The Recommended Vault Parallel to the Artistry of Their Day of Rest...

Dir: William A. Seiter

A young wife is too fond of the frivolities of life to care about raising babies. But one day she finds herself called upon to help a woman in the street who is taken suddenly ill and is obliged to hand over her baby to strangers. The young woman takes the baby home and cares for it. The old trick of the husband misunderstanding a telephone message, and rushing home with an armful of toys for an anticipated heir, is worked in. The arrival of a nurse on the scene to claim the child leaves a vacuum in the home of the young couple, and the wife's hysteria causes the husband to hunt another baby. He arrives at home with it at the same time that the other child, whose mother is unable to care for it, is returned, causing amusing complications.

Dir: William A. Seiter

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

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: William A. Seiter

A young couple quarrel and make-up and quarrel again and it is here where they determine to save the scandal of divorce by placing a white tape through the house to divide it into two parts, each section of which will be exclusively sacred to the other. In the meantime, an almost invisible Cupid hovers about trying to placate them and a little Mephisto with a pitchfork tries to prod the couple along to more troubles.

Dir: William A. Seiter

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

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: William A. Seiter

When his daughter is trapped underground in a mine explosion, a wealthy minister in a mining town is snapped out of his attitude of "miner's safety" to save her.

Dir: William A. Seiter

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

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: William A. Seiter

Billy Barton a bank teller, shoulders the blame for a cash shortage for which Fred Kingston, a fellow employee, is responsible and is sentenced to prison. On his way there, the train is wrecked and he escapes. In the town of Culterton, he meets and falls in love with Mary Spivins, the bank president's daughter, and charms the populace by playing the mouth organ. He obtains work as a farmhand with Silas Harkins, taking the farm mule as wages. When Spivins orders Harkins arrested for assault, Billy learns it was a kick from the mule that laid out Spivins. At the bank he finds Spivins bound while Fred and the clerk are robbing the safe; Billy is locked in the safe, and all efforts to save him prove futile until the wall is kicked out by the mule. Through the efforts of Willie Spivins, the bank is dynamited, but all ends happily.

Dir: William A. Seiter

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Little Church Around the Corner perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: William A. Seiter

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: William A. Seiter

Young Southerners Buck Hineman and Remington Osbury both are in love with the same woman, who promises to marry the one who returns when the Civil War breaks out. On the battlefield, Remington is wounded and left for dead, and Buck returns to marry her. Shortly afterward, Remington returns and contents himself with becoming one of the Hineman family. Years pass and Buck's daughter Luzelle finds herself wooed by two young men, Philip Burwood and Boyd Savely, whose families have been enemies for years. Luzelle's rejected suitor, Boyd, robs the Hineman bank, opens the strongbox containing Mrs. Hineman's papers and tampers with a letter written to her years before congratulating her on the birth of her daughter. The letter, sent to General Buck Hineman on the occasion of his daughter's marriage to Philip, gives the impression by the obliteration of a word that Remington is Luzelle's father. The wedding is halted and a duel between the two old men arranged. Each shoots in the air and realizes that neither wants to kill the other. Soon after, the robbery is discovered and the two old friends are reconciled.