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Today, because of his hobby, he has a new business and a new interest—the movies. And his new line not only is on a sound financial basis itself, but it means increased income for his own big country store and for the other businessmen in the little town of Purdin, Missouri, population 255, by the 1950 census.

Don't envisage a motion picture palace of the type found in big cities, or even the simpler buildings used in small towns, when you think of Craig Beckett's project. The sign at the door says "The Movie Barn," and it is just that—a plain, commodious structure covered with sheet metal, and lined with acoustical board. But its capacity of 300 is filled twice each Saturday night, for free shows, and on Wednesday and Sunday nights, when the charge is 10 cents.

Nor is the equipment the big, costly type used in movie theaters. Rather, it is a pair of 16-millimeter projectors, with sound equipment, which serves its purpose very well. And movie barn, projectors and all cost only $4,000, with $1,250 of that spent for the projectors and sound equipment.

BECKETT NEVER had operated either a movie camera or a projector when he bought his picture-taking equipment, a 16-millimeter, magazine-loading Eastman with f 1.9 lens. He started shooting around town, at the county seat in near-by Linneus, and at Linn County's commercial center in Brookfield. The customers in his store might enjoy some of the resulting pictures, he decided, so he pushed aside merchandise to make room for a screen and chairs.

The Purdin store already was enjoying a good trade, for it is an institution in the county and surrounding areas of North Central Missouri. Craig, Beckett's father started the Purdin Mercantile Company, and virtually started the town, back in 1883. Craig Beckett entered the business in 1911. He became president of the company eleven years later, when his father died. Today the firm operates a big, spreading store which sells everything from groceries to hardware, from men's suits to table china, and maintains a frozen food locker plant where home-killed meat from surrounding farmland is processed and stored.

Preparing to retire, Beckett has taken in as officers of the company two young men who grew up on farms not far away. He thought that by this time he would be entirely out of the business, or almost so. But that idea has disappeared since he started showing his movies. He isn't working so much in the store any more, but he is contributing to its prosperity by drawing crowds to town.

"I've started something I can't stop," he comments, with a smile that says he wouldn't stop it if he could. "Folks look to me now for a show, and I feel I must give them one."

THE FIRST showings were simply pictures that Beckett himself had taken. The response was so good, in the increase of Saturday night customers as well as the interest expressed, that the new movie hobbyist decided he should supplement his own pictures with rented films. He had the equipment all set up; why not use it?

The first rented films were shorts and comedies. The crowds grew, and some of the customers asked for longer shows. The audiences were taking up more and more space in the store; so when summer came, Beckett moved his show outside. A vacant lot back of the company's warehouse became the movie theater. The newer films came with sound tracks, so the new movie man decided to add sound to his shows.

Winter came, and the audience had to be moved inside again. Three or four showings a night were necessary to accommodate all the crowd in the limited space available in the store building. And the sound was not very satisfactory.

"Our outstanding technical problem has always been sound," Beckett remarks. "Outdoors, the sound seemed perfect. But inside we had echoes and other troubles."

That, added to the crowding and the extra runs necessary in the store, started the operator thinking about better quarters. So two years ago, he built the Movie Barn. He wanted inexpensive but fire-safe construction, with good acoustics. He achieved all these goals.

THE STRUCTURE is built on a concrete slab, laid on the same vacant lot which had been used for summer outdoor movies. The framework consists of laminated wood arches, rising to a peak 17 feet 9 inches above the floor. The outside is covered with corrugated sheet metal. The inside is lined with acoustical board.

Across the back is a narrow balcony, which serves as a projection booth. The space beneath the balcony makes up the entrance lobby, with part of its area used for a refreshment stand. On a good night, profit from the sale of soft drinks and ice cream bars may almost pay the cost of the film rental.

The Movie Barn is 37 by 56 feet in floor area, with 300 seats—comfortable but not elaborate theater chairs. The construction project so interested the townspeople that many of them volunteered to help with the work. To build the rustic entrance and the refreshment booth, they brought in wood from stream banks. So they made it something of a community enterprise, holding the cost down to $2,750. And, increasing the community aspect, other merchants and businessmen in Purdin have been contributing 50 cents to a dollar a week to help pay for film.

