YESTERDAY'S NEWSREEL - ACTORS STRIKE OF 1919 FIRST U.S. AIRMAIL HALIFAX EXPLOSION

Television highlights of the news of yesteryear. Words take wings. May 15th, 1918. And in the nation's capital, US mail heads for its first trip by air. The load is 136 lb. Destination, the city of New York. President Wilson adds prestige and a letter to the event and chats with pilot G. L. Boyle. Boyle is off, but he follows the wrong railroad tracks and 25 mi south of Washington, cracks up. At Belmont Park, New York, May 15th, Postmaster Thomas Patton hands 144 lb of mail for Washington to pilot Torrey Webb, destined to do better than Boyle. Patton commemorates the occasion with a send-off speech. On display are the first stamps for US mail by air, and into the air goes the first airmail plane to complete a scheduled flight. An hour later at Bustleton, the Philadelphia terminus, Webb lands for refueling and the first hop is finished. Mechanics check the ship for necessary overhauling and find it undamaged. With pilot J. C. Edgerton at the controls, the mail wings its way to Washington. Here is the completion of a 218-mi journey by air, the first of its kind in America. Edgerton and the mail come through. July 1924, and over San Francisco go, the first transcontinental airmail reaches its destination. In planes flimsy as postcards, US pilots span the nation in short hop relays, and an inspired nation applauds these brave pioneers. Here's Bert Acosta celebrating with Eddie Rickenbacker and friends. July 1st, 1925, and the first flight by night links Chicago and New York. Postmaster New officiates as overnight service is launched between America's two largest cities. In Boston, July 1st, 1926, mail takes to the air for New York. Governor Fuller plays postman with the first mail to leave Massachusetts by plane. Pilot for the initial jump is Leroy Thompson. And another air route opens as mail from Beantown flies to the boroughs of New York. The post office, Dallas, 1926. First airmail from Texas gets a rapid stamping and heads for the plane and Chicago. Here is pilot Herbert Kindred. For the first time, mail from the cattle country wings toward the Windy City. Airmail spans the sea. From Miami, a flying boat arrives at Panama, February 13th, 1929, at the end of airmail's first flight over open water. The pilot is Lindy, just 2 years after his history-making hop of the Atlantic. Yes, it's Colonel Charles A. Lindbergh doing new wonders with wings. That was yesterday. The airmail planes of 1918 are toys compared with the winged giants of today. Today, out of New York's LaGuardia Airport, planes weighing tons carry hundreds of pounds of mail for thousands of miles. Gone are dilapidated trucks, precarious equipment. Modern ships are built to carry mail and passengers swiftly, safely, and for distances pioneer airmen never dared to dream. But history will not forget the men in leather suits and goggles who flew the single-engine crates and box kites to blaze the path that men now fly. Revolt of the Thespians. August 1919, and Broadway actors put on a show that's no act. They're offstage and on strike. 37 plays close, 16 new ones fail to open as actors take a walk. Outside strike headquarters at 160 West 45th Street, players who stopped the show stopped traffic, too. Francis Wilson, president of Equity, argues his case in the most unusual strike ever seen in America. Actor Bruce McRae sounds off as to why the show must not go on. And after 30 days of this, Equity wins. The strike's off, and strike leader Frank Gilmore says, "Let's go back to work and play." Bernard Macfadden at 60. In sculptor's studio, he displays his famous physique. It's 1928, and they're making a statue of the man who founded physical culture healing through physical culture. His famous face gets a pasting reminiscent of the custard pie comedy of a decade before. The set plaster comes off at last. Bernard Macfadden is a picture of the health he preaches. The star of The Perils of Pauline wasn't always in danger. Here's Pearl White, the girl from the Ozarks, aboard ship at the height of her career. Happy sailing and no perils, Pearl White. Banker J. P. Morgan at Bath, Maine, in 1930 for the launching of his 343-ft pleasure craft, Corsair, here in dry dock. The largest of its kind, it cost $2,500,000. Its displacement is 2,000 tons. Morgan escorts his daughter to the Corsair's bow for the launching ceremony. Cost of operation is high, but Morgan remarked that if you worried about that, you had no right to a yacht. During the war, the Corsair joined the Navy and renamed the Oceanographer, saw service in the Pacific area. But in 1930, financier Morgan was all set for smooth sailing. Holocaust at Halifax. December 6th, 1917. The vessel Imo rams the munition ship Mont Blanc, and a violent explosion wrecks harbor and city alike. Dead in the rubble are 1,226, with 400 missing and 4,000 hurt. 3,000 homes are damaged or destroyed. Canadian troops take over as martial law is declared in the devastated city, and volunteer rescue squads bring victim after victim out of the wreckage of homes and buildings. Men dig in search for more. From the North Station railroad yard, debris is carted away and tracks cleared to make way for faster rescue operations. Swift action by rescue squads saved many lives, but so sudden was the blast that hundreds on the waterfront never had a chance. Here survivors tell Canadian troops how they managed to live through the fire and the fury at Halifax, Nova Scotia. The blast that rocked the city and shocked the world. Toe tap time in the '20s. It's a shuffling foxtrot and a bear hug grip as dancers who knew their stuff in those days do the Raggedy Ann. A doll with the same name is responsible for the craze. So, you were really up on your toes when you did the Raggedy Ann. Now, it's the tangolio, a combination foxtrot and tango with a deep dipping motion. Yes, you not only went dancing with your beau in the '20s, you also went for a dip. Photos by wire, a famous first. Bell Lab technicians study apparatus that will send this picture from Cleveland to New York by wire. It's 1924, and years of experimentation and research are about to bear fruit. In Cleveland, the picture is placed in the light scanning area and is sent by light waves over cross-country wire to its destination. In a dark room in New York, exposed film is removed and prepared for developing. In the developer, the picture that came through wires is coming up. The job's a success. Telephone company technicians ring up another achievement for Alexander Graham Bell. In case you don't recognize that teak when you see it, this Balinese dance gives you a clue. Batik, originally woven and exotically dyed by the Balinese, became a popular American fashion fad in 1919. It took Balinese patience and skill to create this floral pattern batik. It took double joints and the jitters to do this dance. Definitely, she's batty about batik. Well, anyway, she's batty. Remember the Bunion Derby? Well, here's C.C. Pyle who promoted it. It's May 26, 1928 and Bunion Derbyists who started in Los Angeles 84 days earlier enter New York at the end of a 3,000 mile walk. 55 contestants are close to the finish now. And in Madison Square Garden, they swivel hip several turns around the track before breaking the tape. And the winner is Andrew Payne of Claremore, Oklahoma. The first prize, $25,000. Travers Island, 1927. Princeton Cornell against Oxford Cambridge in the 100-yard dash. Hand of Princeton is favored to win, but Garth Wilkinson stays with him. Wilkinson falls, but beyond the tape. The winner by a wink, Garth Wilkinson of England. The pole vault. It's Ben Hedges of Princeton at 12:03, a record. John Collier of Cornell tops the crossbar to win the event and set a high of 12:06. 120-yard high hurdles. Second from right is Ben Hedges again, who took second in the pole vault, won the broad jump, and is jumping fences toward another blue ribbon. The time, 15 and 8/10 seconds. The winner, why, of course, it's Ben Hedges of Princeton.