founders of the Paramount Pictures Corporation, and became its president.
The Fox Film Corporation and the Fox circuit of theaters are under control of another Hungarian Jew who is known to the American public as William Fox. His original name is said to have been Fuchs. He also began his artistic and managerial career by running a “penny arcade.” The penny arcade of 15 and 20 years ago, as most city-bred men will remember, was a “peep show” whose lure was lithographed lewdness but which never yielded quite as much pornography as it promised.
Fifteen years ago William Fox was in the clothes sponging business. He also is still in his early forties, is immensely wealthy, and one of the men who can pretty nearly determine what millions of movie fans shall think about certain fundamental things, what ideas and visions they shall entertain.
Marcus Loew also reached fame via the penny arcade and cheap variety vaudeville routes. He went into pictures and is now said to be the active head of 68 companies in various parts of the world. He is in the neighborhood of 50 years old. Loew controls the Metro Pictures Corporation.
The names of Marcus Loew and Adolph Zukor are closely linked in the history of the movies. Both were in the fur business, and both were partners in the first penny arcade venture. Zukor went the way of pictures exclusively, although he later made investments in Loew’s enterprises, but Loew went into variety and vaudeville of the type which is now to be found in the less desirable burlesque houses. From this he developed great entertainment enterprises which have made him a name and a fortune. The theaters he personally controls now number 105.
At the head of the Goldwyn Film Corporation is Samuel Goldwyn who is described as having been engaged “along mercantile lines” until motion pictures won his attention. In company with Jesse Lasky and Cecil DeMille he organized a $20,000 corporation in 1912. In 1916 he had prospered so greatly that he organized a $20,000,000 corporation with the Shuberts, A. H. Woods and the Selwyns, the purpose of this latter company being to screen the works of prominent
