTED REALISM

But that was not the only piece of realism. A gang of roughs was recruited for a drinking scene in the Glenrowan Hotel, and they gulped down their handles and nobblers with true spirit. One of the actors swaggered into the bar and knocked a bucket of water over one of the drinkers, and in a moment everything' was chaos. The toughs joined in, and pulling their revolvers, soon shot up the bar. But nobody dropped, and the disappointed toughs remembered that their revolvers were loaded with blank cartridges. Scenarios in those early days were born on the front pages of newspapers, and little human incidents that crept into print were soon converted into motion pictures. A humorous incident in a Melbourne police station prompted Mr. Gibson to make one picture. A snake charmer, delightfully drunk, had been arrested, and at the police station had been ordered to open his bag. 'Berrer not.' he had warned them, 'ish fuller shnakes.' But the officer had been drunk himself, and knew that snakes always figured prominently in a drunken man's thoughts. Winking knowingly, he opened the bag and bolted, leaving the snake charmer and his pets in charge of the station. Mr. Gibson saw that it would make a good screen comedy, and gave the snake charmer a contract. At the end of the day's work all of the snakes escaped, and wriggled under the floor of the studio before they could be captured. 'Get them back,' Mr. Gibson ordered, but the snake charmer took his loss philosophically, and promising not to charge the studio for them, he walked out and caught more. For months the snakes meant disaster. Frequently dramatic scenes came to an abrupt end when a snake or two wriggled on to the set. The early success of his films induced Mr. Gibson to essay motion picture producing again, and three years ago he sanctioned the expenditure of between £40,000 and £50,000 on 'The Term of His Natural Life.' and £30,000 on 'The Adorable Outcast.' Although these two pictures recouped their cost from the Commonwealth and New Zealand they were not successful overseas. Mr. Gibson appeared as an extra in one of the scenes of 'the Term' and drew his £1 for his work.

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1930

* 27 February 1930, Townsville Daily Bulletin.

The Advance of the Cinema.

It's an old story now that Australia produced in 1906 the world's first five-reel feature. 'The Kelly Gang,' financed and directed by the late Mr. W. A. Gibson and his partner. Mr. Willard Johnson. Scientific chemists in business at St. Kilda, Melbourne, at the end of last century, this pair grew interested in motion pictures and pioneered them; but while Mr. Gibson went on to become Father of the Industry and a managing director at Union Theatres, what happened to Mr. Johnson? About one hundred film men lunched with a tall, grey-faced man at the Australia, Sydney, recently. Mr. Stuart F. Doyle introduced him. For 17 years he has been the New York representative of Australasian Films and Union Theatres, and in that time Mr. Johnson has seen every world famous motion picture magnate of to-day come from absolutely nothing. It was fascinating to hear the store-house of his memory open..... Returning to New York, Mr. Johnson will proceed to London to negotiate with the British producers for the establishment of a permanent talking picture unit in Australia, and then go back to his office in a Broadway skyscraper — the conning tower from which he surveys the entire motion picture world, and keeps Union Theatres informed.

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1933

* 28 January 1933, Smith's Weekly, Sydney.

A Ned Kelly Movie

FEW are aware that the Victorian railway authorities assisted in the production of the world's first full-length photoplay, a silent film which dealt with the exploits of the Kelly Gang. This all-Australian production was made in Victoria, by a company which included Messrs. J. and N. Tait, Millard Johnson, and W. A. Gibson. The latter; who became known as the "Father of the Motion Picture Industry in Australia," died a few years ago. When the producers approached the railway authorities and asked for co-operation ready assent was given. Out on location, a railway line was actually rooted up, Ned Kelly's impersonator (hero-villain) directing operations just as the real Ned had done some years before. The next railway stunt consisted in holding up a real train, from which troopers alighted, going on to "do" the "last stand."

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1934

* 24 May 1934, The Sun News Pictorial, Melbourne.

New Talkie Plant for Melbourne

Cinesound Co. Plans to Begin Production

IMMEDIATE steps to develop the St. Kilda studio of Cinesound Productions Ltd., and to begin production, will be taken by Mr. Millard Johnson, who has been appointed Victorian director of the company. With a new complete studio equipment, which is being manufactured on the Cinesound principle, the local studio will be able to undertake any form of motion picture production. Several new cameras will be installed. With tile late Mr. W. A. Gibson, Mr. Johnson was associated in the production of the world’s first feature length film, The Kelly Gang.

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1939

* 11 August 1939, The Age, Melbourne, Pioneers of the Cinema - Millard Johnson Looks Back. Refers to the making of The Story of the Kelly Gang 1906.

Mr. Millard Johnson Looks Back.

Even before Friese-Greene, of London, in 1889, produced the first perforated band of photographic paper which introduced the film type of cinema and won him the title "father of the motion picture," men in different countries had invented machines for reflecting moving figures in picture form upon a screen. In 1886 Reynaud opened his Theatre Optique, the world's first moving picture theatre, in Paris.. He used a lantern slide for the background and a long strip of hand-drawn cartoons which, when run through his machine, gave his screen figures life and animation in the style of Disney's famous cartoons of to-day. There were other pioneers also before and after "the father of the motion picture," and Australia contributed a share to the development of this "eighth wonder of the world," the cinema. It is claimed that Australia was the first country to produce the long film drama. The pioneer of this form of entertainment (now the most popular In the world) is still here to tell the great story. He Is Mr. Millard Johnson, of Dandenong-road, Prahran, now 80 years of age, but in spirit and appearance much younger than that. He and the late Mr. William A. Gibson (his brother-in-law) in 1903 entered into partnership for the operation of a successful biograph company, which operated 35 shows in town halls and open-air spaces in city and suburbs and on the beaches. (There were no picture theatres then.) In conjunction with the Tait brothers, in 1905 they brought out a long film, Living London, and exhibited it at the Glaciarium, with unbounded success.

World's First Film Dramas.

The great public appeal of this long picture suggested to Messrs. Johnson and Gibson the production of drama on the films, and in 1906 they made, in Ivanhoe, The Kelly Gang, the first five-reel drama in the world. This was so successful that the partners continued their new enterprise, and made eight more drama films, including Robbery Under Arms, The Squatter's Daughter, Called Back, The Mystery of a Hansom Cab, and a stage play The Bells, with Arthur Steyne in the lead. J. C. Williamson Ltd. lent the "star" and the costumes. Memories of the pioneering days of the cinema in Australia are still fresh in the active mind of Mr. Millard Johnson. "My own Interest in the moving picture business," he says, "began late in 1894 when as analyst to a New York firm, and strolling through Park Row one lunch hour, I saw a lot of people in Perry's drug store — so went in, and was probably the first Australian to see a moving picture. There was a large cedar box, about the size of a glory box, with a slot in which you deposited a nickel, and a peep hole through which you saw a real moving picture, about five inches square. The first picture I saw was The Kiss, with Fanny Rice. It lasted about 25 seconds, and was followed by some acrobatic turns — both under one minute, but all for a nickel, or 2 1/2d. This was Edison's Kinescope. Each picture was similar to the films uses at present, but not perforated, and run about forty frames to the second — about double our present rate. Show on St. Kilda Roof "I became enamored of the future of the movies, and my interest increased when I returned to Melbourne and saw Carl Hertz's pictures. A couple of years later, having started a factory for oxygen cylinders. I entered the movie world, by showing, with Stevenson, on the roof of my chemist's shop at St. Kilda Junction, three reels of pictures, which drew a crowd of over a thousand people. I then ordered from London two Warwick Urban machines — one of which the late Alex Gunn took. Then began in earnest my career in the moving picture business."

The Late Mr. E. J. Thwaites

With regard to the early development of the cinema industry in Australia, Mr. Johnson says that great honor is due to the late. Mr. E. J. Thwaites; the first Australian pioneer of the movies. From printed descriptions he made in 1895 a facsimile of the combined camera, printer and projector Invented the same year by the Frenchman Louis Lumiere, and produced a number of very fine short pictures, some of which were shown by Carl Hertz at Rikhards' Opera House late in 1895. In 1896 Thwaites and Harvie (with Thwaites's camera) filmed the Caulfield and Melbourne Cup races, and showed them the same nights on the screen at the Opera House. This is claimed as another record for Australia — the first time ever pictures were taken and screened on the same day.