Beckett is especially happy about the way in which the acoustical problem has been solved in the Movie Barn. The sound is now quite satisfactory. The insulating board on walls and ceiling, actually one smoothly arched surface, contributes to this result. So do Indian-pattern rugs, hung from the balcony with Ozite rug cushions behind them. The back wall of the building above the balcony is finished with perforated Celotex, further to absorb echoes. And the twelve-inch Jensen concert-type speaker is mounted in a box three feet square, lined on five sides with perforated Celotex.

The speaker is matched to the two 3030 Natco projectors for maximum sound quality. Use of two projectors not only gives the operator an emergency unit in case of trouble but permits a long show to be run without interrupting for a change of reels: the second reel is started turning on the second projector as the first one runs out, a practice followed in the big movie houses; and the audience scarcely knows a change has been made.

A microphone on the projection balcony is cut into the sound system; Beckett uses it to comment on silent films—the ones he takes himself—or to make announcements. Helping him with the projectors usually is a volunteer worker, Harold Ferguson, agent for the Burlington railroad at Purdin.

BECKETT AND his helpers take special pains to assure the quality of picture production, as well as sound. The sixteen-millimeter films they use sometimes arrive in poor condition.

"They are used by careless amateur operators," the chief of the Movie Barn crew explains, "or by road show men. These fellows carry film from one location to another in the trunk of a car, with perhaps a pair of muddy tire chains rubbing against them. Grit and dirt work into the case, and scratch the film. Sometimes, too, the reel is wound loosely and the ends are not taped, permitting the film to scratch itself in transit."

Beckett and Ferguson make sure they do not damage it further, by cleaning the film path in the projector before running each reel. Beyond that, they use an arrangement on the projector which runs the film between felt pads, saturated in cleaner before it reaches the aperture.

"We eliminate ninety-five percent of the scratches, at least temporarily," Beckett says, "so that we have a bright, clean picture on the screen. And this operation remedies permanently some of the damage done before the film reaches us."

The results are apparent on the screen—a beaded glass type, nine by twelve feet—and in the continued growth of audiences, not only for Saturday night's free shows but for the 10-cent showings on Wednesday and Sunday. Film for these comes from various rental services. Recently, the suppliers have been Eastin Pictures Company, Davenport, Ia.; National Cinema Service, New York City, and Swank Motion Pictures, St. Louis.

Pictures are first-class productions, not second-rate. All have sound, and many are in Technicolor. Included are such movies as "Arabian Nights," Abbott and Costello, Li'l Abner, and numerous Westerns; about one show in four is a Western.

"They appeal to 90 percent of the men, 50 percent of the women and all the children," Beckett explains. "But a thing like 'Swiss Family Robinson,' which we showed a while back, is liked by everyone."

Rental cost of a film often runs as high as $20.

"If we were attempting to operate shows on a highly profitable basis" says Beckett, "we would have to use cheaper pictures or charge higher admission rates. But our main idea is to give the people entertainment they will enjoy, not to make a lot of money."

IN PROVIDING shows the amateur movie man does not depend entirely on commercial sources. He continues to take pictures himself, as he did at the outset. "I don't bore the crowds with family pictures," he says, but he does show films of local people and scenes occasionally, and they delight the audiences. He adds a little commentary on the microphone, often in a kidding vein, to increase the interest.

And he goes farther afield in search of subjects for his camera. After the great flood of July, 1951, he drove to Kansas City, 130 miles away., to take pictures of the devastation in color. He has photographed the Cheyenne rodeo, as well as rodeos, fairs and other events nearer home. Pictures of 4-H club members showing their prize animals at the Linn County Fair delight his farm audiences.

Beyond the 10-cent admission charge on Wednesday and Sunday nights, there is one additional source of funds which keeps the movie business solvent. That is the refreshment stand. Its sales will pay the attendant a good return for her work and, on a busy Saturday night, will clear $10 or so toward the cost of the film.