Paramount Pictures began humbly in 1912 when Adolph Zukor, the owner of a New York nickelodeon, released the first full-length drama shown in the United States (Queen Elizabeth, starring Sarah Bernhardt) and founded the Famous Players Film Company. A year later, Zukor began distributing his films through a start-up company called Paramount Pictures.

In 1916, Zukor’s Famous Players merged with The Jesse L. Lasky Company, which was producing films in Hollywood (including the first feature-length film ever produced in Hollywood – The Squaw Man) and also using Paramount Pictures as a distributor. The newly formed Famous Players-Lasky Corporation soon consolidated with the distribution company (in which Zukor was a major stockholder), and all three companies became what you now know as Paramount Pictures.

After the merger, audiences first began seeing the iconic logo with the mountain and stars, which was created by Paramount (the distribution company) founder W. W. Hodkinson. Hodkinson had borrowed the Paramount name from an apartment house that he frequently passed in his neighborhood. A mountain peak he remembered from his childhood in Utah inspired the logo, which he designed. Legend has it that the stars surrounding the mountain represented the original 22 film stars Hodkinson had under contract. Another implication was that Paramount had more stars than there were in the universe.

In 1926, Lasky supervised the construction of a new Hollywood studio, which was the foundation of the Paramount Pictures studio lot today. The original studio, which cost $1 million to build, stood on a 26-acre lot and contained four large sound stages.

It only took a year after moving onto the current studio lot for Paramount’s success to become evident. In 1927, Paramount received the very first Academy Award for Best Picture with its release of Wings, a silent movie about World War I fighter pilots. In addition, Wings is the only silent film in movie history to win that award.

There was no looking back after that.

Memorable Movies (1912-1929)
The Sheik (1921)
Wings (1927, Winner of the 1st Academy Award for Best Picture)
Interference (1928, Paramount's 1st All Talkie)
Coconuts (1929)

Famous Stars (1912-1929)
Cecil B. DeMille
Mary Pickford
Clara Bow
Douglas Fairbanks
Gloria Swanson
Rudolph Valentino