When Bushrangers Fell Off Their Horses

Spencer also embarked upon a film making enterprise, and produced for the screen The Fatal Wedding (with incidental music by Wynne Jones), and Nell Gwynne (with Nellie Stewart in the name part). Taking into account the difficulties confronted by film producers in those early years of the new industry, the pictures made by the Australian pioneers of the cinema must be considered achievements of great merit, Mr. Johnson recalls that when he was making his first pictures (The Kelly Gang and The Squatter's Daughter), which were photographed in the open air In paddocks about Ivanhoe, a great deal of this was wasted through the actors falling off their horses as soon as they began to trot. They had never been on a horse before (except through the medium of a bookmaker)......

Australian Achievements

"But all this time," Mr. Johnson adds, "Australia has not been idle in picture making. We have had Arthur Shirley, with his Mystery of the Hansom Cab; Louise Lovely, Chauvel, with Merle Oberon and Mary Maguire (who have since mode world-wide reputations), the late Frank Thring, with his Sentimental Bloke (though Australian slang was not understood overseas), and other splendid productions, especially those with George Wallace as principal. Australasian films made an expansive drama of early Tasmanian history, The Term of His Natural Life, at a cost of £40,000, and then began Cinesound, with Bert "Bailey in the Australian play On Our Selection, which holds tho record for financial successes' in the Commonwealth, and more to be produced by Ken Hall."

* 11 November 1939, The Sun News Pictorial, Melbourne. An account of John J. Forde's participation in the film as Dan Kelly.

The Kelly Gang on location in the Bad Old Film Days.

By Pat O’Neill.

Few, if any, residents of Walker Street, Westgarth, recognise in Mr. John J. Forde, their kindly neighbor, the man who but a few years ago, heavily bearded and still more heavily armed, galloped around the hitherto peaceful countryside at Heidelberg sometimes pursuing, and at others pursued, by men clad in the uniform of officers of the Victorian police. Nor do they know that he and three equally desperate companions were cornered like rats in a two-roomed shack at Kangaroo Ground, a few miles away, and surrounded by a body of men who, after pouring a merciless stream of bullets into their temporary haven, burnt it to the ground. Yet, from this and similar ordeals, Mr. Forde escaped unscathed — only to be blown up by a German shell at the battle of Fromelles in France on July 19, 1916.

It will be admitted by all that when Mr. Forde, as a member of the 57th Battalion, took part in the famous battle of Fromelles, he was helping to make history: but how many Australians know that way back in 1906 among the hills and valleys around Heidelberg he and others performed a similar feat — but in another sphere? They made the first full-length moving picture ever attempted in Australia — or anywhere else. Title — The Kelly Gang.

The picture was produced by Messrs. Johnson and Gibson, two enthusiastic young pioneers of the cinematograph industry, behind whose chemist shop at St. Kilda Junction many of the interior scenes were taken. They made the picture in conjunction with members of the Tait family. Mrs. Charles Tait, formerly Miss Veitch, a splendid horsewoman, played the part of Kate Kelly, her husband the head of the police, and Mr. John Tait enacted the role of the heroic school master who ran along the railway line at Glenrowan and warned the occupants of the approaching police train of the disaster which threatened them. Most of the scenes were shot on the property of Mr. Veitch (Mrs. Tait’s father) at Heidelberg.

No Drastic Cutting

Among many other things for which the picture was noted there was one which probably stands as a world record: of but 6000ft. of film used in its making, no less than 3,500ft. was actually used in the finished production.

But let us hark back to Mr. Forde. . . . A scion of a well-known theatrical family — his father was Martin Forde, a famous comedian of the day — he was a member of a more or less scratch company which was playing The Kelly Gang to approving if somewhat one-eyed audiences at Fitzroy. The latter part did not worry Mr. Forde a bit, for he was cast as Dan Kelly, and the sympathies of his public were definitely with him. The parts of Ned Kelly, Steve Hart and Joe Byrne were played by Frank Mills, Jack Ennis and Will Coyne — all of whom have long since passed on to the actors’ heaven. The whole company was engaged to put over the play under actual working conditions and the unforgiving eye of a movie camera. Each Sunday and Wednesday for several weeks the entire company and camera crew left St. Paul's Cathedral corner in horse drawn drags for Heidelberg and plunged into crime — to the great edification of residents of that district. In direct opposition to the theory "that crime does not pay," the pseudo desperadoes received salaries which ranged from (I would that Messrs. Gable. Flynn, Taylor and Co. could read this) 3/6 to 5/- a day — on the days that they actually worked. The horses used in the production were hired from Garton’s livery stables, but unfortunately the majority of the members of the cast were — to put it mildly — very poor horsemen. As a fact., the ringleader of the gang — unlike the great bushman whom he portrayed - was unable to ride at all. This led to several embarrassing situations and eventually Mr. Veitch was compelled to provide him with a half-draught farm horse — on which he successfully out-distanced pursuing minions of the law for quite a long time. General co-operation was forthcoming in the big job of making the picture. For the scene which depicted the attempted derailment of the police train at Glenrowan, the authorities supplied a real train. The rails were torn up by workmen actually in the employ of the Railways Commissioners in a section between Eltham and Greensborough. Even the cattle of the district seemed anxious to help. “Many times.” Mr. Forde told me, “when I set out with a herd of stolen cattle, I finished with twice the number. The cows around Heidelberg seemed definitely pro-Kelly or screen struck — for they joined in wherever an opportunity offered. At Kangaroo Ground, some 14 miles from Melbourne, an abandoned house was located which proved to be an almost perfect replica of the Glenrowan Hotel. Here the Kellys met their end and the picture — the filming of which had been marked by a distinct falling-off in attendances at schools around Heidelberg — was completed. Unfortunately for Mr. Forde, his part in the production of the Kelly picture brought him on one occasion into a clash with the genuine police. One day when not on location he was commissioned by the manager to buy some blank cartridges for use in the old-type pin-fire revolvers which were used by the outlaws. Taking a couple of the weapons along, he made an unsuccessful effort to fit them at Edments Store, the manager of which advised him to try the Small Arms Co. in Elizabeth Street. Mr. Forde followed this advice and got the cartridges, but the day was hot and on his homeward trip he lingered by the wayside. When re-passing Edments he was asked by the manager if his quest had been successful. “Yes, I got them all right,” he replied — at the same time somewhat unwisely unwrapping his parcel. A bystander ran for the police and soon Mr. Forde found himself in the lock up trying hard to explain to a sceptical Irish sergeant that he was playing in the Kelly picture and that the pistols were props. "Ye might be Dan Kelly in a picture — and I have me doubts," said the officer, “but I’m sure of one thing: you’re in the cell and sitting on the seat where the real Ned Kelly waited for trial.” Mr. Forde was soon released from his predicament, however. The Kelly picture was shown for a long time to crowded audiences at the Athenaeum Theatre and Melbourne Town Hall. Later it was shown in many parts of Victoria until withdrawn at the request of the police. Among other reasons for their action was that the youth of the State was armed to a boy. Toy cap-pistols were at a premium and oil drums had been converted into helmets. Another, but shorter, Kelly picture was made later, but with an almost entirely different cast. [Image caption: The movie camera in a rear guard action shoots the Kelly Gang while they are in the act of reading the proclamation offering £8000 for their capture, dead or alive. All of them would have cheerfully given themselves up for a very small proportion of this handsome sum.] [Image caption: Blank cartridges put an end to the screen versions of Dan Kelly and Steve Hart. Dan Kelly (Mr. John J. Forde) had a miraculous recovery and is still very much alive.]

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1946

* 31 January 1946, Film Weekly. Early Days Recalled. Story of Gibson and Johnson.

* 18 November 1946 - Josephine O'Neil, Josephine, It all began with a feature movie on the Kelly Gang, News, Adelaide. Extract:

.....An old-time showman named Sam Crews suggested that the Taits make "The Kelly Gang" as a movie (the bushranging saga was then a smash stage show). Johnson and Gibson provided the equipment, and took a share in the venture. The picture was taken mostly at Eaglemont and at Chartersville estates, Heidelberg — and generally on Sundays. The company went out by train or "drag" (large waggonette), taking their picnic lunch with them. Mr. Gibson operated the camera, and John Tait, Frank Tait, and Mrs. Charles Tait (she played Kate Kelly) were in the film. Ned Kelly the star received £1 a day, and wore the genuine Kelly armor, borrowed from Sir Rupert Clarke. The extras were recruited from tough citizenry, who turned the bar-room brawls into the real thing, and had to be separated by force. The film's big highlight was the Kellys' final stand at Glenrowan, when the railway track was lifted by the gang. The Railways Commissioner . placed a train and gangers at Eltham rail terminus for the occasion. W. A. Gibson later calculated that "The Kelly Gang" cost £400 to film. It was first released at the Melbourne Athenaeum at Christmas, 1905, and was a hit. Unhappily, the original negative was lost or destroyed, and there are no prints in existence......

