Whats some good vintage research material for Film History

[J. A. Boschen]

I hope everyone here enjoyed the holiday season, and of course had a fun New Years. I was curious, What is some good research material of yester year to do film history research with. What I am referring to are actuall trade advertisement type material. I know of the Film Daily Motion Picture Yearbooks (where I had a chance to buy one from the early 1940's for thirty dollars at an antique shop and didn't because I did not know at the time what it was :mad: ) but what else was there.
I am assuming that the studios released books as well as I have seen a 1930's Columbia Pictures Yearbook on sale on ebay for a huge price. Surely there must be other sources for research out there.

[Bugsmer]

You might want to read old issues of magazines published from around the time you want to focus on. Often, they'll throw in a name that you'll not have heard of too frequently. Popular Mechanics was a good one for showcasing the technical apparatus used in making cartoons. You can also try the US Patent Office to see old patents by Bray, Fleischer and the like. You might find something that catches your eye, and this might give you a direction to turn in. We have more questions than we have answers, so once you start asking the right questions, it hopefully won't be too difficult to find the answer.

[Tom Stathes]

What you really need are the Moving Picture World and Motion Picture News issues. They are somewhat hard to find [and affordably] so it's easier to look through them on microfilm if any library near you happens to have them. I've looked through some at LoC and the NYPL.