Film, Motion Picture

Adventures In Research

Silent 16mm film, mostly in black and white, but with one color scene, containing a compilation of footage of William Bushnell Stout's airplanes, train cars, automobiles, and other designs spanning 1926 to 1936.

The first few scenes show three of Stout's airplane designs. First the Ford Tri-Motor is shown in flight. Then the Ford-Stout Dragonfly is filmed from behind as it taxies along a runway. Then the Stout 3-AT is shown taxing and being pushed around an airfield.

The next segment of the film focuses on the Pullman Railplane railroad car. The train car is shown traveling around a length of track. A dark interior scene shows passengers within and a control panel. The camera also captures a detail of one of the car's lights as shot from within through a window.

Stout's Buckley LC-4 is then highlighted. This airplane is shown taking off and flying, landing, and taxing around an air field. A hanger painted with a sign for "Wadlow Bros. Flying Service Co.," a Kansas-based company is visible in the background. After some shots of men posed beside the plane, and three men shaking hands outside of a hanger, the LC-4 is filmed in flight from another plane.

The Stout Skycar is the focus of the next sequence. Several men inspect it at an airfield, and then it is shown landing. After a shot of its propeller spinning up, a man is shown in close-up looking out of the plane's side window.

The film then returns to the Railplane; it is shown traveling around a rail junction, and stopping for a passing train.

Then the reel contains a segment taken from a Detroit News Pictorial newsreel. A title card announces "Detroit-Made Railplane Is a Streamline Job. William B. Stout Designs New Pullman Car That Makes 90 Miles an Hour." The rail car is then shown traveling around a track. A man lifts a panel to show its engine.

The next section begins with the Stout-designed Gar Wood Rear Engine Couch backing out of a garage, with a Stout Scarab parked in the foreground. The bus's destination signs read "Stout Bus" and "Dearborn." A group of men are filmed outside of the bus. Then the camera rolls inside of the bus, as the group rides.
A Stout Scarab then is the focus of several scenes. One is first shown in several black and white shots. Then a color sequence captures a view from the windows of a Scarab as it travels around Washington D.C.

Next, a five-axle trailer pulled by a truck appears to be the focus. The trailer is painted with the name "Ward." The truck and trailer are shown maneuvering over a curb and off-road.

The final scenes on the reel showcase a refreshment stand in a park beside a lake, and the assembly and disassembly of a small prefabricated cottage.

The film is in a metal De Vry Corporation reel with a handwritten label reading "Chrysler P28821." The reel is housed within a metal Eastman Kodak Company canister with a strip of masking tape marked, "Adventures in Research I, 1926 to 1936" on its lid.