Best Western Movies of 1914

Around the film hang fascinating questions about border politics, which I’ll touch on in an introduction before the screening. One of Eugene Buck’s motivations for making the film may have been his rough cross-examination during his kidnappers’ first trials, in October 1913, when defense attorneys cast him as a confused and unreliable witness against idealistic freedom fighters. On film he could reproduce the pursuit, the shootouts, his kidnapping, and his friend’s murder just as he had testified. Reenacting the crime on film may have been the best revenge—and a way to honor the sacrifice of Deputy Ortiz, a twenty-year police veteran and, for the era, a rare Mexican American lawman.

After the bandit Jim Stokes robs the stage he is wounded fleeing. Recuperating at a ranch, he falls in love with and marries the daughter. Now wishing to go straight he tries to return the money but is recognized and captured. When the Sheriff then loses the recovered money at a crooked roulette table, he and Stokes strike a bargain.

Blamed for the theft of an orphans fund, Captain James Wynnegate flees to the West where he makes a new life with the Indian woman Nat-U-Rich.

A good-natured but chivalrous cowboy romances the local schoolmarm and leads the posse that brings a gang of rustlers, which includes his best friend, to justice.

The earliest surviving film featuring Lon Chaney in a major role, By the Sun's Ray's was but one of several 2-reel westerns starring the florid Murdock MacQuarrie. MacQuarrie plays a detective investigating a series of gold shipment robberies. Along the way, he falls for a mine superintendent's pretty daughter (Agnes Vernon), much to the dismay of a sullen mine office clerk (Chaney), who is also smitten with the girl...

The firm of John Sterling and Sons bad been organized by his father, and when son Gilbert was old enough, he took active part in the management. Gilbert's love for the high life led him away from his duties, and it was nothing unusual for him to spend six nights out of the week with questionable company. Early one morning, intoxicated, Gilbert finds his way to his home. His father reprimands him and finally puts him out of the house, telling him "never to return."

When beautiful Salomy Jane resists the romantic advances of a young ruffian, she is rescued by Jack Dart, who has his own additional reasons for tangling with the man. Jack fights the ruffian and kills him. He escapes with the law on his trail, for it is (wrongly) presumed that he is also the man who held up the stagecoach. Salomy Jane comes to his rescue when he is captured and about to be lynched.

A film about Sioux leader Chief Gray Otter who sends his son Tiah off to a "white man's school" so that he can become a great leader. The son returns home as a worthless drunk, disappointing the father but things get worse when the son joins a group of renegades and robs a payroll. The father is then forced to make a decision.

Tom and Sally are the only survivors when their wagon train is attacked by Swift Wing's braves. Starlight aids in their escape and they join a group of hunters. But there is more trouble when the tribe attacks again.

STRONGHEART (1914) is a rare Native American Indian drama that was produced by the Biograph Company in New York City. Based on a famous play of the time, the film features an all-star cast: Henry B. Walthall (later of BIRTH OF A NATION), Blanche Sweet, Antonio Moreno, Lionel Barrymore, and Alan Hale (father of "Gilligan's Island" skipper). Originally five reels, the film was reissued at three reels in 1916.

Billy plays a prank on an old miner and causes the poor old man to have a heart attack.

The Escott family, on their way to Montana, is attacked by Indians. Army Lt. Joe Lanier finds little Elsie Escott, the only survivor,

Broncho Billy comes between a Mexican thug and the young woman he is disturbing. The Mexican plots revenge for the insult and captures Billy, who has rescued a lost old man. The young woman discovers Billy being held prisoner and rides for help. The townsmen gallop toward Billy's rescue.

Esra Kincaid takes land by force and, having taken the Espinoza land, his sights are set on the Castro rancho. Government agent Kearney holds him off till the cavalry shows up and he can declare his love for Juanita, called “the Rose of the Rancho.”

Life on the 101 Ranch, Bliss Oklahoma

Jack Holmes, a squatter, and his daughter, Margaret, settle on land owned by Harry Rawlins. Broncho Billy, gunman, is engaged by Rawlins to eject the squatter or put him out of the way. Broncho is wounded by a half-breed and Margaret nurses him back to health. The gunman then refuses to turn Holmes out.

Bill, squatter, while playing it the side of the hill, accidentally discovers silver.

The Different Man is a silent Western from 1914

ARCHIVE: George Eastman House

In what scenarist C. Gardner Sullivan misleadingly called “The Romantic Adventures of a Woman of the ’50s,” this story has Hart play Jim Brandon, who has just robbed the Wolf Creek stage of a payroll meant for Frank Wilding’s Lost Hope Mine. Fearing another holdup, Wilding reluctantly entrusts his daughter Edith with the next payroll. Confident of his concealed identity, Brandon comes to town, orders drinks at the local saloon, and hears that this is “payday” for the mine. Outside, he realizes Edith will be carrying the payroll and follows her onto the stage. When it stops at the Mountain House Restaurant, Brandon protects Edith from a man forcing his attention on her, which forges an unacknowledged bond between them. strangely leaves her to barricade the door.

