E. K. Lincoln, Canine Fancier (1917) 🇺🇸

To be a popular screen actor and in much demand by producers; to have your own producing organization and a splendidly equipped studio in which to make pictures whenever you choose to; to own a farm in the picturesque rolling country of Pennsylvania and an estate in the Berkshire Hills; to raise dogs that will win cups and blue ribbons for you at the biggest shows; to motor, to hunt, to go in for various athletic sports; to be successful on the stock market; to have a full share of all the social qualities; to be an all-round good fellow and enjoy an unbounded friendship, all this sounds like one of those “castles in Spain” dreams, doesn’t it?

by J. Allen Boone

Nevertheless, it’s very much of a reality to one man, and his name is E. K. Lincoln.

“Eddie” Lincoln has been much favored of the gods. But this can be said of him: he has never basked in the sunshine and waited for the gods to come to him; he has always gone to the gods. This has often meant taking big chances, but taking big chances is one of Lincoln’s chief characteristics. Life to him is a system that requires deep study. Whatever he does he believes in doing with every ounce of energy, and as he has plenty of energy, results are bound to break for him, not always his way, perhaps, but nevertheless they break, and in the continuous breaking he runs a high average in getting the things he starts after.

Lincoln began life with four valuable assets — good looks, a keen mind, a bubbling sense of humor; and a splendid physique. These got him thru school days, with an alacrity that surprised even his parents, and then he decided to become an actor. His good looks and personality landed him a small part in a stock company and in one of the second-class cities of Pennsylvania, and three weeks afterwards he was the leading man. From then on, for the next few years, he played leads in stock companies in different parts of the country. Always he kept a close eye on the financial barometer, realizing that independence in any walk of life exists only when one can afford to be independent. Each week a certain part of his salary went into a savings bank, and each time he changed stock companies it was because he could better himself financially. He worked hard, but, most important of all, he saved his money. Once, he took his savings, and, with some borrowed capital, took a flier in stock as a proprietor-producer-leading man. The venture was a success, and a tidy sum went back to the savings bank at the close of the season. He was urged to try it again the following season, but, after careful consideration, he made up his mind to let the other fellow do it, and the other fellow landed on the financial reefs because of an off season.

The advent of Motion Pictures interested the young actor-manager to such an extent that he waved an adieu to stock work and joined the Vitagraph Company as leading man. He was featured in a large number of screen productions, and his clean-cut appearance and ability as an actor won for him a large following. It was Lincoln, it will be recalled, who played the lead in A Million Bid, the screen play which signalized the opening of the Vitagraph Theater on Broadway in New York.

Lincoln’s interest in Motion Pictures was a thoro one, and he studied film production from every angle. While with the Vitagraph he invested quite a lot of money in different companies that were working to complete inventions that had to do with various phases of picture-making, and practically every one of these organizations was successful. After leaving the Vitagraph Lincoln devoted part of his time to playing leading roles for various producers, and the rest was given to his increasing business interests.

When the Photo Play Production Company planned to film “The Littlest Rebel,” Lincoln was persuaded to pull down the top of his roll-top desk for a few weeks and play the leading role, a part which afterwards won him added laurels as a screen player. Later, Lincoln organized the E. K. Lincoln Players, Inc., and built one of the best equipped studios in the East at Grantwood, N. J. There he produced The Fighting Chance, The Girl from Alaska, and several other big productions in which he not only played the leading role, but was business manager and chief factotum as well.

But Lincoln’s activities were by no means confined exclusively to Motion Pictures. He found time to superintend his farm in Pennsylvania, conducting it on modern scientific lines, and making it bring him in a good financial return; he bought property at Fairfield, Conn., and established the Greenacre Kennels, where he bred some of the most successful prize-winning dogs that have been shown in this country; he added to his property holdings a 4,000-acre estate in the Berkshire Hills, and by private wires at his New York office, his studio and his city and country homes he kept in close touch with his financial interests in Wall Street.

With so many business affairs to occupy his mind and time, one would have thought Lincoln would have let acting slide, but he didn’t, and, what is more, doesn’t intend to for a long time to come. Acting to him is a big, serious art, and he loves every angle of it. Producers are continually making big offers for his services, but Lincoln is in a position where he will play only in pictures that appeal to him from an artistic point of view. He doesn’t need the work, and he doesn’t need the money, so he can afford to be fastidious and pick and choose. Recently he appeared in a number of special Lubin productions [Siegmund Lubin], following which he played a special two-picture engagement with the World Film, being featured in The Almighty Dollar and The Almighty Dollar.

Lincoln is the ideal type of leading man. He personifies the well-bred, well-groomed, athletic young American, cosmopolitan to his finger-tips and set to meet any sort of emergency in any environment. Away from the screen Lincoln’s personality is even more striking. He lacks utterly the actor’s ego, due, no doubt, to the fact that he is interested in so many different things that he hasn’t the time to spend on self-contemplative adulation.

Lincoln is a human dynamo of activity, and to even his intimate friends it is a puzzle how he finds time to attend to the innumerable things he is interested in. Aside from his property and business interests, he devotes time to motoring, riding, golf, tennis, hunting and fishing; he is an enthusiastic baseball, football and boxing fan, and at all these events, provided they are of an important character, you will generally find E. K. Lincoln’s name among the box-holders. He attends practically all of the “first nights” in New York theaters, and often goes to other cities to see the premiere performance of what may be a good show. At his New York home he has a large library, and in between things he manages to keep abreast of the best there is in good literature. He is a member of over a dozen New York clubs and several country clubs, and drops in at all of them frequently to spend a few social hours with his friends.

As was observed before, “Eddie” Lincoln has been much favored by the gods, but, and there is much emphasis on this “but,” he has never basked in the sunshine and waited for the gods to come to him; he has always taken a chance and gone to the gods.

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Collection: Motion Picture Magazine, February 1917