This edited article about the Alsation dog originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 720 published on 1 November 1975.

Alsation dogs are used by the Austrian Mountain Rescue team, by James E McConnell

Probably the most easily recognisable dog of all is the Alsatian or German Shepherd dog. It is the national dog of Germany and the most popular breed of dog in the world.

The way the breed got its British name is interesting. During World War I in this country, anti-German feeling was intense. Anything remotely connected with Germany was suspect, even a dog! Hence the change of name from German Shepherd Dog to Alsatian (a native of Alsace) because it sounded less Teutonic.

The breed was created by one man, German cavalry officer Rittmeister von Stephanitz, who also bred sheepdogs. In 1899 he bought a dog which greatly appealed to him. It had all the qualities he admired, a handsome head, obvious intelligence and the look (plus ability) of a sheepdog. From this dog, all true Alsatians are descended.

They are happiest when they are working and Alsatians are preferred by every police force in the world to any other breed. The formidable combination of a policeman and his dog has been proved to be a strong deterrent to would-be criminals.

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This edited article about Romania and Transylvania originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 720 published on 1 November 1975.

Bram Stoker’s Dracula by Oliver Frey

When Bram Stoker’s horror novel, Dracula, first appeared in 1897, most of its readers took it for granted that the setting of the book, Transylvania, was a place conjured up by the author’s vivid imagination. The wild, mountainous land with its dark forests and remote villages in which superstitious peasants lived in terror of vampires and werewolves, sounded too eerie to be true.

Even the name “Transylvania” sounded as though it had been made up, and the scoffers agreed that anyone who believed such a place really existed would probably be gullible enough to believe in Count Dracula as well.

As it happened, Bram Stoker had based his masterpiece on a surprising amount of fact. As manager to the great Victorian actor, Sir Henry Irving, he was used to travel, drama and the sheer labour of writing fifty letters a day. But when at the age of 50 he came across the vampire legends of Eastern Europe he sensed instinctively that he had found the basis of a sensational and best-selling book.

At the time Bram Stoker was writing about it, Transylvania was an ancient principality, occupying the extreme Eastern part of Hungary. It was a high plateau, surrounded on all sides by the Transylvanian Mountains, a continuation of the Carpathians. During the 1st century, A.D. it had been a Roman province, but when the great Empire began to collapse and the legions withdrew for the last time, the Dark Age that descended on Britain also fell on Transylvania. Nobody was left to keep records, and for almost a thousand years the lonely plateau existed without a record of its history.

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This edited article about Rudolph Valentino originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 706 published on 26 July 1975.

Valentino as the eponymous Sheik on his Arab stallion in the desert sands (top right)

Kings make so many official visits that they learn to turn a blind eye when part of the ceremonial goes wrong. Even so, King Victor Emmanuel of Italy must have needed all his royal tact to avoid laughing when he inspected one of his country’s military academies on a summer’s day in 1909.

In those days, cavalry was still all important, and the lines of immaculately turned out troopers mounted on superb horses were only to be expected. What spoiled the whole effect was the sight of a 14-year-old boy, dressed in a uniform many sizes too large for him, his head almost hidden by a gilded helmet, sitting rigidly to attention on a small and shaggy donkey.

The King was probably amused, the crowd were certainly delighted. The only people who were furious were the staff of the Academy where young Rodolpho Alfonzo Raffaelo Pierre Filibert Guglielmi di Valentina d’Antonguolla was a pupil. As soon as the parade was over he was dragged before the principal and asked for an explanation.

He hadn’t meant to be disrespectful, Rodolpho explained. But as a punishment for careless work he had been banished to his dormitory and his clothes confiscated just to make sure he would not be able to attend the parade. Determined to see His Majesty at all costs, he had searched everywhere for clothes, and an old, full-sized uniform had been all he could find.

“But what about the donkey?” his masters demanded. Rodolpho had an answer to that question too. By the time he had escaped from the Academy all the roads had been closed to pedestrians, and a donkey had been the only mount available.

Perhaps today such a story would have been accepted as a good joke, but discipline was discipline in 1909, and Rodolpho Guglielmi, one day to be world famous as film star Rudolph Valentino, was promptly expelled. Although he went to another Academy, to his family’s bitter disappointment he never did become a cavalry officer, passing out in 1913 with a diploma from an agricultural college instead. It was a time when thousands of young Italians dreamed of making their fortune in the United States, and Rodolpho was as keen to see the world as the next man. Accordingly, with his diploma for agriculture in his pocket, he headed hopefully for New York.