Tim Clancy was a politician. He was a contractor incidentally. He wanted and secured, by breaking down a good man's moral code, the contract to build the new city water system. Specifications called for the best. He put in the cheapest.

A 1914 silent Western short

Broncho Billy, an express messenger, saved the life of Geraldine Burke, a school teacher. They learned to love each other and later married. One day, the village gossip informed some of the cowpunchers about town that Geraldine was entertaining a gentleman in her home. Broncho Billy was soon given the news and determined to settle with the critter immediately

Thomas Lattier is a well-to-do westerner in the cattle business. One fine day he sells a herd of cattle, receiving for it cash payment in bills of large denomination. He proceeds to town alone to deposit it in his bank. Two bad men, Bretall and Hayes, have learned of the deal and trail him with a view to securing the money.

Broncho Billy is a typical bad man. The story opens with him shooting up a small town in the west, and scaring the inhabitants nearly to death. The sheriff with his deputies order him out of the country. Sunday morning, the congregation is in church singing. Boardman, another bad man, and his protégés, break up the meeting. The preacher is ousted.

Maximillo Corto, a Mexican crook, keeps a tavern on the Mexican border and has a daughter whom he abuses and who has to do all the hard work around the place. One day, Bob Jamison, really an American spy in the service, comes to the inn and stops overnight. He falls in love with the daughter of the innkeeper. She is infatuated with him, as he is the first human being who has ever been kind to her. He goes away but promises to return. While he is away a large reward is offered for his capture, dead or alive. The innkeeper tells the messenger of the news that if Bob ever comes back, he will put him into room seven and hold him. The daughter overhears this, and when Bob returns, unable to warn him, she changes the number on the door of room seven to that of six. When Bob is sent up to his room by Corto, he goes in what he thinks is seven but the daughter afterwards shifts the door numbers back to their original positions. Corto decides to kill Bob in his sleep and steals upstairs.

John Wilson had driven the stagecoach for years. When his daughter, Marguerite, became old enough, he allowed her to make an occasional trip with him. It was when she was about 19 that she had the terrible experience. Her father and the express messenger bad gone into the general store. Marguerite remained on the coach to watch the horses, four of them. A shooting contest a few feet away frightened the horses and they bolted. On a gallop they dashed down the road. Marguerite screamed for her life.

The new minister en route to a new western town to preach loses one of his suitcases containing his clerical robes. It is found on the road by Pete and Ike, cowboys of the Bar X Ranch, who decide to play a huge joke on the boys of their town.

Marguerite becomes weary as the hours and the Overland Limited roll on. Her trip from New York to the far west was a tedious one, and it is with a sigh of relief that she steps from the observation platform to pluck some flowers. The train had stopped for water. Marguerite wanders into the woods and when she returns, discovers that the train had pulled off. She is alone in a new country, without friends or funds.

A detective from the east is sent west to locate a notorious bandit and train robber. In the costume of a western cowpuncher he reaches a small town. He is injured by falling over a precipice. Broncho Billy finds him, carries him to his cabin and nurses him back to health. It is then that Broncho discovers that the detective is looking for him

Broncho Billy, a doctor and minister in the far west, is overwhelmed with grief one evening when he returns to his home to find a note from his wife stating that she could not bear the loneliness any longer and had gone to town with the man she loved. A few years later she is forced to her bed where she finally dies of a broken heart. Broncho had been told of her condition and hastens to her in time to kiss and forgive her. The negligent husband returns and Broncho Billy forgetting himself, is about to slay the man, when he suddenly remembers the note his wife had left for him, with these words, "Never forget your duty to your God."

Broncho Billy saves an Indian from starvation. The Indian's intelligence is soon discovered by Broncho, who determines to make the red man a partner in his prospecting camp. An accident renders the prospector unconscious and the Indian hastens to the village for a doctor. The physician discovers that Broncho Billy's marred face is filled with dirt and gold. He tries to bribe the Indian. "Where did the explosion occur? See, Buck, I'm going to give you this money, tell me?" But the Indian is loyal.

William Young and his daughter, Mildred, settle in the west, with the intention of investing their money in a mine. True Boardman, a mine shark, knowing that Young will be easy money, salts the mine and sells it to them.

Carnos, a greaser, is sent to jail. He is a very refractory prisoner and swears to get even with the sheriff when he is liberated. On the day of the greaser's release, the sheriff had captured Broncho Billy, an outlaw, and was bringing him to justice, when he is suddenly pushed from his horse by the outlaw, and is left to wend his way across the plains afoot. Broncho Billy escapes on the sheriff's horse and unknowingly stops at the sheriff's home for food. Looking through a window he sees the greaser about to take the life of the sheriff's wife.

To err is human, but in the end, goodness of heart will prevail and the one who has committed an offense against man-made laws may come out of the mire and develop into a law abiding and god-fearing citizen. Broncho Billy, from being one of the most desperate characters in the west, is reformed through the kind treatment accorded him at the hands of the sheriff and his wife, and is made deputy.

Mary's lot. always hard, becomes doubly so upon her father's death. