Return to Website

The Charlie Chan Family Message Board

Welcome to our Message Board. Please feel free to post your thoughts, questions, or information.

The Charlie Chan Family Message Board
Start a New Topic 
Author
Comment
View Entire Thread
Re: Audio Recordings of Lost Chan Films

Rush Glick
Our librarian friend was with us two weeks ago, and I gave him the information. He was not in attendance last week, but when next he participates, I will see if he has had even the slightest luck on this.

-Rush
I finally had a free moment to call a librarian at the Library of Congress. This was a very helpful librarian working in the sound recordings division.

He pulled up the same listings from the Discography of American Historical Recordings website by searching on 'Charlie Chan', and I explained to him about 'Charlie Chan Carries On' and 'Charlie Chan's Chance' being missing films, but 'Eran Trece' being the surviving Spanish-language version of 'Carries On'. I also noted that soundtracks had apparently been made of other films besides these two Chan films, so that there might be soundtracks of other lost films in existence somewhere.

He did a quick search and located the trailer for 'Charlie Chan Carries On', which we know is in the library's collection.

The recordings on the DAHR website are described as 16" discs, and the library has a collection of such discs, though we shouldn't get our hopes up, as it seems likely that someone would have probably noticed them previously since they are soundtracks of well-known lost films.

Yet, even if we discover they are not in the library, the next question would be how to find out what happened to these various soundtrack recordings. Did they go up in flames along with the film prints in 1937, or were they perhaps stored somewhere else? Might they still exist? What was their fate?

I gave him my phone number and email address, and he promised to look into the matter further and to get back to me.

Re: Audio Recordings of Lost Chan Films

Here's an update.

The librarian in the sound recordings division confirmed that none of these soundtrack recordings exist in their catalogued holdings. That didn't surprise me, but it needed to be checked anyway.

I asked if he had an suggestions about what next to try in tracking down the fate of these recordings. He suggested talking to one of the librarians in the moving pictures division, as that division may have more information about who to contact to track down movie soundtrack recordings.

I will do that once I have another bit of free time.

It is clear that these recordings were made in 1931 and 1932, but determining the exact fate of these discs may be very difficult. I'm going to give it a try though.

Re: Audio Recordings of Lost Chan Films

Thank you for all of your time and effort on this project. I'm still hopeful that something will turn up.

Re: Audio Recordings of Lost Chan Films

Dear Douglas,

I will echo what John said, and thank you for your GREAT work on this! Even if we continue hit dead ends, just knowing that such recordings were made at all is of great interest! Who knows, at the end of one "dead end" their could be a glimmer of hope to one day finding one or more of these elusive discs!

Thank you, again, and, it should go without saying, please keep us informed on anything that turns up...even if it's yet another wall!

Sincerely,
Rush