The video that kicks off the first day of the first Deadline Detroit Old-Time Detroit Film Film Festival is “Safety Patrol,” a 1937 film that features a young safety boy and a police sergeant discussing pedestrian safety as they walk down Detroit streets and enjoy a treat in a soda shop.
Produced by the famous Detroit-based Jam Handy Organization, the nine-minute-long “Safety Patrol” was released at a time when Detroit was crowded with people and cars and pedestrian safety was a major civic concern because of the elevated annual death toll.
For decades, safety boys, and, eventually, girls, were stationed at intersections near Detroit’s public and parochial schools to supervise students crossing the streets. Like the boy in the film, members of the safety patrol wore white belts that could be folded up into a baseball-sized lump. They received no pay, but once a year the Tigers invited every safety patrol member in the city to a game at Briggs (later Tiger) Stadium.
The film shows a landscape of leafy trees and blocks jammed with houses and automobiles.
Also notable: the safety boy and the police officer featured in the production. Nothing is known about their backgrounds, so it is impossible to say with certainty if they were Detroiters, or actors, or both. The sergeant seems a little old for a working cop, and the boy has an accent that is difficult to discern.
The film is one of thousands produced by Jam Handy, which was located on E. Grand Boulevard near the New Center.
Jam Handy was founded by Henry Jamison (Jam) Handy, a former Olympic swimmer from Chicago who was expelled from the University of Michigan in 1903 for writing an article for the Chicago Tribune that ridiculed a U-M professor.
Handy’s fledgling film-production company received a break after World War I when General Motors Corporation chose it to make short films for both training and marketing purposes. Jam Handy went on to produce films for other companies and organizations, and during World War II, it made an estimated 7,000 films for the U.S. armed forces.
Handy himself was eccentric, working at his headquarters without a permanent desk and wearing suits without pockets, which he considered a waste of time.
“Safety Patrol” shows a variety of Detroit scenes, including the area of E. Grand Boulevard near E. Vernor, just north of the Belle Isle Bridge. Most of the streets and the school included in the film could not be identified by the Deadline Detroit staff; if you can supply names, please do so in the comment section of this article.
The young safety boy who stars in the film would be in his late 80s if he were alive today; we would love to hear from him or his descendants.
While "Safety Patrol" resides on YouTube, it was brought to the attention of Deadline Detroit through the Prelinger Archives, a San Francisco-based source for old films and other historical matter.
The Deadline Detroit Old-Time Detroit Film Festival runs every day this week. A new film will be posted each day at 11 a.m.
