Editor's Top Picks Following the Footsteps of The Grail: Cult Guide

Dir: Colin Campbell

Former college football hero Kirk Anthony, to the disappointment of his father, a railroad magnate, refuses to enter the business world. Kirk prefers to coach the university team and carouse, until he is drugged during a drunken victory party and put aboard a steamer bound for Panama by an embezzler who switches clothes with him. During the trip, Mrs. Edith Cortlandt, who has married her diplomat husband for convenience, falls in love with Kirk. In Panama, Kirk and Allan Allan, a Jamaican friend, are arrested when Kirk's efforts to use American firefighting methods cause a riot. After Mrs. Cortlandt's influence gets Kirk out of jail and into a job, he falls in love with Chiquita Garavel, the daughter of a Spanish grandee. When Mrs. Cortlandt warns Kirk not to marry Chiquita, her husband overhears. He insults Kirk in public, and Kirk vows revenge. After Cortlandt commits suicide, and Kirk, who has secretly married Chiquita, is arrested, Mrs. Cortlandt withholds Cortlandt's suicide note, but Kirk's father arrives and convinces her to help arrange Kirk's release.

Dir: Colin Campbell

Stephen Brice, a young lawyer in Civil War-era St. Louis, falls in love with Virginia Carvel, the daughter of his benefactor. But she is loyal to the South and Brice is committed to Lincoln's cause. In the course of the war, their convictions separate them, and Virginia becomes engaged to her cousin Clarence Colfax, a Confederate officer. Brice becomes an officer under General Sherman, and eventually finds himself faced with the captured Colfax, facing execution for spying. Brice must decide whether or not to intercede in his rival's behalf.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Crisis perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Colin Campbell

U.S. Secret Service agent Truxton Darnley attires himself as a sailor and boards a schooner owned by Gus Olsen, who has been employed by a German spy named Von Linterman to smuggle arms to German raiders in the South Seas. During the voyage, Truxton learns that Gus and his men plan to blow up the National Munitions Plant in San Francisco, but Gus discovers his identity and throws him overboard. Truxton is washed ashore on the island of Moana, where he meets and falls for Lurline, the daughter of beachcomber "Brandy" Cain. Promising to return to her, Truxton boards a steamer bound for San Francisco in the hope of saving the munitions plant, and soon afterwards, Brandy sells Lurline into marriage with Gus. Seeing Truxton's steamer, Lurline dives from Gus's schooner, and her sweetheart rescues her. In San Francisco, Gus abducts Lurline and forces her to dance in his Barbary Coast saloon, but Truxton and his men raid the bar, and Gus is killed. After receiving the happy news that her real father is the owner of the munitions plant, Lurline joins Truxton, the man of her dreams.

Dir: Colin Campbell

Miss Otis nearly hits a derelict with her car, and out of sympathy she gives him some money and advises him to "clean up and keep clean." Soon after, the derelict meets Esther, an anarchist who involves him in a plot to blackmail a banker. When he realizes that Miss Otis is the banker's daughter, the derelict tears up the banker's check but is arrested and committed to an asylum. Esther, who is in love with the derelict, helps him escape, and he resolves to attain a position of wealth and importance. After he earns his fortune, he rejects Esther's affections and asks Miss Otis to marry him.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Sea Flower perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Colin Campbell

Caleb Conover, a railroad section boss, marries Letty, the daughter of a man of higher social standing, after rescuing her from harassment in a rough Italian neighborhood. By unrelenting force and tenacity, Conover becomes the corrupt political boss of his county, and the railroad president. His son Gerald refuses to work, and marries a chorus girl who is after his money and who retains her former lover. When Conover's daughter Vera returns from Europe supposedly married to a prince, Conover throws an elaborate reception and drunkenly nominates himself for governor. Anice Lanier, Conover's trusted secretary, to whom he is attracted, likes Clive Standish, a lawyer Conover cannot corrupt. After she steals compromising letters Conover wrote to his broker, Conover learns that Anice is the daughter of a man he earlier ruined. When Letty informs him that Vera's "prince" was untitled, the marriage not legal, and that she is starving in Paris, Conover, his drive now gone, loses the election to Standish.

Dir: Colin Campbell

Surrounded by a group of children, poet James Whitcomb Riley narrates the story of Little Orphant Annie, who loses her mother at an early age and is sent to an orphanage. Annie charms the other children with her stories of goblins and elves until her uncle comes to claim her. He and her aunt force Annie into a life of drudgery, treating her so cruelly that Big Dave, a neighboring farmer, takes her from them and places her in the charge of the kindly Squire Goode and his wife. Big Dave, who intends to marry Annie, is called away to fight in World War I. When Annie hears the news that he has been killed, she pretends to be gravely ill but wakes up to learn that it has all been a dream.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The City of Purple Dreams perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Colin Campbell

Tom and Sally are the only survivors when their wagon train is attacked by Swift Wing's braves. Starlight aids in their escape and they join a group of hunters. But there is more trouble when the tribe attacks again.

Dir: Colin Campbell

When her mother elopes with a lover and her father dies cursing the name of God, Domini Enfilden attempts to forget her pain in Beni Mora, an oasis in the Sahara. At the desert hotel, she meets and falls in love with Boris Androvsky, a tormented man of mystery. Abruptly announcing his departure one day, Boris bids farewell to Domini in the Garden of Allah, but passion overwhelms them, and after making love, they are married by Father Roubier. The two are happy until Capt. De Trevignac, a dinner guest, recognizes Boris as the former Father Antoine, a priest whose irrepressible lust forced him to leave the monastery. De Trevignac says nothing, but after his departure, Boris confesses to Domini, who urges him to return to the monastery. The years pass, and Domini rears her son Boris in the Garden of Allah.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Railroader perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Colin Campbell

The Pasha's servant Mohamed, is entrusted to guard the Sacred Carpet of Bagdad with his life. In New York, after banker Arthur Wadsworth forces his brother Horace to give up his inheritance, Horace joins a band of crooks and plans to rob the Wadsworth Bank by tunneling from the adjacent home of antique dealer George P. A. Jones. The gang follows Jones to Egypt and Bagdad, where Horace steals the carpet and sells it to Jones. Fortune Chedsoye, the innocent daughter of a gang member, falls in love with Jones. When Fortune discovers that Mohamed plans to kill Jones to retrieve the rug, she hides it with her mother's belongings. Mohamed forces Jones, Wadsworth, and Fortune into the desert, but they escape his torture during a sandstorm. Wadsworth then rejoins the gang at Jones' home in New York. When Fortune and Jones catch the crooks tunneling, Jones, sympathetically, gives them a two hour head-start before informing the police. Fortune and Jones keep the carpet, while in the East, Mohamed bows in resignation to Allah's will.

Dir: Colin Campbell

New York broker Bruce Corbin comes to Kentucky to force Allan Pomeroy, whom Bruce can prove is a forger, to give him his daughter Ruth in marriage. Even though she loves Spencer Vail, Ruth agrees, and despite Pomeroy's death, they wed. Ruth soon discovers that Bruce, to avenge his father's death in a feud with the Pomeroys, married her so that she would be childless, thus ending the Pomeroy family. Because Bruce was born during a thunderstorm, he temporarily goes insane whenever he hears a thunderbolt and forgets his actions while affected. Knowing this, Ruth seduces him during a storm, the night before he is to leave for a year. Later, when Bruce sees Ruth's child, he starts to choke it, believing it to be Vail's, but Ruth stops him by telling him of the stormy night. After four years in a distant marriage pass, Bruce loses his fortune because of another thunderbolt. Ruth leaves, but later they are reconciled because of the child.