1949

* 9 October 1949 - Jack Percival, "Kelly Gang" film Began Era of "Feature" Pictures, The Sunday Herald, Sydney.

"Kelly Gang" Film Began Era Of "Feature" Pictures

By JACK PERCIVAL

[The Story of Pioneer Films]

The cinema is now the world's chief means of entertainment. In Australia alone the cinema theatres take £12 million annually, have 200 million customers a year. But few of the Australians who go to the "pictures" once a week - or several times a week - realise that an early Australian film profoundly influenced the international development of the industry.

THE world's first full-length feature film was not made in Hollywood, California, but in backyards and paddocks in Melbourne. It was a venturesome, rough-and-tumble affair, "The Kelly Gang." To-day it would probably be called a "horse-opera." But whereas present-day feature films cost anything up to £1 million to produce, "The Kelly Gang" was made 41 years ago for £400. W. A. Gibson, "father of the Australian motion picture industry," was the producer.

"THE KELLY GANG" was exhibited throughout Australia - mostly on vacant allotments behind hoardings. There were no picture theatres in those days with cushioned seats, deep-piled carpets, air-conditioning, uniformed usherettes and guards-man-like commissionaires. The success of "The Kelly Gang" played a notable part in the foundation of the large city and suburban cinema circuits, which since have built palatial entertainment centres complete with such modernities as milk bars and crying rooms for babies. Back in 1900, when Mr. Gibson was projecting his first flickering "kinematographics," his projection machine cost £40, "stars" £1 a day, theatre rent a few shillings nightly, and people such as production managers, directors, film editors, scenario writers, art directors, sound engineers and lighting experts, who to-day draw salaries which would satisfy a maharajah, had not been thought up. To-day an Australian "A" feature production can cost up to £150,000, production and sound equipment between £2,800 and £4,500, and a not too pretentious suburban theatre (if yon can get a licence) about £250,000.

IT began in 1900, when a sign over a door in a St. Kilda street stated that Messrs. Johnson and Gibson were open for business as chemists. An Englishman was a frequent visitor to the shop. He wanted materials for one of the headline acts of a none too successful vaudeville show. The act used a magic lantern to show "motivated figures" on a screen. The manager of the vaudeville show disappeared with the takings after an evening performance and left his "acts" with the grim prospect of walking Melbourne's Poverty Point (where unemployed show people congregated). The Englishman sold his magic lantern to Mr. Gibson for £40.

MR. GIBSON bought the magic lantern to entertain his friends. At nights he took them to the roof of his shop and projected 50-foot lengths of film on a makeshift screen, beneath the stars. Unknown to the roof-top audience, the show could be seen from the street. One night so many stood watching the show from the road below that they caused an irate policeman to clamber to the roof and demand that the performance should cease. That was when Mr. Gibson first sensed the public interest in movies. Later he moved his projection outfit and films to St. Kilda Beach, where he gave public performances. The success of the St. Kilda Beach exhibitions interested other showmen. They persuaded Gibson to hire out projection machines and films. Johnson and Gibson became what was later to be known as a film exchange. They were forerunners in Australia of such firms as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Fox, Paramount, other American film exchanges, and British Empire films, who rent films and accessories to exhibitors.

THE firm supplied and repaired projection machines. They also hired trained "projectionists" to exhibitors. These projectionists were usually men who had another job during the day, and earned a few extra shillings at night in this way. The business prospered, and it was not long before Johnson and Gibson had 40 operators and projection machines "on circuit." Many of the operators and machines "played" two shows nightly. It was not unusual for Mr. Gibson himself to give an early performance at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, move over to the Temperance Hall for the second show, and then return to the Cricket Ground for a final performance. Mr. Gibson secured the rights for an "extended scenic" titled "Living London." This film was a box-office success until it met with a series of disasters when it was "booked" into towns simultaneously with a "flesh and blood" show called "The Kelly Gang."

GIBSON'S reply was characteristic. He drew £400 from his bank and began filming "The Kelly Gang" as a full evening's entertainment. These extras got £1 a day. When the idea leaked out, it was scoffed at. Nowhere else in the world had a five-reel film been made. Audiences, it was claimed, became restless towards the end of the then standard one-reelers, which took 20 minutes to screen-providing there were no breaks in the film and no fires in the machine. Mr. F. Marden, who later worked at what is now known as Cinesound Studios, Ebley Street, Bondi Junction, and at the film studios next to the White City Tennis Courts, became production manager. Mr. S. Cruse was appointed property master. Sets were built in paddocks outside Melbourne, actors were hired from Cole's Dramatic Company at £1 a day, and the big spectacle, the Glenrowan Hotel conflagration, was staged in a Melbourne backyard.

A GROUP of Melbourne "toughs" was hired for a brawl scene in the bar of the Glenrowan Hotel. An additional lure was "as much as you can drink in the bar scenes." The "toughs" disposed of quarts at a rate which sent up production costs alarmingly. Horse-play began, and a bucket of water was thrown. There was an unrehearsed fight, in which the "toughs" joined. When blood began to flow they "pulled" the revolvers which had been issued to them by the property master, and "shot up" the place with blanks to such an extent that the gunfight was reported in the Melbourne newspapers, and police inquiries were made. "The Kelly Gang" not only made history in world film production, but also established box-office records-except in Sydney. The film opened on a lot in Sydney's Haymarket to a Saturday night premiere audience of 3,000. The rent for the lot was £8 a night. On Sunday it began to rain, and the drizzle continued for weeks.

RECORDS of the earnings of "The Kelly Gang" have been lost, but old-timers in the film trade estimate it grossed about £25,000. Its box-office receipts were so convincing that it induced the Carrolls and the Taits to become interested in the possibilities of local film production. The Taits became financially associated with Mr. Gibson in a subsequent film production, "The Luck of Roaring Camp." By 1912 the importance of the feature film was becoming obvious. But a Mr. Spencer bought the Australasian rights of "Quo Vadis" for £4,000, while The Thanhouser Company worked abroad with 200 people for four weeks to produce "The Star of Bethlehem" for £1,600. From £5 to £10 was the average price paid in America for scenarios. In England the rates were much lower. When, in 1927, Gibson's company made the Australian film, "For the Term of His Natural Life," the cost was £40,000.

GIBSON was quick too, to realise the importance of the newsreel. One of Australia's most famous early newsreel items pictured Diver Hughes going down a flooded mine in Western Australia to take food to a trapped miner. This heroic incident was such a sensation in its day that Mr. Gibson decided to make a 500 feet news "special." Pony expresses rushed the copies between exhibition centres. Gayne Dexter, internationally known Australian film man (now with Warner Bros, in London) says: "Gibson erected a tarpaulin tank and hired diving apparatus to show the frantic miner in a cavern being rescued by the diver at the last moment. "George Coates played the diver, and he was kept at the bottom of the tank by heavy weights attached to his body and legs. "Frank Marden took charge of the pump and commenced to turn. "His impression was that a man under water needed all the air that could be forced through a pipe. Mr. Gibson cranked the camera. "Then, with a tremendous splash, a huge balloon shot to the surface. It contained the gallant rescuer with his suit so inflated that hundredweights of lead wouldn't keep him down. For two hours Marden hid in the fastnesses of St. Kilda."

WARNING: Anyone who hopes to emulate Gibson and make a fortune out of a backyard production of "The Kelly Gang" should take warning from the experience of one Australian producing group about 20 years ago. This group made another "Kelly Gang" film (at a cost of about £27,000) and the Chief Secretary promptly banned its presentation in N.S.W., using powers under the Theatres and Public Halls Act. The reason: The police considered this version offended against "good manners and decorum."

* In response to the Percival article, Fred Daniell of Sydney radio 2GB contacted John H. Tait of J. C. Williamson Theatres Ltd., Melbourne. He responded on 11 October 1949 as follows:

The Kelly Gang

Thanks for sending the article in the Sunday S.M. Herald of the 9th inst. The article is quite interesting but it contains several inaccuracies. My brother Charles wrote the Scenario and was the actual producer of the film which was almost entirely filmed at a farm at Ivanhoe near Heidelberg, Melbourne, in 1905. Johnson & Gibson had some financial interest in the venture with J. & N. Tait and W.A. Gibson was the one in charge of the camera. The entire cost … The success of “The Kelly Gang” led to the Tait's, with the same association, producing Rolf Bolderwood’s famous “Robbery Under Arms.” “For the Term of His Natural Life” was produced by Charles McMahon and R. J. Carroll and was exhibited by Mr. Claude Kingston, now J.C.W. Theatres Director. It was also very successful but its production cost only 1/10th of the amount mentioned in the article. Kind regards, Yours Sincerely, John W. Tait.

