Finding footage of someone who lived in the early twentieth century can be very difficult, even when the subject in question–Julius Rosenwald–was relatively well-known. As a result, as we conduct research for The Rosenwald Schools, every time we uncover a piece of film footage that contains Rosenwald himself we get excited.
Usually, we aren’t able to share these finds on our blog because of copyright issues, but the video embedded in this post is from film housed at the National Archives and falls into the public domain. Enjoy this tantalizingly short glimpse of Julius Rosenwald in 1929, shot in Clinton Township, Michigan. The film was made to document the Lights Golden Anniversary, a 50th anniversary celebration of Thomas Edison’s invention of the light bulb. Rosenwald was 67 when the film was shot – he would pass away a little more than 2 years later.