Prescott's Best Early Movie

 

If newspaper reviews are any indication, “The Power of Silence” (the sixth movie made in Prescott) was the best one Lubin produced there in 1912. After reading the glowing critiques and lively descriptions, one is left only to lament its loss.

The Forgotten Westerns of Prescott: 1912

This article was inspired by the hard work of Tom Slaback, whose comprehensive list of the movies made in Prescott lives on the Sharlot Hall Museum website. (CLICK HERE)

1912 was the year the Lubin Manufacturing Company set up shop in Prescott to produce western motion pictures. In a mere four-month span, they produced nine one-reel western shorts.

First Movie Made in Prescott: The Cringer

The only surviving image from "The Cringer"

There are no known surviving copies of the first movie filmed in Yavapai County. However, a nationwide search of movie reviews and newspaper accounts for “The Cringer” offers a reasonable, albeit general, recapitulation of the film and some of its background.

That's My Daddy! (at Frontier Days)

Lester Ruffner, Arena Director, Frontier Days

Early etiquette at movie theaters was sacred. People paid good money to watch and demanded to do so without distraction. But there was an occasional time when the silence was broken and even more rarely, when it was excused.

Prescott was Hollywood for Silent Westerns

(Tom Mix with an unknown starlet in an unknown film.)

What do these movies: "Creepshow 2," "Universal Soldier," "Arizona Summer," "Transamerica," "Jolene," "How the West Was Won," and "Billy Jack" have in common?

They are part of 16 modern movies that were all filmed, at least in part, in Prescott, Arizona. (*1)

But when it came to silent western movies, Prescott was a real "Hollywood."  Incredibly, in the three years of 1913-15, over a hundred silent westerns were filmed in Prescott and the surrounding area.

The first movie ever made in Prescott was The Cringer.

Entertainment In Prescott a Century Ago

In later January 1915, nothing much happened in Prescott according to the Journel Miner newspaper.  Heavy snows made all travel but train nearly impossible.

The resulting slow news stories were charming:

* A couple of hundred words were given to the story of two boys who "shot the lock off the pump house (and)...After a stern lecture and cross-your-heart promises," the boys were released...

* It was observed that the mail-posts in downtown had received "so many degradations from local canines" that replacements were needed swiftly...

* It was reported, in detail, how a local woman slipped and fell on the ice. (No hospitalization was needed--simply bedrest)...

All of which gives the author an opportunity to talk in general about entertainment in Prescott a century ago...