1971

* Viola Tait, A Family of Brothers. The Taits and J.C.Williamson: a Theatre History, Heinemann Australia, 1971. Chapter 4 refers to the making of The Story of the Kelly Gang and the involvement of the Tait family.

[Chapter] 4 ‘The Kelly Gang'

During 1905 the Tait brothers were spending their weekends making a film – and history. Charlie’s interest in film had been aroused by the enterprise of a Salvation Army man, Joseph Henry Perry, who in 1901 had produced The Early Day Christian Martyrs, the first film to be presented in tableaux form in Australia. Only hundred feet long, its setting was a tennis court at the Salvation Army Home for Girls at Murrumbeena, Victoria. Encouraged by its success Major Perry made two more films, Soldiers of the Cross and The Scottish Covenanters. To perfect the projection of his reels he needed limelight, so he employed Millard Johnson and William 'Gibby' Gibson, two chemists in partnership in St Kilda, to supply oxygen with acetylene gas to raise a block of lime to white heat. This provided light to project the picture.

Johnson and Gibson became so interested in the new medium they sold their chemist shop and concentrated on experimenting with films, importing cameras and equipment which they hired out as the demand increased. Their first success aroused public interest on St Kilda beach where they rigged up a sheet against a bathing box to show a film they had made of a dancer, Loie Fuller. In 1904 they assisted the Fitzgerald family in making a film, The Bushranger and its success persuaded them to go into production themselves. All they needed was the theatrical experience which Charlie provided by co-opting their services to film The Kelly Gang.

The hair-raising exploits of these sensational bushrangers were still fresh in the public's mind, although it was more than twenty years since the hanging of their leader, Ned Kelly. Charlie and John set about writing the scenario for a 9000-foot film. The location for the film was not where the history books said, at Glenrowan, but at Chartersville Estate, Heidelberg, the home of the Veitch family. The estate originally belonged to Henry Charters and later to a Swiss, François Robert de Castella, the property for dairy farming. Mostly dense bush, Chartersville was an ideal setting for filming outside scenes: two small on the estate were used for indoor scenes and Rosanna became the Glenrowan Hotel. A large barn provided shelter from the elements for members of the Tait family and friends who watched the fun and, when necessary, appeared in crowd scenes. Ted’s diary describes some details of the programme:

The Kelly Gang Film
Scenario: John and Charles Tait
Director: Charles Tait
Assistant Director: Sam Crew
Photographer: Millard Johnson
Filming: William Gibson

Location of the Kelly Gang exploits
(Bushranging, bank robberies, hold-ups, etc.)
Glenrowan, near Echuca, Victoria.
Scenes all shot at Heidelberg, 14 [sic] miles from Melbourne.
Cast

Ned Kelly: [see page 26]
Ned's sister: Mrs Charles Tait
Mob scenes: John and Frank Tait,
Harriet Amy and Charles
Tait's family, and others.

The first film in the world that ran the full evening
bill, no support, at Athenaeum Hall, Melbourne.

Sam Crew, Charlie's Assistant Director, had toured with a drama company which had staged The Kelly Gang as a dramatic play and it packed the country halls. The film production was based on the melodramatic stage version with policemen, black trackers and fifty horses lent by a local circus. The company travelled to Heidelberg at weekends by train or four-horse drays. Present-day costumes were worn, with the exception of Ned whose authentic armour was lent by Sir Rupert Clarke. Ivan Tait, Charlie's son, remembers Gibson, whose knowledge of chemicals came in useful for stage effects on the set, with his peaked hat turned back to front, using a red substance to give the effect of fire in a scene where the bushrangers were making their armour. There were no star actors and all the cast were interchangeable.

During the early part of filming the actor who played Ned deserted and never returned. He name is forgotten, but Frank remembered him as a Canadian stunt actor from the Bland Holt company playing at His Majesty’s Theatre. In order to avoid reshooting Ned’s scenes the unknown understudy was never filmed facing the camera. Actors and circus riders were paid £1 a day and were engaged by Gibson while drinking at the bar of the Royal Hotel in Bourke Street or outside it at Poverty Point Corner. Lizzie Tait, an expert horsewoman, did all the riding for the unknown actress who played Ned's sister, Kate, splashing her white horse through the waters of the Yarra when acting as a bush telegraph for the gang.

A Victorian Railways Commissioner co-operated by lending a special train and railway crew to stage the bushrangers' attempted derailment of a train loaded with police sent to capture them. All expenses for the making of the film, however, came within a budget of £1000, and the entire film equipment consisted of one camera, operated by Johnson, who shot every scene in the film.

The bar of the Glenrowan Hotel was built in Charlie's backyard and placed in one of the cottages on the property. Sunlight was the only light available, both for interior and exterior shots and when the nine thousand foot film was finished it was developed in Gibson's bath.

During the first screening, the film broke several times and incidental music had to be quickly organised to calm the impatient audience while the film was joined with metal clips. Another time the acetylene box sprang a leak and made loud hissing noises causing everybody to think the whole film would explode. 'Gibby' quick on the job was relieved when he discovered it was only a faulty stop-cock.

The first week of country try-outs was an enormous success and the film recouped its expenses. Premiered at the Athenaeum Hall in December 1906, each scene was described by an actor reading the script and subtitles, and changing his voice to depict each character. Sound effects were supplied by the property department: the noise of galloping horses' hoofs was made by pounding half-coconut shells on to a hollow board; gunshots came from blank cartridges; wind storms from vigorously shaking sheets of tin; and rain from gravel stones rattled around inside a barrel.

The film lasted one hour and forty minutes. Crowds flocked to see this wonderful new form of entertainment after it had been advertised in the newspaper as: ‘The biggest and most costly cinematograph work ever undertaken. Modern science has harnessed photography so that with the new biograph we are able to tell this thrilling story in its entirety over again.'

The Age reviewed the film:

‘The Kelly Gang is one of the finest things in the way of cinematograph views that has been placed before the Melbourne public. The story supplies sufficient sensationalism to satisfy the most exacting in this respect and the whole of the miscreants’ lawless career is covered from the first encounter between Constable Fitzgerald and the Kelly women to the fall of Ned Kelly outside the hotel at Glenrowan.

The rugged scenery amongst which most of the outlaws' days were spent is also picturesquely shown. Messrs J. & N. Tait, the promoters, had promised that no expense would be spared in securing an imposing combination of cinematograph films and by frequent outbursts of applause the audience indicated that the quality of the entertainment had not been overstated.

The clothing, all save one person's, the leader of the gang, is correct. Ned Kelly, when taken, was got up in quite the dandy bushman style - yellow cord pants with slate cross-barred pattern cloth, very thin-soled and high-heeled kangaroo skin riding boots with spurs, white Crimean shirt with large black spots, vest of the same material as the pants, and a long white mackintosh, closely buttoned, worn over all. These items could easily have been followed.’

A footnote in the Taits' souvenir booklet stated:

‘The management, of course, have had to take many liberties in making the great biograph picture, The Kelly Gang, inasmuch as the police are all shown in uniform, whereas they were nearly always dressed in plain clothes, but were this adhered to in the picture, the dramatic interest would be lost and it would be difficult for the onlooker to know which were the police and which were the Kellys.’ Two months after it was first shown in Melbourne, The Kelly Gang had an equally successful reception in Sydney as evidenced by the review in Table Talk:

‘The Kelly Gang at the Palace ought to be suppressed by Act of Parliament. The show has become so popular and such excited crowds throng the theatre every night to see the fascinating pictures taken from real life that bushranging is in danger of once more becoming popular. The Kelly gang acquired everything so easily with the help of a gun that it must be the easiest way out of earning your daily bread…. It really is exciting to see the story unfold and the pictures are splendid. The magnificent riding of the girl portraying Kate Kelly caused roars of admiration, also the beautiful horses the gang rode…. Dan Kelly made a most awful picture at the last, gazing out of the biograph the at about four times the size of an ordinary man with the boiler on his head and the corrugated iron roof riveted on his chest. We tried hard not to look at him but he simply commanded attention.'

In his diary Ted tells the story of a man demanding to see the manager after viewing a performance of The Kelly Gang.

‘What can I do for you, sir?' Charlie asked politely.

‘I was a policeman at the capture of Ned Kelly,' he bellowed, ‘and I was not shot in the back, like you say in the film!'

Charlie, fearing a law suit, fired back: ‘The book says you were, so what can I do about it?’

The man replied thoughtfully: ‘I think a season's pass for the wife, myself and kids will be OK.'

