Joseph P. Eckhardt, Emeritus Professor of History at Montgomery County Community College, in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, taught history and art history from 1968 until his retirement in 2007. His first book, The King of the Movies: Film Pioneer, Siegmund Lubin, was published in 1997. He has also published several articles on the early film industry both in the U.S. and Europe. Eckhardt’s film research led to the foundation of the Betzwood Film Archive at MCCC. He also lectured on the Philadelphia area’s silent film industry, occasionally staging recreations of early Nickelodeon shows with movies, songs, lantern slides, narration, and sound effects. Following his retirement from teaching, Eckhardt began work on an in-depth study of American history painter, William T. Trego. His biography of this nearly forgotten artist, So Bravely and So Well: The Life and Art of William T. Trego, accompanied by an online catalogue raisonné, was published in 2011 in conjunction with a major retrospective exhibition of Trego’s work that Eckhardt curated at the James A. Michener Art Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. Eckhardt’s interest in Wilna Hervey began as a consequence of seeing her performances as “The Powerful Katrinka” in the Toonerville Trolley comedies he acquired for the Betzwood Film Archive. As further research into her life and subsequent career revealed the details of her extraordinary story, he decided that she and her life companion, Nan Mason, deserved to be better known. The result was Living Large: Wilna Hervey and Nan Mason. Eckhardt's most recent work is a spin off from and prequel to Living Large—Dan Mason: From Vaudeville to Broadway to the Silent Screen.