Wikipedia / Churchill Films
Wikipedia / Churchill Films
Churchill Films, also called Churchill Media, was an American Film producer and distributor of direct-to-video/educational films founded by Robert Churchill (1911-1997) and Sy Wexler (1916–2005) in 1948 as Churchill Wexler Film Productions. They have produced The Mouse and the Motorcycle (1986) based on the 1965 book by Beverly Cleary and many other award-winning children's films.
Churchill Films was acquired by American Educational Products in 1994. The Churchill Films catalog is now part of Discovery Education.
In December 2009, The Jungle (1967), a film distributed by Churchill Films in 16mm for the educational film market, was named to the National Film Registry.
History
Origins
Churchill Films was Founded in 1948, by Robert Churchill and Sy Wexler. Churchill was a Harvard law graduate and former fashion photographer who pivoted to cinematography during World War II, making training films for the U.S. Army Signal Corps.
The studio originally launched under the name Churchill Wexler Film Productions when Both Churchill and Wexler met
Operating out of Los Angeles, California, the duo produced their first educational short, Wonders in Your Own Backyard, in 1948 on a budget of $836 ($11,583 adjusted for inflation)
In 1961, the partnership dissolved, and the company was officially rebranded as Churchill Films.
Buyouts
In 1994, co-founder Robert Churchill sold the company to American Educational Products.
In 1996, Churchill Media was integrated under AMEP and was merged into another major acquisition to form SVE & Churchill Media, continuing to distribute 16mm films, multimedia, and direct-to-video educational content to schools and libraries.
In 2004, SVE & Churchill Media was merged with another educational media distributor, Clearvue/eav. Following this merger, the "Churchill" name was dropped from the corporate branding, and the new entity operated under the name Clearvue & SVE.
By 2008, Discovery Bought the Combined entity and it was merged into Discovery's Operations between 2008 and 2009.