Charlie, much relieved, gave it to him.

There were so many Taits involved in the filming of The Kelly Gang that Charlie, conscious of this fact, decided Frank, who played a policeman in the film, should change his name. Charlie chose the name 'Stetson' after his favourite hat, and Frank Stetson appears on the programme as manager.

After many months of touring, the first five-reel film in the world became scratched and worn out. Several copies of it were made, and one was given to E.J. Carroll, a film distributor, for screening in Queensland. Carroll was reputed to have made a fortune out of the film, showing it in woolsheds, tents and tin shacks in almost every country town.

But all that remains of The Kelly Gang today, unfortunately, is a souvenir programme, with complete scenario, and a number of still pictures.

* Jack Cranston, The Story of the Kelly Gang Film, Glen Rowan Cobb & Co., Glenrowan, 2016. Cranston claimed to be the son of the director of the original 1906 film.

Contrary to many reports published over the years, following on from the success of the previous 1906 film, in 1910 Messrs. Johnson and Gibson produced a totally new film titled 'The Story of the Kelly Gang'. With a new script, and almost totally new cast, Johnson and Gibson's production team set about producing a brand new film measuring 6,000 feet in length.

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4. The Scenario

According to Wikipedia, the script for The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906) is attributed to Charles and John Tait, and was possibly based on the 1899 play The Kelly Gang by Arnold Denham which, in turn, was likely plagiarized from the 1896 similarly titled play by Reg Rede. This attribution could go on and on, as the subject of the Kelly Gang was popular amongst the colonial theatre scene almost from the time their activities were first reported during the 1870s, and especially following the dramatic capture and later hanging of Ned Kelly (1854-1880) in November 1880. For example, in 1900 the Bohemian Dramatic Company of Sydney premiered its play Hands Up!, or Ned Kelly and His Gang, written by proprietor of the Company, Edward Irham Cole. Gibson later noted that he had used the Bohemian troupe in filming The Story of the Kelly Gang. The scenario for Hands Up! (1900) is almost identical to that presented in the film. The following is a description of it as published on 8 January 1900 in a promotional pamphlet for the premiere Brisbane performance:

ACT I. —

Scene 1: Kelly’s Home at Greta — The Warrant.
Scene 2: Interior of Kelly’s Home — Shooting of Fitzpatrick.
Scene 3: Superintendent of Police Quarters at Benalla.
Scene 4: In the Ranges — Kate’s Message.
Scene 5: Police Quarters, Benalla.
Scene 6: Kennedy’s Camp — “Hands Up” — Death of Sergeant Kennedy.

ACT II. —

Scene 1: Interior of Euroa Bank—The Robbery.
Scene 2: Police Quarters.
Scene 3: Jerilderie Police Station.
Scene 4: Bush Track — The Gang at Work.
Scene 5: Interior of Sherritt’s Home — Death of Sherritt.
Scene 6: In the Bush — Ready for the Train.
Scene 7: Special Police Train — Kernewtothe Rescue.

ACT III.—

Scene 1: Interior of Mrs. Jones’ Hotel, Glenrowan
Scene 2: In the Bush—Ned Kelly in Armour.
Scene 3: Battle of Glenrowan — Ned Kelly’s Last Stand.

BLACK TRACKERS, RAILWAY OFFICIALS, POLICE, Etc.

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An advertisement for the film in the 19 December 1906 edition of The Age, Melbourne, presented the script outline of the completed film as the following, in 9 sections:

The Story of the Kelly Gang

Section 2.—Takes us into the inaccessible Wombat Ranges, where the police, all innocent of impending danger, are surrounded and shot down, with the exception of MacIntyre, who makes his escape.

Section 3.—The Gang proceed to Younghusband's station, which they stick up and make numerous prisoners, and then go to rob the bank at Euroa.

Section 4.—In the fastnesses of the Strathbogie Ranges, Joe Byrne's mother comes across Aaron Sherrit, a former friend of the gang, in the Police Camp.

Section 5.—Two of the gang follow up Sherrit and shoot him in his hut.

Section 6.—The gang capture the line repairers, and at the revolvers' point force them to tear up the railway line. The timely warning of the train by Schoolmaster Curnow.

Section 7.—At the Glenrowan Inn. The surprise. The gang at bay. Surrounded at the Glenrowan Inn.

Section 8.—Death of Joe Byrne. Father Gibney rescues the wounded. The hotel on fire. Death of Dan Kelly and Steve Hart.

Section 9.—Ned Kelly at bay. Clothed in his heavy armor the bullets of the police make no effect; at last they hit him in the leg, when be falls, and is captured.

In the 2006 restoration of the film by the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia DVD it is stated that the film script comprised 5 sections, based upon those presented in the 1906 program booklet, as follows .....

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5. Gibson's film

During 1944 and 1945 Australian cinema journalist Dan Mcguire published two articles in The ABC Weekly dealing with the making of The Story of the Kelly Gang 1906. In the first he utilised a 1927 interview by producer William A. Gibson to tell his story. Nine months later he wrote another narrative which this time told the story from the perspective of the Tait family. Both narratives were different and in conflict. The first said that members of the Tait family did not star in the film; the second said that they did. The first highlighted the significant role of Gibson in the actual making of the film; the second gave to the Taits the role of instigators and creators. What was the truth? As noted above, the NFSA and Bertrand camp appeared to come down on the side of the Taits, based in large part on the account published by Dan Mcguire in 1945 after he was specifically approached by the family to answer statements contained in a earlier piece. The Tait family case was clearly set out as follows, with the role and Gibson and Johnson now moved fairly and squarely into the background, almost appearing as an after thought, or mere contracted technicians:

....The idea of The Kelly Gang emanated from an old-time showman, one Sam Crews, in the year 1905, Mr. Tait declares. The idea appealed to Charles Tait and his brothers. At that time, the then young firm of J. and N. Tait was presenting picture shows in Melbourne and elsewhere (Living London was one of its big successes) and was purchasing its film programmes from Messrs. Johnson and Gibson. The first step in making the Kellys was the production of a scenario, written by Charles Tait. Messrs. Johnson and Gibson were then approached, and in consideration for providing the necessary camera equipment, were given a share in the venture. The Kelly Gang was filmed mostly at Eaglemont or Chartersville Estates, at Heidelberg, Melbourne, generally on Sundays, at that... The producers themselves took part in the film. In fact, the cast included John Tait, Frank Tait, and Mrs. Charles Tait - an accomplished horse rider, who played Kate Kelly. To Charles Tait himself was given the job of producing and directing the film. (Mcguire 1945)

It was reinforced by others such as John J. Forde in 1939, but most especially Viola Tait in her 1971 book on the family (Tait 1971). Therein the writer appears to take great effort at allocating roles in the film's creation to members of the family. Gibson had largely lost out in all all, and since 1971 remains very much in the shadows. It could be said that the disappearance of Gibson;s role, along with that of his partner Willard Johnson, goes back to the initial release of the film. For example, a report in The Sunday Sun, on a screening of The Story of the Kelly Gang in Sydney during February 1907 did not mention Gibson or Johnson, but instead highlighted how:

The Palace Theatre was crowded in all parts last night when Messrs. J. and N. Tait presented their Biograph story of the Kelly Gang.

Could we perhaps equate this to a modern instance where, for example, the recent successful The Lord of the Rings trilogy is known as Warner Brothers' creation, rather than Peter Jackson's? And could this be behind the reason that a couple of months later Gibson & Johnson went out on their own in presenting films, father than merely making them for entrepreneurs such as the Taits?

