Let's Go Stag!: A History of Pornographic Film from the Invention of Cinema to 1970 (Global Exploitation Cinemas)

For much of the 20th century, the underground pornography industry - made up of amateurs and hobbyists who created hardcore, explicit "stag films" - went about its business hounded by reformers and law enforcement, from local police departments all the way up to the FBI. Rumors of this illicit activity circulated and became the stuff of urban myth, but this period of pornography history remains murky. __Let's Go Stag!__ reveals the secrets of this underground world. Using the archives of civic groups, law enforcement, bygone government studies and similarly neglected evidence, archivist Dan Erdman reconstructs the means by which stag films were produced, distributed and exhibited, as well as demonstrate the way in which these practices changed with the times, eventually paving the way for the pornographic explosion of the 1970s and beyond. __Let's Go Stag!__ is sure to point the way for countless future researchers and remain the standard work of history for this era of adult film for a long time to come. "For much of the 20th century, the underground pornography industry - made up of amateurs and hobbyists who created hardcore, explicit "stag films" - went about its business hounded by reformers and law enforcement, from local police departments all the way up to the FBI. Rumors of this illicit activity circulated and became the stuff of urban myth, but this period of pornography history remains murky. Let's Go Stag! reveals the secrets of this underground world. Using the archives of civic groups, law enforcement, bygone government studies and similarly neglected evidence, archivist Dan Erdman reconstructs the means by which stag films were produced, distributed and exhibited, as well as demonstrate the way in which these practices changed with the times, eventually paving the way for the pornographic explosion of the 1970s and beyond. Let's Go Stag! is sure to point the way for countless future researchers and remain the standard work of history for this era of adult film for a long time to come."-- Provided by publisher Cover Contents Acknowledgments Introduction 1 The Earliest Stag Films: To 1923 2 The Stag Scene and the Debut of 16mm Film: 1923 to the Second World War 3 Stag Films during the War Years: 1941 to 1945 4 Postwar: 1945 to 1970 Conclusions and Directions for Further Research References Index 1. Introduction -- 2. The first stag films -- 3. 1900-1923: stags in the nitrate era -- 4. 1923-1941: stag films hit the road -- 5. 1941-1945: World War II -- 6. 1946-1960: the stag comes home -- 7. The 1960s: the blue movie is history -- 8. Epilogue: the curious persistence of stags