industry of Hollywood is one of the four greatest industries of the world, and gives promise soon to be the leader of all.
There are 50 or more motion picture studios in Hollywood operating companies which employ approximately 15,000 to 80,000 persons, and having an annual payroll of $50,000,000. In the year just closed the industry expended $20,000,000 on material, and in total films produced spent $156,000,000. In the present year that great total, according to official advices, will be far greater.
That is the Hollywood of yesteryear.
The Hollywood of today is a different Hollywood.
Hollywood today holds a unique and anomalous position in the sight of the world. It has been referred to as the "Sodom of the Twentieth Century" and the "Paris of America," yet it is the home of two great non-profit, artistic community enterprises that distinguish it from any other community in America. These are the Hollywood Bowl, wherein thousands each night hear the glorious "Symphony 'Neath the Stars" in the summer bowl concerts, and the Pilgrimage Play, Life of Christ, because of which latter it has been rightly termed the "Oberamergau of America." Hollywood has 40 civic and improvement associations, all of which labor assiduously for the betterment of the community generally, and it has 14 grammar and high schools, with two other school buildings in construction, and it has 50 churches of various denominations and creeds. Because of the latter its citizenry refers to Hollywood as the "City of Churches."
Within its walls are the great Hollywood Community Chorus, composed of more than 1000 home vocalists, who once each week gather in the high school auditorium to sing old and new classics under the direction of Hugo Kirchhofer, and under the administration of Mrs. J. J. Carter, one of the most enthusiastic and widely known workers for higher things in art in Hollywood.
Five years ago Hollywood had a population of between 35,000 and 40,000. Today the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce estimates that population at 100,000, while super-enthusiasts boost the total considerably higher.
Hollywood, in brief, is a home place and, to the present time, has taken no drastic step toward industralization, but continues the residence center of the Southland.
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