The present writer, in researching the Ogle family tradition of a connection with the film and, in association with that, the role of Edward Irham Cole's Bohemian Dramatic Company, developed the view that Gibson was the true creator of the film, with the Taits being bit players and later distributors and promoters of the film. When the tens of thousands of pounds started to role in due to its success, it would seem that both the Taits and Gibson and his colleague Johnson shared in the spoils. Unfortunately arguments fell on the side of the Taits because their job was in the area of promotion - of theatre and later films. Gibson appeared to initially be more of a backroom creator and distributor, responsible for the technical side of what the Taits were about. As such they were both listed as producers of The Story of the Kelly Gang. However, when we look deeper, and pull out the material relating to Gibson presented by Bertrand and others, we are able to make the contrary case in his favour. In putting the case for Gibson, the following information is provided:

Dexter 1929: ... "The Kelly Gang" ran to the astounding length of 6,000 feet. It made a fortune for William A. Gibson.... It is generally believed that E. J. Tait and his brothers - the powerful Taits of J. C. Williamson. Ltd. - acted in "The Kelly Gang." This is not so, but the picture opened their eyes to the possibilities of local production, and they became associated with Mr. Gibson in a later cycle, which included "The Luck of the Roaring Camp" - yes, an American western picture made in Australia.
Mcguire 1944: .... The Kelly Gang was made in 1906 by W.A. Gibson, of Melbourne, and was five reels in length. Gibson, already an exhibitor, got the idea because a flesh-and-blood show about the Kellys played as rival in towns where he was showing a scenic picture called Living London - and the populations left Mr. Gibson’s film playing to empty seats. To make the Kellys, Gibson drew £400 from his bank. Having no studio, he built his sets in a paddock outside Melbourne, where the wind and rain took sometimes a nightly toll. His cast came from Cole’s Dramatic Company, and were paid the dazzling figure of £1 a day. Contrary to to-day’s tradition the Taits did not play in The Kelly Gang. Their interest in local films came later when they were associated with Gibson in The Luck of Roaring Camp and other roaring dramas.
Mcguire 1945: .... Cameraman on The Kelly Gang was Mr. W. A. Gibson, who used up 10,000 feet of film.
O'Neil 1946: That 1906 film,"The Kelly Gang," was the beginning of it all. "The Kelly Gang" was made by Messrs. Johnson and W. A. Gibson, of Melbourne, and the very young firm of J. & N. Tait. W. A. Gibson, originally a chemist, with his partner, had spent £40 to buy a movie camera owned by a touring Englishman, and had gone into the movie business.

It can be noted that the allocation of the title "director" to the film has been shroud in a deal of controversy. At the time of the films production it was not a clearly defined term in regard to a cinematic production. Of course, this quickly changes as individuals such as Cecil B. de Mill achieved fame. However was can see from the example of The Story of the Kelly Gang, that the lines between all the important elements of the film's creation, namely producer, director, script writer, cinematography, set designer, casting director, etc. etc. were all blurred. An argument could be put that William A. Gibson engaged in all of these tasks for the 1906 film, and that no other person can be identified to have at the time done the same. It is therefore, in the view of the present writer, Gibson's film.

The film's Wikipedia page clearly identifies Charles Tait as the director. It further states that it was written by Charles Tait and John Tait. It says that it starred John Tait and Elizabeth Tait. It also says that the cinematography was by Millard Johnson, Orrie Perry and Reg Perry. In addition, we are told it ran for 60 minutes when premiered. The present author would take exception with all of those statements. The only ones which are supported in the entry are that it was distributed by J.& N. Tait, and that the producers were Gibson & Johnson and J. & N. Tait. As for the others:

Director - as William A. Gibson, by his own account, made the film with no direct reference to input from Charles Tait, it can be said that Gibson would best be described as its director, in the modern sense. In 1916 it is said that Sam Crews was the director, and this is the earliest known reference to a person in that role. It is therefore likely that Crews, as an employee of Gibson & Johnson, played a part in directing some of the filming, especially whilst Gibson was on the camera.

Script - as the film appears to follow a near identical script to the Bohemian Variety Company's presentation of Hands Up!, and as it was noted that at the time filming commenced there was no scenario or script, this must put into question the statements by the Tait family that John and Charles were responsible for the film's script. It is more likely that the team of Gibson & Johnson, used a theatre play script such as Hands Up! as the basis for the filming and proceeded as such.

Cinematography - most evidence points to William A. Gibson as primary cameraman during filming in 1906, and subsequent to that with the 1907 and 1910 versions.

Set design - W. A. Gibson has commented on his involvement in their construction. Sam Crews / Cruse was employed by Gibson & Johnson on the film and acted as a general jack-of-all-trades, even going so far as being the earliest person to be cited as director of the film, in a 1916 newspaper article.

Film development - Gibson & Johnson and their staff were responsible for this, including the production of the at least six prints that are known to have circulated in Australia, New Zealand and Great Britain.

Editor - Gibson & Johnson seem the most likely candidates for this.

Under the direction of .... - This refers to the presentation of the film in theatres and other live venues. It does not refer to the creation / production of the film itself. The phrase is a theatre term. As J. & N. Tait were in the business of theatre presentation, in association with J. C. Williamson's and also Gibson & Johnson, the use of the term on the 1906 poster should not be interpreted as a designation as regards direction of the film.

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6. What about Dan Barry?

On Boxing Day, 26 December 1906, actor and theatre producer Dan Barry (born John Ringrose Atkins in 1851) presented his World-Wide Wonder Show at the Town Hall, Hobart. Included on the program was a film entitled The Kelly Gang. Was this The Story of the Kelly Gang or a different film? Is it the so-called "Perth Fragment" in the NFSA collection, as identified by Ina Bertrand? There has been much debate over the years regarding this, and the jury appears to be out (Gaunson 2010). And what about a Kelly film, or films, produced and released in Australia prior to the Johnson Gibson made film? The Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, in its webpage Early Australian Cinema states the following in regard to Barry's involvement in this episode, based on information contained in Eric Reade's Early Australian Silent Film: A Pictorial History book of 1970:

In 1906 Dan Barry and Charles Tait of Melbourne produced and directed The Story of the Kelly Gang, a silent film that ran continuously for a breathtaking 80 minutes, definitely the world's first feature film. It wasn't until 1911 that other countries began to make feature films. By this time Australia had made 16 full length feature films.

Stephen Gaunson, in his 2010 PhD theses, goes further, citing Ina Bertrand and others in attempting to unravel this early Australian cinematic who-dun-nit:

Before Charles Tait‟s 1906 film, at least one other Kelly film had been produced. Bertrand entitled its remaining footage as "the Perth Fragment‟, as it seems to have been shot in Western Australia and was registered at the proprietors of copyright on December14, 1906 (Fotheringham, 1987: 32). This footage can now be viewed at the National Film & Sound Archive in Canberra. The existing footage of "the Perth Fragment" includes Aaron Sherritt betraying the Kellys, and according to Routt, this film was based on either the play The Kelly Gang or the Career of Ned Kelly, the Ironclad Bushranger of Australia (1898) produced and written by Arnold Denham or Hands Up! Or Ned Kelly and His Gang or The Iron-Clad Bushranger (1903) produced by E. I. Cole (Routt, 2003a). Eric Irvin writes that The Kelly Gang (1898) ran at the Opera House for a further twenty-eight performances making thirty-five for its first production. It had a repeat run of eleven performances at the same theatre in 1907, having in the meantime played all over Australia‟ (Irvin, 1981: 82). Indicated by reviews, the play represented the Kellys as typical avengers who "kill for killing sake‟ (Routt, 2003a). The Mitchell Library currently holds the original manuscript of The Kelly Gang (1898). Denham‟s play had led to other plays that celebrated the subject of "lawlessness‟, and certainly, he could have inspired Cole's own Kelly play (Irvin, 1981: 82). Routt states that "it would not have been out of the question for Cole‟s company to have been touring with this production in Western Australia in 1906 – just as it would not be out of the question for Barry to have been in Western Australia with his "cold-blooded‟ Kelly revival the year before ...‟ (Routt, 2003a). "The Perth Fragment" was most likely titled "The Kelly Gang‟ and probably it was not a feature film. Most possibly, it was a short in the tradition of other bushranging films like Joseph Perry‟s Bush ranging in North Queensland (1904) and the American Western The Great Train Robbery (Edwin Porter, 1903). Routt describes the Gang from "the Perth Fragment‟ as "vile fellows, not like heroes at all‟ (Routt, 2003a). On the same evening as the Taits Melbourne premiere, a film titled The Kelly Gang seems to have premiered at the Hobart Town Hall; however, it is not known whether this was another copy of the Taits film or perhaps "the Perth Fragment" (Ina Bertrand and Routt, 2007: 36). It was presented by Dan Barry and Robert Hollyford.

From this we can surmise that, excluding Perry's 1904 production, it seems likely that the Tait and Johnson and Gibson film was associated with the film Barry and Hollyford included in their Tasmanian and Western Australian presentations. Why? Because of the available evidentiary coincidence and the fact that no evidence has been found to support any actual production by the latter. Until such information is found, the present author is left to assume that Barry and the Taits, as theatre distributors, had come to some sort of arrangement in regard to the December 1906 release of narrative film footage around the story of the Kelly gang. And what of this aforementioned notice by the Taits in the Mount Alexander Mail:

Items of News

This is rather strange, and it is unclear what it is trying to say or imply - is somebody using film that is not by Johnson and Gibson, released under the name of Tait; or is somebody using footage by Johnson and Gibson but not referring to Tait and releasing it in part or whole?..... The "unless submitted under their direction" simply states that they are the only distributors to be presenting such a film at this point in time - which perhaps is directed at Barry and his activities in Tasmania. And the reference to "moving pictures .... being selected by unauthorised persons" perhaps suggests that Barry and/or others have been presenting elements of The Story of the Kelly Gang in a manner similar to what Barry did in Hobart, i.e. not in full and without reference to the Taits.

