Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1920 [PAGE 509]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

1919]

U N I V E R S I T Y OF I L L I N O I S

505

at the lowest possible cost, would be in their work of betterment and reform. Each year, in Illinois, there are more than 100 County Teachers Institutes, attended by more than 40,000 teachers. If this body of instructors could become enthusiastic for our University their influence would be immense. Heretofore this influence has not been especially guided our way. We think the teachers of Illinois should be induced by proper information and enthusiasm for their own, to boost all Colleges and educational institutions, but especially our own and their own University of Illinois. This would be a reasonable thing for them to do as they themselves help support it, but perhaps their attention has not been sufficiently directed that way. There are in Illinois several Hundred High Schools, attended by Thousands of pupils who are just ready to be persuaded that as soon as they graduate, their own University of Illinois offers them the advantages of a higher education in any line they may choose at a minimum cost. There are in Illinois 85 County and District Fairs whose managers would welcome an opportunity to present to more than a million patrons, a series of Exhibits along agricultural lines, which would thoroughly advertise the agricultural work of the University. The managers of the Chautauquas, Lyceum Bureaus, Farm Institutes and Horticultural meetings throughout the State would be glad to include an attractive University program as one of their entertainment features. During the War the United States Government used the Motion Picture films to spread American propaganda, and it was the most effective advertising known. There is a big opportunity in motion pictures to give broad publicity to the University of Illinois. It is claimed that 87% of what we know is acquired through the sense of seeing. The motion picture talks to each individual in his own language in a way that he can understand. The average human being cannot absorb easily complicated sentences, but the eye understands instantly; pictures move rapidly but the brain easily follows the story they tell. Well prepared moving pictures of the right kind, create more thought in the mind of the spectator than can be produced in any other way. Hence the success of the moving picture of today. We are trying to reach the minds of the people. We want them to think University of Illinois thoughts; let us do it in the most efficient way. The United States Department of Agriculture, Department of the Interior, Department of Commerce, and the Reclamation Service are all using the motion pictures to enlighten the people regarding their departmental work. The State of Illinois is using them to inform the people that the State Institutions for the insane, the Reform Schools, Penitentiaries, and all public charitable institutions, are being properly conducted; and by presenting them to vision they teach the people that their taxes paid to support such institutions are judiciously expended. Col. Whipp of the Department of Public Welfare sends literature throughout the State offer-