Summary
In a soot-choked mill town whose very air reeks of coal tar and shredded lungs, the Boyd empire rises like a malignant cathedral—spires of iron, bells of clanging looms, child-sized coffins hammered shut beneath the ledger books. Emerson Boyd, a robber baron carved from chilled marble, reigns over two pillars of venality: Great Boyd Mills, where lint clouds hide consumptive urchins, and Boyd Chemical, peddler of Saco-Ozone, a lurid elixir hawked as nectar to the dying. David Duncan, his political mastiff, wields graft like a cudgel, courting Eleanor—Boyd’s sheltered heir—who secretly breathes for Matthew Brand, a silk-gloved idler awakening to outrage. A single broadside in the Clarion detonates Boyd’s composure; ink becomes shrapnel, and Brand, galvanized, buys the press, converting lounges into war rooms. He prowls the mills, beholding sewage trickling past oatmeal vats, tiny fingers mangled by looms, Saco-Otonic billboards looming like death warrants. Columns blaze, boycotts foment, sanatorium blueprints unfurl—yet Boyd’s machine smothers city hall, branding public health a luxury. Duncan, spurned by Eleanor and cornered by conscience, slinks into night rain to plant dynamite behind the Clarion; the fuse misfires, obliterating the assassin instead of truth. When Eleanor hacks crimson into a lace handkerchief, the tyrant confronts mortality; medicine bottles sail through stained-glass windows, testimonials flutter like fallen angels. A bargain is struck: Brand’s vision for Boyd’s redemption. Twelve months on, gaslights dim, chimneys quiet, gardens bloom atop reclaimed slag heaps; at a banquet of contrition, Eleanor—cheeks sun-crested, lungs clear—extends a ring toward Brand, while her father, diminished yet luminous, toasts a skyline no longer etched in soot.
Synopsis
Emerson Boyd is the owner of the Great Boyd Mills, a relentless scheming, grinding corporation, which employs child labor and disregards all laws of health and sanitation. He is also in control of the Boyd Chemical Company, another large corporation with the same greedy and heartless policy which turns out upon the public certain harmful and toxic medicines, among which is Saco-Ozone, a widely advertised cure for tuberculosis and pulmonary diseases. Back of the powerful arm of Emerson Boyd is David Duncan, general manager of the Boyd Mills. Duncan is also a crooked politician. He is in love with Eleanor, Boyd's daughter, who, however, is secretly engaged to Matthew Brand, one of the idle rich. Emerson Boyd reads a newspaper attack upon the Boyd Corporation and, in a great rage, calls Duncan to see what influence he can use as a political boss to muzzle the paper. Eleanor goes away and Brand runs across the newspaper article against her father. Alarmed by the facts set forth in the paper, Brand determines to investigate, and, calling upon Cole, the editor of the "Clarion," hears a story that makes him sick at heart. Then he learns that Boyd's political machine has muzzled the paper. Brand pays a visit to Boyd's factories, and is horrified at the unsanitary conditions. Brand visits the "Clarion" office and buys the paper, but retains Cole to help him. They start at once on an article that drives Boyd wild with rage when the paper comes from the press. Brand goes to call on Eleanor. At the same time Duncan and the detective are closeted with Boyd. While Brand is telling Eleanor of his campaign with the Tuberculosis Society to wipe out the dread disease the detective is telling Boyd that the man who is so bitterly opposing him and printing the vitriolic stories is none other than the quiet Matthew Brand, who has been courting his daughter. Boyd is astounded. Meanwhile, Eleanor has become so enthusiastic that she determines that her father must hear the story and hurries to the library, where Boyd is closeted with his hirelings, and begs him to come and listen to Matthew Brand. When Brand sees Boyd, the latter attacks him unsparingly and, refusing to grant him a hearing, orders him to leave the house and never return. Eleanor is astounded. The National Tuberculosis Society meets with failure, for, when Boyd learns of the proposed sanitarium, he orders the mayor to prevent it, fearing that it might hurt his patent medicine business. Following the dictates of his superior, Mayor Alrich replies that the finances of the town would not warrant such a measure. Meanwhile Boyd becomes interested in the persistent attack upon the horrible system of the great mills and inquires of Duncan as to the truth of the stories. The latter lies glibly. In the meantime, Eleanor has gone to the "Clarion'' office to see her sweetheart. Duncan calls, and Brand pushes Eleanor into an adjoining room, that she may hear what is said. Duncan threatens Brand to induce him to stop the damaging articles, but Brand defies him. Boyd is beginning to admire Brand, but Duncan plans to dynamite the "Clarion." Eleanor, becoming very ill, the old family physician is sent for, and, making a thorough examination, tells Boyd the crushing news that his daughter has symptoms of tuberculosis. Duncan arrives at the rendezvous where he learns that the police have become suspicious of the gangsters and they had retired to await his orders. Duncan is angered to the utmost over the hitch in the well-laid plans, and, calling them all the utmost cowards, takes the bomb himself and bids them follow. In the darkness of the rear of the "Clarion" office, Duncan sets the bomb and lights it, while on the inside, Brand and a helper are working over some copy. The bomb has a defective fuse, and a premature explosion takes place, killing Duncan, while the falling bricks and masonry seriously injure Brand. Boyd's family physician tells the money king that there are no places in Every-town for the proper treatment of tuberculosis, as Boyd and other corporation owners have persistently fought to keep out all sanitariums. Boyd thinks of his own remedy, and sends for a case of Saco-Ozone. He reads from the testimonials of its wonderful cures, but the family physician appears, and hurls it all from the window, telling him that it is harmful and poisonous. He then tells Boyd that Eleanor, to get well, must be sent to an open air sanitarium. When Boyd tells Eleanor of the doctor's suggestion, and offers her anything her heart desires, if she will only try to get well, he is told that her one wish is that he will send for Brand and listen to him. Boyd leads Brand to the library, where he listens to the other's talk on the existing evil conditions and of his efforts to prevent the spreading of tuberculosis. Boyd thereupon plans to reconstruct Every-town. Miracle upon miracle is accomplished by the enthusiastic money king, who sends his daughter to a sanitarium, where she ultimately recovers after receiving good care, fresh air, rest and wholesome food. The story ends one year later with a big banquet to celebrate a new and clean Every-town and, incidentally, the engagement of Eleanor and Brand.
Review Excerpt
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The White Terror arrives like a sulphur match struck in a sepulcher, its nitrate frames flickering between moral grand guignol and Progressivist pamphlet. Director Tom Ricketts, armed with Raymond L. Schrock’s scalding scenario, fuses melodrama with muckraking so brazenly that one expects Upton Sinclair to lunge from the wings applauding. Yet within this 1920 five-reeler lies a discomfiting sophistication: it indicts capital not through sentimental waifs alone but through systemic anatomy—legi..."