But nobody seemed interested in his diploma, so pocketing his pride he settled down to give dancing lessons. Also, for the benefit of the Americans, he altered his name to Rudolph Valentino.

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This edited article about fencing originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 704 published on 12 July 1975.

A bout with the foils

Many fencers call their sport “high speed chess” because you cannot win a proper sword fight without thinking out your moves several steps ahead of your opponent.

The dashing film actor Errol Flynn, who did as much as anybody to popularise fencing with his many exciting swashbuckling roles, once said he felt more like a ballet-dancer than an actor when rehearsing a fight sequence for the screen.

“Every move you make has to be according to a plan,” he said. “It’s worse than remembering lines – that’s why nobody ever speaks in the course of a fight.”

Duelling with swords – outlawed in Britain since the early 19th century – has a very long history. The Ancient Egyptians of over 3,000 years ago made temple carvings of men fencing.

Originally, of course, it was developed as part of the training soldiers needed to remain alive in the heat of battle and set “moves” taught to them were still being used by cavalrymen in training drills in the Victorian era.

No man armed with only a sabre could have hoped to have lived long in the Battle of Waterloo or survived the Charge of the Light Brigade without being so efficient at what is called the “Cut, thrust, parry” of swordsmanship, that he could do it in his sleep.

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This edited article about Randolph Hearst originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 700 published on 14 June 1975.

THE CLEANSING OF NEW YORK. The long arm of the law holds Joseph Pulitzer and Randolph Hearst by their collars above the skyline of New York, by Louis Dalrymple

The Hollywood guests assembled in the great hall. Gaudy Spanish banners hung 22 feet above them from a ceiling that once graced a palace in Brescia. Suits of armour stood in grim parade around the oak walls. A long table edged with medieval chairs beckoned with sparkling, cut glass and glinting candelabra.

The amiable chatter ceased. In the expectant hush on the stroke of 7.30 p.m., their host appeared, stepping through a panel set in a 16th century choir stall. A big, dominating man with hard features exuding the power that only millions can provide: William Randolph Hearst, newspaper tycoon, master of the sensational smear campaign, the Press king who revolutionised journalism with blaring banner headlines in black, red and even emerald green ink, the “Lord of San Simeon” – the fortified Spanish-style castle that he had carved out of solid rock, 200 miles from Los Angeles.

It was there that Hearst loved to entertain Hollywood stars, directors and producers on a scale that a Roman Emperor would have envied. They could hunt buffalo on its 240,000 acres, in area bigger than Bedfordshire, fish, send falcons after their prey or swim in the castle pool inlaid with gold. They arrived either by air, touching down on San Simeon’s airstrip, or by train over Hearst’s private railway.

He imposed only two rules on his visitors: they had to gather in the 100-foot long great hall for his staged entry every night and the word “death” must never be uttered in his presence.

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This edited article about Charlie Chaplin originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 688 published on 22 March 1975.

Charlie Chaplin

The Canteen Theatre in Aldershot was an entertainer’s nightmare and many regarded an engagement there as a week of terror. Most of the audience were soldiers who simply came to jeer. One night a charming lady singer got “the bird” when her voice cracked and became a mere whisper, and she was howled off stage.

The stage manager was a friend of hers and, recalling that her five-year old son had proved a good comedian in front of his mother’s friends at home, decided to gamble to keep the curtain up. He sent on the little boy.

Out went the toddler to appease the soldiers, and when he sang them a song called Jack Jones they started throwing money on the stage. He stopped singing and announced that he would pick it up first and sing again afterwards, which earned him his first laugh. Charlie Chaplin, now Sir Charlie, was on his way to the top.

But fame did not come at once for, from that night onwards, his life was bleak in the extreme for many years. He had been born in 1889 and brought up by his loving mother. When he was not roaming the shabby streets of South London, he was flitting from job to job, including selling newspapers, making toys, and acting as a doctor’s errand boy.

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This edited article about the cinema originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 685 published on 1 March 1975.

Count Dracula by Oliver Frey

Pioneer film-maker Georges Melies was astonished!

He had begun by viewing film he had developed after shooting a street scene in front of the Paris Opera House. Then he found to his amazement that a bus had changed into a hearse before his eyes. He realised that the camera had jammed for a few seconds and the flow of film had been interrupted, accidentally causing this extraordinary effect.

