Till It Helps!

Creator: Premier Film & Recording Studio

Format: 16mm

Sound: sound

Description: How the United Fund intervenes to help poor residents of St. Louis. With rare footage of low-income residential areas in the late 1950s.,

[Much of the footage from this film was in another film made for the United Way]

1959 St. Louis; footage of United Way of Greater St. Louis services for elderly, disabled, sick, and impoverished.

Young boy with back to camera lying in crib begins to cry; title credits superimposed over shot; nurse room and flips on light and checks up on crying boy in crib.

CU old woman eating with a spoon; LS woman using her can gets up from table with box of cereal on it.

High-angle shot looking down downtown St. Louis street in 1950s, Mercantile Trust Co. sign along right side of frame.

Old woman walking with walker assisted by a nun followed by other old women and nurses and nuns pushing old women in wheel chair through the corridor

Little girl with cerebral palsy trying to walk, camera slowly zooms to CU little girl with cerebral palsy

CU young boy's legs strapped into heavy braces of metal and leather, slow pan up struggling to control his arms while trying to exercise on weight machine, nurse stands by weight machine watching boy

Pan over room with children with cerebral doing physical therapy with nurses.

Pan over greater St. Louis in 1959.

St. Louis city bus speeds past camera, man walks out of building and dodges 1950s cars cross street toward camera; VS following older man walk down busy St. Louis sidewalks; VS busy St. Louis, MO sidewalks in 1959.

Two elderly Jewish couples walk down front steps of house; VS Golden Age Club with elderly seated at various tables playing different games; two old men playing checkers

High-angle pan over St. Louis.

VS St. Louis slums in 1959

CU bricks on street along curb, group of boys enter frame and pick up bricks; tracking shot interracial gang of 5 teenage boys walking up sidewalk toward camera holding bricks
Crouching teenage boy wearing white t-shirt and backwards hat stands up and throws a brick; cuts to boy in baseball uniform throwing a pitch

MS boy about 12 to 13 years old using a drill, United Fund Agencies sign above power drill.

Pan over St. Louis, Missouri

Children playing on playground, little girls riding tricycles, nun supervises children on slide.

VS tornado

Young child enters from bottom of frame carrying a doll in hand walks up steps and tries to open door; MS back of child as she tries to open door, little girl knocks; sign for Family and Childrens Serves of Greater St. Louis with Closed sign taped diagonally over it; front door to the Lighthouse For the Blind St. Louis Society for the Blind with Closed sign placed inside door; Closed sign hanging from bottom of sign pointing toward entrance to Washington University Clinics

Young child about 10 years old wearing hospital gown lying in hospital bed reaches for glass of water, takes drink, and lies back down, nurse enters frame and checks up on little child who smiles at nurse; dissolves to same little girl in bed at home, walls around child's bed smeared with dirt, child is filthy

Disembodied hands raise plastic protective bubble over child sucking its thumb, oxygen tank beside child's hospital bed

09:59:27:27 tracking shot down rows of old women in wheel chairs.

09:59:32:19 Great shot nurses wearing sanitary masks walk toward camera holding babies in their arms

09:59:41:12 sad looking child with leg in cast lying in hospital bed holding toy in hand, nurse hands child a ball and tries to turn his head; CU young girl with cerebral palsy.

• 3:33:30- 3:46:42
We view a trash man on a side street in a poor neighborhood in Saint Louis, Missouri. Cut to the backs of row houses and then to piles of trash in an empty lot.

• 3:52:20- 3:59:15
Interesting shot of young "hoodlums" (three white and two African American boys) walking down a St. Louis street (in a lower income residential area) carrying bricks.

worth noting: short but interesting shot of African-American and white children playing on a playground (6:28:09- 6:32:25). Cusp of the 1960s.

We digitized and uploaded this film on behalf of the Prelinger Archives. Email us at footage@avgeeks.com if you have questions about the footage and are interested in using it in your project.

,

[Much of the footage from this film was in another film made for the United Way]

1959 St. Louis; footage of United Way of Greater St. Louis services for elderly, disabled, sick, and impoverished.

Young boy with back to camera lying in crib begins to cry; title credits superimposed over shot; nurse room and flips on light and checks up on crying boy in crib.

CU old woman eating with a spoon; LS woman using her can gets up from table with box of cereal on it.

High-angle shot looking down downtown St. Louis street in 1950s, Mercantile Trust Co. sign along right side of frame.

Old woman walking with walker assisted by a nun followed by other old women and nurses and nuns pushing old women in wheel chair through the corridor

Little girl with cerebral palsy trying to walk, camera slowly zooms to CU little girl with cerebral palsy

CU young boy's legs strapped into heavy braces of metal and leather, slow pan up struggling to control his arms while trying to exercise on weight machine, nurse stands by weight machine watching boy

Pan over room with children with cerebral doing physical therapy with nurses.

Pan over greater St. Louis in 1959.

St. Louis city bus speeds past camera, man walks out of building and dodges 1950s cars cross street toward camera; VS following older man walk down busy St. Louis sidewalks; VS busy St. Louis, MO sidewalks in 1959.

Two elderly Jewish couples walk down front steps of house; VS Golden Age Club with elderly seated at various tables playing different games; two old men playing checkers

High-angle pan over St. Louis.

