The Frederick Douglass Film Company was an early American film production company in
Jersey City, New Jersey.[1][2] It was established in 1916, soon after the pioneering
Lincoln Motion Picture Company,[3] by prominent African-American business and professional men from New Jersey.[4] The intent of the founders was to counter anti-African-American films such as The Birth of a Nation (1915) and to improve
race relations.[3] It was named after the African-American abolitionist
Frederick Douglass.[5]
Its first film, The Colored American Winning His Suit, debuted at the Majestic Theatre in Jersey City on July 14, 1916, to an "interracial audience of over 800."[6] The film is a love story about a lawyer[7] and was hailed by The New York Age as "the first five-reel Film Drama written, directed, acted and produced by Negroes."[4]
It only produced two more films, in 1917 and 1919.[3]