[2] After being driven out of Paramount, he established his own independent distribution company, the W. W. Hodkinson Corporation, in 1917, before selling it off in 1924.

In addition to gaining a huge efficiency advantage over the previous regional States' Rights and Road Show systems of film distribution, Paramount introduced the concept of block-booking.

Hodkinson's plan guaranteed exhibitors a steady supply of features because Paramount would help producers finance and advertise their pictures with advance rentals collected by the exchanges.

In return, Paramount charged producers a distribution fee of 35 percent of gross to cover operating costs and profit.

Zukor soon fired Hodkinson and took over as president of Paramount and added motion-picture production to the company's film distribution business.

Hodkinson soon joined Raymond Pawley to start Superpictures Incorporated in November 1916, and was the producer for the Leon F. Douglass color feature film Cupid Angling (1918).

PDC lasted until 1929 and played an important role during Cecil B. DeMille's short-lived but ambitious plans as a full-fledged independent filmmaker in the late 1920s.