Protect-a-Print leader

Many archivists have run into this stuff, especially if they’ve inspected prints originating from heavily circulated educational distributors, libraries, etc. The idea was that this especially thick plastic film – smooth on one side and textured and rough on the other – should be spliced to the head of a print, and when run through the projector it claims to help drag away stubborn bits of dirt, particles, and other bits and pieces of schmutz in the film gate and overall projector path that may risk scratching your print.

In principle it makes sense! And the simple fact that this product was produced for a few decades suggests that maybe it worked to some degree…? (Unless it’s attributable to the placebo effect!) I’ve also encountered several anecdotal comments from folks online and elsewhere that Protect-a-Print leader had the unfortunate side effect of wearing out or damaging the sound heads on people’s projectors. Eumigs in particular are cited online in a few places as being particularly sensitive victims. But purely as an archival artifact, I’ve for some reason always enjoyed the logo and look of this funny stuff.

Protect-a-Print was produced by a company called Photographic Specialties, and was available in 16mm, 8mm, and Super 8 formats. In an online citation I came across of their trademark filing, the trademark was filed 2/27/1974, with its first use being cited as 7/14/1958.

In a quick search thanks to the Internet Archive, an early ad I encountered for Protect-a-Print appears in 1961 issues of Educational Screen and Audiovisual Guide:

Here’s an ad for it I spotted online from a 1975 Blackhawk Films Bulletin:

And here’s a kookier ad for it from a 1979 issue of Super-8 Filmaker (that spelling always irks me!) magazine:

And thanks to completed online auction listings, here’s an example of how this stuff was packaged, ca. 1970s:

Here and there when I encounter this stuff in my work as an archivist, I typically remove it, and have saved a certain amount of it just for posterity’s sake, since it’s such a unique bit of once-common ephemera from a specific period in film distribution history.