Pensions; Duck Hunters; Japan

From the waterways of the Northwestern United States to the puppet state of Manchukuo via Washington DC, these three stories from 1935 invite the viewer to consider the benefits of a revolutionary pension scheme, show how a former cartoonist is fighting the slaughter of endangered wildfowl and finally - with ominous footage of soldiers marching on the Great Wall of China - demonstrate the danger of Japan’s ambitions of conquest following the invasion of Manchuria.

These stories show a range of subjects and stylistic devices that were to become typical of the series as a whole. From the recreation of real-life events in the Townsend pension scheme story, to the dramatic depiction of the duck ‘slaughter pen’ operators in the second item, the use of recreated scenes added urgency to the films’ narrative flow and aimed to elicit a strong emotional response from the audience. The final story - a condemnation of Japanese aggression - takes an editorial line which was to become one of the defining characteristics of the series, marking it out as one of the few news outlets in America to explicitly and consistently attack the rise of imperialism and Fascism.