Chief Askew's Diary: March 31, 1930

The mayor protem becomes a crime victim; moralists clamp down on Hollywood

Mayor Brown was out of town today, so the mayor protem, C.W. Farmer, presided over city court. A couple of days later, thieves stole the tags off his car as well as those of a one-and-a-half-ton Chevrolet truck at the cottom mill.

Alarm over the wicked films being churned out by Hollywood today resulted in studios agreeing to abide by the Motion Picture Production Code, usually called the Hays Code after Will H. Hays, long-serving president of theMotion Picture Producers and Distributors of America.

Paid subscribers can read on about some of the guidelines that drastically changed the movies.

Baby Face, a 1933 pre-code movie, starred Barbara Stanwyck as a secretary who literally slept her way to the top. The movie poster was accessed via Wikipedia.