Further adding to the confusion, was the statement contained in The North Western Advocate and Emu Bay Times of 28 January 1907, wherein Robert Hollyford addresses questions raised around the presentation by him of Barry of the show:

Dan Barry's Wonder Show.

As will be seen in our advertising columns, the above sterling combination pays Burnie a return visit to-night in the Town Hall. A packed house greeted them on their last visit, and so favorable was the impression left that no doubt a full home will welcome them again tonight. A complete change of pictures will be presented, and none of those shown on the previous visit will be repeated, except the fight for the champion ship of Australia between Squires and Kling. Another fight picture has been added to the company's repertoire since their last visit, and that is the contest between Squires and Williams, which is said to be a fine picture, and which will be shown tonight. New songs, both comic and sentimental, will be submitted by the artists of the company, and Mr Jack O'Kane will render some of his charming pianoforte compositions.

It having come to the ear of Mr Robt. Hollyford, the manager, that certain persons have been casting aspersions on his show, he wishes it to be known publicly that Messrs Barry end Hollyford hold the copyright of the sole Australian and British rights to the moving picture of "The Kelly Gang." Anyone can see the copyright by applying to Mr Hollyford at the Town Hall to-night.

By the end of January 1907 Barry and Hollyford were no longer advertising The Kelly Gang as part of the World-Wide Wonder Show program of cinematic presentations. It would therefore appear from the above, that the following series of events form a possible explanation.

From the late 1880s through to 1905 Dan Barry, an actor, was heavily involved in touring theatre productions throughout Australia, including a prominent and successful The Kelly Gang play. Newspaper reports also note Barry as being interested in the salacious and often controversial topics. By 1905 he had tired of performance, but not necessarily of touring. As such, his company ventured away from presenting plays and other theatre based productions into the new arena of cinema. As such, and being an experienced player in the field, he knew how to get jobs done, cut corners and put on a good show for the general public. Therefore, during 1906 he focussed on touring with a collection of film - shorts of all genres, including sport, news, documentary and drama. During that year he probably became aware of the success of his competitors in the field - namely the firm of J. & N. Tait with their Living London long form documentary film. He may therefore have made contact with the firm of Johnson & Gibson who operated a film exchange based in Melbourne. Barry's touring company was based in Melbourne and he quickly acquired a collection of film and equipment that he could use to supplement his traditional theatre presentations with cinematic elements. As a result, with the creation of his World-Wide Wonder Show he secured material from Johnson and Gibson and others, readying his company for the premiere Tasmanian tour during December 1906 through to February 1970. By some means he acquired some of the Johnson and Gibson The Story of the Kelly Gang material - perhaps a couple of reels of film - and included it in his programme. He was either oblivious to, or decided to ignore, the overriding copyright claim on all the footage by the Taits, and proceeded to present, claiming rather audaciously his own rights to the material whilst in Tasmania. This may have been genuine, if he legitimately secured the film from Johnson and Gibson - and this is reinforced by his official application to the Copyright Office of relevant copyright claims. However, at the end of the day, and by the end of January 1907, it would appear that the bigger, wealthier Taits organisation were able to override Barry's claim and he carried on the show without The Kelly Gang footage.

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7. The Case for the Taits

Living London, which brought together the partnership between J. & N. Tait and Johnson & Gibson – or, in other words, promotion with production – is perhaps most important for being an influential factor in the production of The Story of the Kelly Gang (Jackson 2009).

The present writer was not only able to find any specific contemporary references to the precise involvement of the Tait family in the actual making of The Story of the Kelly Gang during 1906. The only references available pertain to the role of J. & N. Tait as promoters and distributors between December 1906 and April 1907, financiers, provides of locations and employment of actors. It is stated in a Sydney article on 6 February 1907 that the film cost "nearly £1,000." It is unclear who funded the project beyond Gibson's initial £400 and prior to its Melbourne premiere. It would appear that when the Taits came on board, perhaps late in December 1906, or as early as July 1906, and upon identifying the success of the production, they supplied additional funding to help support the cost of film, prints off the negative, posters, machinery, production staff, and projectionists in touring the completed film. Some of these costs were also likely to have been born by Gibson & Johnson. Further statements regarding the Taits involvement were made during 1907 and are reproduced below, though most of the Tait family claims to much of the film arose only following the deaths of Gibson and Johnson. As such, the present author is skeptical as to the veracity of these claims. Unfortunately they largely persist. The most significant early references to the involvements of the Taits in the making of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906) includes referenced to their employment of some forty actors, likely as part of the series of additional filming dates referred to in a Brisbane article on 9 February 1907 article, which also states that by that stage the Taits has spent "over £1,000" on the film.

* 22 December 1906, The Argus, Melbourne.

The season will be continued at the Athenaeum, under the direction of J. and N. Tait.

* 27 January 1907, The Sunday Sun, Sydney. Notice of the Sydney release of the film.

......Messrs. Tait engaged some forty actors, actresses, and children to dress and enact their parts for the purpose of making a correct film, and when these people were fully rehearsed, they were taken to the exact localities where the different events occurred, and thus a replica of the different events was secured.

* 6 February 1907, Referee, Sydney. States that "....nearly £1,000 has been spent...." on the film.

* 9 February 1907, Courier, Brisbane. The film is "....said to have cost Messrs Tait over £1,000. They are now continually adding fresh scenes to the principal film, which is estimated to be over one mile in length. Over 60 people were employed ......"

* 1 March 1907, Mercury, Maitland. The film is "....over 4,000 feet in length and cost the Messrs. Tait over £1,000 to produce."

* 6 May 1907, New Zealand Times, Wellington. "....The whole picture is the exclusive property of Messrs. Tait as the subject was planned and executed under their supervision. The subject was carefully worked out in every detail, so that the moving picture should present a really reliable representation of the daring deeds of the notorious quartet of bushrangers."

* 7 May 1907, Mercury, Hobart. "...Messrs. Tait, who have the exclusive registered copyright of these pictures, have had six of them on tour through the states and New Zealand."

It would appear from the above that it seems J. & N. Tait came on board at the outset in the middle of 1906 and that, following the premiere, during January 1907 paid for the preparation of additional footage. This involved the 40 actors mentioned above, and the use by the Taits of part of the £1,000 they added in to their costs. This second stage of shooting, which would have also been undertaken by Gibson and company, may have taken place on the Tait properties. Stage 1 of the production involved Gibson and crew and, possibly, the Cole's Dramatic Company actors. There was also a Stage 3 which Gibson undertook in preparation for the release of the updated version of the film in 1910, and by which time the Tait's do not appear to have been involved in the film as before. Gibson and Johnson had control of the film from May 1907, in regard to editing and release.

In 1907 Gibson and Johnson made in collaboration with the Taits Robbery Under Arms, another five-reeler. It was based on Rolf Boldrewood's famous novel relating the adventures of Captain Starlight and premiered in October. During 1911 the two groups formed Amalgamated Pictures Limited and went on to make eleven films between 1911-12 and in 1918 (Gillard 2020). It therefore appears that, prior to his death in 1929, no claims to directorship of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906-10) was made by anyone other than William A. Gibson and his property manager Samuel Crews. The latter could perhaps be allocated the modern-day title of Second Unit Director.

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8. J. & G. Intertitles

No intertitles are known for the initial, December 1906 release of The Story of the Kelly Gang. In fact, within later reminiscences, Millard Johnson noted that in the Living London film that he, Gibson and the Taits toured successfully throughout 1906, there were no titles. However, when some of the reviews of The Story of the Kelly Gang noted how it was often difficult to follow in and of itself, it seems that the creators quickly realised that they needed to include intertitles. As it was, during that initial premiere season of December 1907 through to May 1907 the film was supplemented by (1) orchestra or other musical accompaniment; (2) narration in front of the screen, either as an introduction, or throughout the screening; (3) narration and sound effects behind the screen, to replicate the words and sounds which would have occurred if it was a sound production; and (4) the programme booklet which retailed for 6d. and contained an outline of the plot. As a result of this confusion, there were intertitles in the version shown in Hobart in May 1907, coinciding with the time at which Gibson & Johnson appeared to gain control of its distribution in Australia from J. & N. Tait. There were also intertitles in the revised 1910 edition. These are comprised of white, capitalised text (with a single exception) on a dark blue background, with a "J. & G." logo in the lower left corner. It is possible that the May 1907 intertitles were signified by the simple " J. & G." whilst the 1910 versions were encased in a circle. Known intertitles are listed below.

