Silent films to encore in Dartmouth-backed lobby card project

In this December 2022 photo, collector Dwight Cleveland holds a lobby card from his extensive collection. He has entered an agreement with Dartmouth College to digitize his silent movie-era lobby cards for preservation and publication. Image courtesy of Dwight Cleveland.
In this December 2022 photo, collector Dwight Cleveland holds a lobby card from his extensive collection. He has entered an agreement with Dartmouth College to digitize his silent movie-era lobby cards for preservation and publication. Image courtesy of Dwight Cleveland.
In this December 2022 photo, collector Dwight Cleveland holds a silent movie-era lobby card from his extensive collection. He has entered an agreement with Dartmouth College to digitize his lobby cards for preservation and publication. Image courtesy of Dwight Cleveland.

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – Missing Millions is a 1922 silent film with a darkly prescient title – like the vast majority from that era, the movie all but vanished in the ensuing century, survived mostly by lobby cards. Scarcely bigger than letter paper, the cards promoted the cinematic romances, comedies and adventures of early Hollywood. More than 10,000 of the images that once hung in movie theater foyers are now being digitized for preservation and publication, thanks to an agreement between Chicago-based collector Dwight Cleveland and Dartmouth College that all started when he ran into a film professor at an academic conference in New York.

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