It was the beginning of all cinematograph trickery: films of fantasy were born!

Between 1896 and 1897, more than a dozen film halls were opened in the centre of Paris and movies were much in demand.

Wearying of the somewhat stereotyped programmes provided by the American pioneer, Thomas Edison, the public flocked to see the imaginative fantasy films created by former stage illusionist Melies, who came to be known as the Magician of the Screen, the King of Phantasmagoria.

Recognised as his masterpiece and a major achievement in the first decade of moving pictures, was “A Trip to the Moon” (1902), which he adapted from stories by Jules Verne and H.G. Wells. It is full of invention and the first screen version of science fiction and interplanetary travel. Using the camera’s full bag of tricks – the fade, the dissolve, double and multiple exposure, fast, slow and stop motion, he produced incredible effects.

By 1908, films everywhere were taking on a more sophisticated look and Melies fell from favour, but he must always be regarded as the father of the supernatural fantasy film.

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This edited article about the American cinema originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 684 published on 22 February 1975.

Bonnie and Clyde are ambushed

In the cosmopolitan cities of the United States, with their mixed races and nationalities, violence speedily became established as a way of life. The early film-makers realised this and a string of films were made which turned men like the trio above into a part of the Hollywood legend.

The big, black saloon swerves and skids around a corner at top speed, bullets spraying from a flung-open door. Bodies slump on to the pavement as, one by one, the members of the rival gang are eliminated.

“Cut!”

The director gives this instruction to stop filming and the “dead” men get up and dust themselves down, ready for another “take”, this time in close-up.

A gangster film is in the making, but this scene is not just a figment of a screen-writer’s imagination; it was happening in many cities across America in the early Thirties when crime had reached a frightening peak.

Gang warfare was front-page news and Warner Brothers’ Company in Hollywood, sensing that the public would appreciate seeing reality, however harsh, in their pictures, decided on a new policy. Movies based on headline items in the newspapers would henceforth be given top priority.

In 1930, they made “Little Caesar”, starring Edward G. Robinson. It was an instant success and started a cycle of gangster films which were immensely popular both in America and in Britain.

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This edited article about the Western originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 680 published on 25 January 1975.

John Ford’s favourite outdoor location is Monument Valley which spreads over Utah and Arizona

The hot, dusty street is deserted, the stillness broken only by the creak of a rusty saloon sign, gently swinging.

A lone cowboy, hand poised over gun-holster, walks slowly into view. From the shadows emerges a dark, menacing figure.

The classic Western confrontation scene, the showdown, is about to be played – a scene so familiar that it has often been parodied, yet it remains part of an action pattern, a ritual which seldom fails to grip an audience.

The story of the Western is nearly as old as the Cinema itself.

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This edited article about Walt Disney originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 678 published on 11 January 1975.

Donald Duck and Goofy are famous Disney cartoon characters

Mention the phrase ‘Cartoon film’, and the chances are that most people will immediately bring to mind the name of Walt Disney.

For the cartoon films of this delightful film maker have been charming audiences of all ages ever since the first sound films appeared in the cinemas in 1928.

Walter Elias Disney was born at Chicago on December 5th, 1901. Trained as a commercial artist, he went to Hollywood in 1923. There, he built his first studio, in a garage, and drew animal cartoons. It was when he created one particular animal cartoon, Mickey Mouse, in 1928, that the garage developed into a huge film factory in order to keep pace with the sudden demand for Disney productions. Soon, Disney was employing hundreds of draughtsmen and controlling his own studios.

Mickey Mouse, the most famous of Disney’s creations, was followed by Donald Duck, Pluto, and Goofy.

In 1932 Disney began to make short colour films, featuring all these and a host of other characters from nature in his musical Silly Symphonies, of which Three Little Pigs is the most famous.

In 1938, Disney brought all the wit, brilliance and beauty of his film techniques to his first full-length musical cartoon film, Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs. This was followed by the moral fantasy Pinocchio. In 1942 came Dumbo, the baby elephant and Bambi, the baby deer. But a year before this, Disney produced his most ambitious creative work, Fantasia in which he set patterns and stories to eight pieces of classical music.

In 1948 he produced the first in a series of brilliant factual nature films.

In 1955 Disney opened a huge amusement park in Anaheim, California, with scenery and characters based on some of his films. He called it Disneyland, and today, eight years after his death, the park, together with the films which are being shown over and over again, both in cinemas and on the television, continue to give pleasure and delight to millions of people all over the world.