* 2006 NFSA restoration of the 1906 version, replicating the 1907 edition:

Death of Joe.
Police Burning the Hotel.
Steve and Dan Shoot Each Other.
Ned Kelly's Last Stand and Capture.

* 2012 The American Video Cellar edition of the 1907/1910 version:

Steve Hart.
Joe Byrne.
The Kellys' Home.
Police Searching for Kellys.
The First Camp in the Ranges.
Departure of Ned for Creegan's Shanty.
Return to the Camp. The Oath of Vengeance.
Death of Joe.
Police Burning the Hotel.
Steve and Dan Shoot Each Other.
Gallant Rescue by Father Rigney of the Platelayer [Not capitalised].
Ned Kelly's Last Stand and Capture.

It seems that these surviving prints are examples of where the film has been edited down to a single reel from the original five reel presentation, and now only running for approximately 20 minutes.

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9. Facts

There is much that is known about the film, much that is not known, and much that is mis-stated. The following is a list of so-called factual information, with the sources cited. The listing is arranged chronologically.

Millard Johnson was projecting film in the Melbourne area from the middle of 1901, under his banner of Edisonia.
Pre-production and production of The Story of the Kelly Gang occupies a period of 6 months prior to the premiere i.e., from late June to 26 December 1906.
The whole series of Pictures [i.e. the film] were taken by Messrs. Johnson and Gibson, for Messrs J. and N. Tait and are copyright throughout the world. (Promotional Booklet, 26 December 1906).
The Story of the Kelly Gang premieres at the Athenaeum and the Town Hall on Melbourne, and at Adelaide the Town Hall (26 December 1906).
"Mr Johnson and I claim to have made the first long picture in the world" (W. A. Gibson 1920).
Mr. Gibson photographed, directed, developed and finally projected the picture [The Kelly Gang], such a record remaining unequalled even to this day. (Everyone's 1923).
The Story of the Kelly Gang was photographed for J. & N. Tait by Johnson and Gibson (Reade, 1970, 29).
Orrie Perry filmed additional scenes in Studley Park, Melbourne, for the 1910 release (Reade, 1970, 29).
Elizabeth Veitch, wife of Charles Tait, played Kate Kelly (Reade, 1970, 30).
Most of the shooting was done at Charles Tait's property, Chartersville, Heidelberg (Reade, 1970, 30)
The stable shots were taken behind the present YMCA building in South Melbourne, or at the building used as a dark room by Johnson and Gibson (Reade, 1970, 30).
The tearing up of the railway line took place at Eltham, though Lady Tait stated it occurred at Rosanna (Reade, 1970, 29-30).
Charles, John, Frank and Ivan Tait all played extras in the film (Reade, 1970, 30).
Mrs Gibson, an excellent horse rider, appeared in the film (Reade, 1970, 30).
A Canadian in the Bland Holt Company played Ned Kelly in the early scenes, then disappeared (Reade, 1970, 30).
NFSA audio: Reginald Archer talks about his father, Haley Archer, who was an associate and friend of John Jack Cranston, who played the part of Steve Hart in the 1906 versions of 'The Story of the Kelly Gang.' Interview undertaken to prove authenticity of John Jack Cranston as the person who played Steve Hart in the 1906 version of the Story of the Kelly Gang. Reginald's father Harley Archer was a business partner and friend of John Cranston's. Interview is the history of John Cranston and Harley Archer employment and recollections of the filming of the 1906 film. (00:17:50) The second interview is about Able Kay (Snr). His son Able Kay (Jnr) is interviewed by Jack Cranston and states that his father "played a minor role in that story of The Kelly Gang film produced in 1906 by the J. and N. Tait Theatrical company of Melbourne on behalf of Messers. Johnson and Gibson in the confines of Melbourne and the outerlying areas of Templestowe and Mitcham".

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10. References

Allen, Julie K., Screening Europe in Australasia: Transnational Silent Film Before and After the Rise of Hollywood, University of Exeter Press, 2022, 482p.

Bertrand, Ina, Early Kelly Gang Films [video], Melbourne Cineastes Association Conference, 21 September 1980, duration: 62.17 minutes.

-----, Approaches to Australian Film: The Story of the Kelly Gang 1906 [seminar presentation], Series: Videocrit, Australian Film, Television and Radio School, 1982.

----- and William D. Routt, 'The picture that will live forever': The Story of the Kelly Gang, Series: The Moving Image, number 8, Australian Teachers of Media, St. Kilda, 2007, 197p.

Chomley, Charles Henry, The True Story of the Kelly Gang, Pater and Co., Melbourne, 1900.

Cranston, Jack, Kelly Truths, 1979, 4p.

----, The 1906 production of the Kelly Gang film, mss., 20 October 1982. Collection: NFSA.

-----, When flicks were flicks: The Kelly Gang film of 1906, Melbourne, circa 1985, 159p.

-----, The Flicks Circuit Man: Biography of John Jack Cranston 1882-1966, mss., 1987. Collection: NFSA.

-----, Interview with Reginald Archer, 1990. Collection: NFSA.

-----, The Story of the Kelly Gang Film, Glen Rowan Cobb & Co., Glenrowan, 2016, 188p.

Dexter, Gayne, When Australian Made "The Kelly Gang," Evening News, 8 October 1929.

Fotheringham, Richard, Light on a lost hoard, Time, 18 August 1986, 24-29.

-----, The Man in the Iron Mask, Cinema Papers, 62, 1987, 32-36.

Gaunson, Stephen, Ned Kelly & the Movies 1906-2003: Representation, Social Banditry & History, PhD thesis, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University, April 2010, 288p.

-----, The Ned Kelly Films: A Cultural History of Kelly History, Intellect Books, 2013, 132p.

Gibson Death Removes Australian Pioneer, The Film Daily, New York, 17 July 1929, 5.

Gibson, William A., Theatre Magazine, 1 June 1920. [Bertrand and Routt 2007]

Gillard, Gary, Australian Cinema - Producers, 2020.

Irvin, Eric, Ridiculing the Police, in Australian Melodrama, Hale & Iremonger, Sydney, 1981.

Jackson, Sally, The Living London Boom, Senses of Cinema, Issue 49, March 2009.

McGuire, Dan Australia' First Film, The ABC Weekly, 10 June 1944.

-----, Further Footnotes on the Kelly Gang film, The ABC Weekly, 7(10), 10 March 1945.

O'Neil, Josephine, It all began with a feature movie on the Kelly Gang, News, Adelaide, 18 November 1946.

O'Neil, Pat, The Kelly Gang on Location in the Bad Old Film Days, The Sun News Pictorial, Melbourne, 11 November 1939.

Percival, Jack, "Kelly Gang" film Began Era of "Feature" Pictures, The Sunday Herald, Sydney, 9 October 1949. [A comprehensive history of W.A. Gibson's involvement in the film industry.]

Pike, Andrew F., William Alfred Gibson (1869-1929), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Melbourne University Press, volume 8, 1981.

Reade, Eric, Early Australian Silent Film: A Pictorial History, 1896-1929, Lansdowne Press, Melbourne, 1970.

Routt, William D., Bush Westerns? The Lost Genre, at Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Melbourne, 3 February 2003.

Shirley, Graham and Sally Jackson, The Story of the Kelly Gang - Restoring the World's First Feature, National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, Canberra, 2023.

Stratton, David, The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906), Australian Cinema, ABC Television / YouTube, 16 November 2020, duration: 3.24 minutes.

Tait, Viola, A Family of Brothers. The Taits and J.C.Williamson; a Theatre History, Heinemann Australia 1971.

The Story of the Kelly Gang, National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, Canberra, DVD + Booklet, 2007.

Wikipedia, Bushranger Ban [webpage], accessed 20 May 2024.

-----, Charles Tait, ibid.

-----, Cole's Dramatic Company, ibid.

-----, Edward Irham Cole, ibid.

-----, Hands Up!, or Ned Kelly and His Gang (1900), ibid.

-----, Millard Johnson, ibid.

-----, Reel of film, ibid.

-----, Robbery Under Arms (1907), ibid.

-----, The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906), ibid.

-----, William A. Gibson, ibid.

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10. Acknowledgements

In the compilation of this work I would like to acknowledge assistance from Ray Edmondson and Sally Jackson, both formerly of the National Film & Sound Archive of Australia.

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Last updated: 22 August 2024

Michael Organ, Australia (Home)

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