Edward G. Robinson starred in two biopics from Warner Bros. in 1940. The first, released in February, was Dr. Ehrlich’s Magic Bullet about Dr. Paul Ehrlich and his discovery of a treatment for syphilis. In the second, released in October, he portrayed Paul Julius Reuter (referred to exclusively as Julius throughout the film) in A Dispatch from Reuters.
The film opens with a dedication to journalists – “gentleman of the Fourth Estate” – and their perpetual commitment to truth and speed. It follows Reuter as a boy, intrigued by the possibilities of technology, to a visionary underdog as an adult. At first ridiculed for his strategy of using a combination of telegraphy and homing pigeons to acquire financial updates faster than trains or couriers, he eventually expands his business and earns allies, building a communication empire that grows into an international news service. From the Pigeon Post to the Reuters Dispatch to the Reuter’s Telegraphic Agency, Reuter is driven by a dedication to documenting world events for the benefit of communities everywhere. “I have no opinions to sell,” he states, “only news.”
The film ends with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln in 1865, but Paul Reuter would live until 1899, whereupon his son Herbert took over the business until his death in 1915. Former general manager of the Reuters office in South Africa, Sir George Roderick Jones, eventually became the chairman of the renamed Reuters Limited. Upon his retirement in 1941, the company was restructured and its ownership was divided amongst various newspapers, leading to the creation of the Reuters Trust. Ever eager to implement rising technologies, Reuters was one of the first to use the radio in the 1920s and computers in the 1960s.
By 1984, the Reuters Trust became a public company, listed on both the London Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. At the beginning of the 21st century, Reuters was still considered one of the top three news agencies in the world, alongside the Associated Press and Agence France-Presse. In 2008, Thomson Corporation bought Reuters, creating Thomson Reuters, headquartered in Toronto, Canada. As of April 2021, the Reuters website is partially public-access but predominantly paywalled.
An astonishing 170+ years after Paul Julius Reuter began his news service in Aachen, Germany, Reuters continues to evolve in response to a changing world. In 2022, Screenocean, a clip-licensing service and footage library, launched Newsfilm for Education. A license especially designed for academic institutions, the program offers unprecedented access to raw video coverage of international news and over 1 million clips from one of the world’s oldest, largest, and most renowned video archives… The Reuters News Archive.
Students and faculty worldwide can have access to licensable content for productions at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods (ranging anywhere from $600 - $2,000+ a minute). This authenticated access is a blanket license, which grants unlimited access and downloads. Footage used in student productions can then be shared non-commercially online, at exhibitions, events, and festivals, and/or in order to promote the work of students.
Almost as much time has now passed since A Dispatch from Reuters premiered in theaters as had passed when the film was made looking back to the establishment of Reuters in 1851. Yet Reuters lives on, covering the news of the third century since its creation in its current incarnation as the multinational enterprise Thomson Reuters Corporation. Online, we can find late-breaking news alongside the extraordinary sum of its decades of audio-visual news reporting from across the globe.
“The present is news; the past is history” declares Edward G. Robinson as Reuter, looking toward the future.
Except in our present, technology gives us a way to have both.
To learn more about Reuters Newsfilm for Education or to request a trial or quote, visit The Trojman Corporation website here.
1 of 6
A Dispatch from Reuters (1940) promotional slide.
2 of 6
A Dispatch from Reuters (1940) promotional slide.
3 of 6
Picasa
Italian movie poster. The film was released in Italy in 1950, under the name Messaggio Tragico, La vita di Giulio Reuter (Tragic Message, The Life of Julius Reuter).
4 of 6
Italian movie poster. ... ha tenuto in pugno il destino di milioni di uomini (... has held the fate of millions of men in his grip).
5 of 6
Production still. Edward G. Robinson (right) as Julius Reuter, with Eddie Albert (left).
6 of 6
A Dispatch from Reuters (1940) movie theater promotional brochure.