Albert Warner an office in the Bakewell building in downtown Pittsburgh with a loan from Max Fleischer. Harry then sent Sam to New York to purchase and ship films for their Pittsburgh exchange company, while he and Albert remained in Pittsburgh to run the business. In 1909, the brothers sold the Cascade Theater to open a second film exchange company in Norfolk, Virginia; through this second film exchange, younger brother Jack joined his three brothers' business. Afterwards, Sam and Jack went to Norfolk, while Harry and Albert stayed in Pittsburgh. However, one serious threat to the Warners film company was the advent
Jack L. Warner the film's success at the box office, Harry Warner remained concerned about the economic threat presented by the Edison Trust. He subsequently broke with Laemmle and sent Jack to establish a film exchange in San Francisco, while Sam did the same in Los Angeles. The brothers were soon poised to exploit the expanding California movie market. In 1917, Jack was sent to Los Angeles to open another film exchange company. Their first opportunity to produce a major film came in 1918, when they purchased the film rights for "My Four Years in Germany", a bestselling novel that condemned German wartime