VS St. Louis slums in 1959

CU bricks on street along curb, group of boys enter frame and pick up bricks; tracking shot interracial gang of 5 teenage boys walking up sidewalk toward camera holding bricks
Crouching teenage boy wearing white t-shirt and backwards hat stands up and throws a brick; cuts to boy in baseball uniform throwing a pitch

MS boy about 12 to 13 years old using a drill, United Fund Agencies sign above power drill.

Pan over St. Louis, Missouri

Children playing on playground, little girls riding tricycles, nun supervises children on slide.

VS tornado

Young child enters from bottom of frame carrying a doll in hand walks up steps and tries to open door; MS back of child as she tries to open door, little girl knocks; sign for Family and Childrens Serves of Greater St. Louis with Closed sign taped diagonally over it; front door to the Lighthouse For the Blind St. Louis Society for the Blind with Closed sign placed inside door; Closed sign hanging from bottom of sign pointing toward entrance to Washington University Clinics

Young child about 10 years old wearing hospital gown lying in hospital bed reaches for glass of water, takes drink, and lies back down, nurse enters frame and checks up on little child who smiles at nurse; dissolves to same little girl in bed at home, walls around child's bed smeared with dirt, child is filthy

Disembodied hands raise plastic protective bubble over child sucking its thumb, oxygen tank beside child's hospital bed

09:59:27:27 tracking shot down rows of old women in wheel chairs.

09:59:32:19 Great shot nurses wearing sanitary masks walk toward camera holding babies in their arms

09:59:41:12 sad looking child with leg in cast lying in hospital bed holding toy in hand, nurse hands child a ball and tries to turn his head; CU young girl with cerebral palsy.

• 3:33:30- 3:46:42
We view a trash man on a side street in a poor neighborhood in Saint Louis, Missouri. Cut to the backs of row houses and then to piles of trash in an empty lot.

• 3:52:20- 3:59:15
Interesting shot of young "hoodlums" (three white and two African American boys) walking down a St. Louis street (in a lower income residential area) carrying bricks.

worth noting: short but interesting shot of African-American and white children playing on a playground (6:28:09- 6:32:25). Cusp of the 1960s.

We digitized and uploaded this film on behalf of the Prelinger Archives. Email us at footage@avgeeks.com if you have questions about the footage and are interested in using it in your project.

Complete Record: How the United Fund intervenes to help poor residents of St. Louis. With rare footage of low-income residential areas in the late 1950s., [Much of the footage from this film was in another film made for the United Way] 1959 St. Louis; footage of (more…), [Much of the footage from this film was in another film made for the United Way] 1959 St. Louis; footage of (more…)NOTE: Two (or more) records have been merged together to create this data.

Transcription

[Music] what is so terrible about a child screaming why should it disturb us just because we happen to be there to hear it there are children suffering everywhere there are thousands of children and there are old people too who shrivel and waste away like grass Without Rain because they're alone and so few of us seem concerned or even to know they are the lost the helpless the Hopeless everywhere why do these things disturb us because they happen in our prosperous City of St Louis why should there be so many who need help in St Louis in 1959 there are many reasons there are the sick The Afflicted this is a child with cereal py sometimes she screams at night the world is usually Beyond her even in the Small Things body hands legs mouth will not obey the Mind cannot control it's hard to make herself understood she cannot without help without love without training do many of the simplest things every child takes for granted never even thinks about with care money professional training with the new techniques there is hope for the victims of cerebral py without these things the world is just too much who else needs help in Greater St Louis and prosperous [Music] 1959 in the center of the stream the current is Swift it is not for eyes and legs that have grown weak hands that shake things slip past the world Falls gradually away and sometimes it's hard to realize that they're gone savings livelihood friends loved ones families scatter or too poor to help there were days but that was long ago where he go who needs an old man even in civilized St Louis in 1959 Prosperity is for those who have money or can earn it but in St Louis in 1959 there are also Pleasant backwaters gentle shs United Fund homes for the Aged in which old people can rest and watch the race go by there are golden age clubs where they can find company and activity suited to their pace and friends like themselves who else who else cries however silently for help those who are crippled in different ways who must live in the jungles for man makes his own jungles at least as cruel as Nature's in any jungle man-made laws don't count for much you can't survive alone you have to run with the pack and when a pack runs there are always enemies they are not stopped they are not shown some other way of life some other way to use their energies what'll happen they can learn that all men are not their enemies in some place where they can learn by example where they are made welcome where they can play and work and belong how long does the role go on who else in St Louis needs help the child who's working mother cannot keep her during the day the individual ual [Music] disaster a community disaster many thousands and each problem is different which is the most terrible none of these the most terrible hasn't happened yet it would be to need the help that the 122 agencies of the United Fund can give and to find no Open Door no willing ear no outstretched hand what would happen then our nation was organized to promote the general welfare our religion says Love Thy Neighbor how will it be with nation state and religion if we prove these ideals to be lies how would it be with our city and our homes a great dramatist has defined the essential element of tragedy as being that which could have been prevented if a child should die from an unpreventable and incurable disease and there was no way she could have been saved then it certainly would be a very sad and terrible event but if that child could have been saved but for our neglect or our laziness or our lack of generosity then that is a tragedy don't let these tragedies happen in St Louis the 122 agencies of the United Fund are ready experienced and eager to help if you will only back them up please give till it helps please give your fair share at least an hour's pay per month please do it now