Motion Pictures, 1912-1939, is a cumulative catalog listing works registered in the Copyright Office in Classes L and M between August 24, 1912, and December 31, 1939. Prior to that period motion pictures were registered in the category of photographs. These earlier works have not been included in this catalog because of the difficulty of identifying the motion pictures so registered.

The information given in each entry for the motion pictures in this catalog has been obtained from the record books of the Copyright Office, the original application for the registration of the copyright claim, and descriptive material deposited with the application and film in the Copyright Office at the time of registration. In addition, when these sources indicated that a particular motion picture was based on a published book or story or on a previously existing dramatic work, the name of the author and the title of such work have been verified, when possible, by reference to the records of the Copyright Office and the Official Catalog of the Library of Congress. Information from other reference tools was supplied in the entry only in the case of missing numbers and titles of parts of a serial, and in the few cases when that occurred the number or title is given in brackets. The descriptive material mentioned above is not available for all films. The film itself could not be examined because, in the case of published motion pictures, it was the policy to return the film to the claimant as soon as registration was completed, and in the case of unpublished motion pictures only representative prints taken from the film were deposited.

Each entry contains information which 1) is descriptive of the film, and 2) identifies the copyright claimant and the author of the motion picture as given in the application, the date on which the term of copyright began, and the copyright registration number. The descriptive portion of the entries varies considerably in fullness, depending on the completeness of the information contained in the sources used.

In the case of each entry the name of the copyright claimant is that given at the time of registration. Any information relating to renewal copyrights or to subsequent changes of ownership recorded in the Copyright Office can be ascertained upon request and upon payment of the statutory search fee to the Register of Copyrights. In addition, information relating to renewal copyrights can be secured by referring to the Catalog of Copyright Entries covering the period in which the renewal registration was made.

In the case of unpublished works the entry contains the date of the deposit of the title, description, and prints. For published works the entry contains the date of publication, rather than the date of the deposit of the copies (or copy, as the case may be). Deposit of the published copies has, however, been made as shown by the records in the Copyright Office.

This catalog is a part of the Catalog of Copyright Entries: Cumulative Series. The publication of these catalogs is authorized by sections 210 and 211 of Title 17 of the United States Code. Section 210 provides in part: "The current catalog of copyright entries and the index volumes herein provided for shall be admitted in any court as prima facie evidence of the facts stated therein as regards any copyright registration."

The purpose of these catalogs is three-fold: 1) to meet the administrative needs of the Copyright Office; 2) to provide the legal profession, publishers, authors, and others interested in copyright easily consulted, compact index volumes listing the registrations in the several classes of works; and 3) to produce reference tools useful to libraries, to industry, and to research personnel by making available in printed form bibliographical information on record in the Copyright Office, much of which is not available elsewhere.

Of the same nature as the present Catalog of Copyright Entries: Cumulative Series, but issued before the series was established, is the two-volume work, Dramatic Compositions Copyrighted in the United States, 1870-1916. Supplemental volumes to this earlier work and to the present work are under consideration, as well as cumulative volumes for other classes of material.

Catalog entries for motion pictures registered subsequent to 1939 and for copyright renewals which have been or are presently being registered are available in the issues of the Catalog of Copyright Entries, covering the particular period of registration. A description (including price and instructions for ordering) of each part of the present Third Series, published semiannually, and of other publications of the Copyright Office, will be found in a list at the back of this volume.

The Copyright Office welcomes inquiries, suggestions, and comments on the content and organization of any of its catalogs. Please address communications of this nature to the Chief of the Cataloging Division, Copyright Office, Library of Congress, Washington 25, D. C.

Copyright Registrations of Motion Pictures

Class M contains many animated cartoons and newsreels as well as nontheatrical films. The letter P or U has been added to the class symbol preceding the registration number for each entry to indicate whether the respective film was registered as a published or as an unpublished work.