Henry Walthall — Blue Book of the Screen (1923) 🇺🇸

The sturdy motion picture industry of today owes much to a very small coterie of true artists who caused the flickering cinema flame of early days to burn with a steady glow, at the time when infant pictures needed dignity and public respect, for they were believed to be but a passing fancy.

Henry Walthall [Henry B. Walthall] stands out clearly as one of these pioneer stalwarts. The artistry and individuality of this star early caused him to become known as the “Mansfield” of the screen, a well-earned title.

He was virtually drafted into pictures by D. W. Griffith. He met the director while he was calling on James Kirkwood at the old Biograph studio. Having seen him on the stage, Griffith knew of his ability, and insisted that he take a small part in the picture he was then making, giving him some old clothes and a shovel and sending him out to a sewer trench to begin his screen career in “A Convict’s Sacrifice.”

To list all of the productions in which Walthall won fame would be like giving a resume of the early efforts of the film industry. Among his best known releases are: “Classmates,” “Strongheart,” “Beulah,” “Ghosts,” “Pillars of Society,” “Home, Sweet Home,” “The Gangster,” “The Raven” and The Confession.

He was raised on a plantation in Shelby County, Alabama, the same state, incidentally, which furnishes the locale for “One Clear Call.” He was the oldest boy in a family of six children, and the family fortunes, which had been impaired during the Civil War, were still at low ebb when little Henry was old enough to take his turn at the plow and pump-handle. He had but very little actual schooling, acquiring most of his education through the teachings of his parents, who were highly cultured.

During the Spanish-American War, he enlisted in a regiment recruited in Birmingham, but, like thousands of other ardent patriots, he got no farther than Florida. Shortly after his discharge he took up the study of law, but six months of plodding through moss-bound books convinced him that it was “too dry.”

A better and more lucrative engagement at the American Theatre followed and then he went up to Providence in stock. After that his rise was slow but sure. He played Captain Clay Randolph in the Civil War drama, Winchester, for one season, and for the following three years he had the role of Steven Danbury in Lottie Blair Parker’s Under Southern Skies.

His final stage appearance was with Henry Miller and Margaret Anglin in The Great Divide. It was at the end of a four-year engagement in this play that the meeting with D. W. Griffith came about.

His latest appearance was in Rupert Hughes’ production, “Gimme.”

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Though Henry Walthall is one of the veterans of the screen, he still has the power to sway audiences with his dramatic performances.

Collection: The Blue Book of the Screen (1923)