The Romance of the Reaper

In the early days of cinema, one of the ways that folks experienced the moving images was mediated through a lecturer. Traveling exhibitors like the well-known Lyman H. Howe, and Burton Holmes set up temporary exhibition venues from small-town church halls to opera houses and offered audiences edutainment in the form of a lecture accompanied by magic lantern slides and moving images.

Prelinger, Rick. Field Guide to Sponsored Films. 2006: 79.

Special interests too would travel the nation with lecturing on topics illustrated by moving pictures, The Romance of the Reaper (1910) was a sponsored film, commissioned by the International Harvester Company in 1910 (Prelinger dates it to 1911, but I found a reference to the film in a 1910 issue of The Harvester World)

. 100 years ago today, this film was exhibited in Irvington, Kentucky.

BRECKENRIDGE NEWS (15 November 1911): 7.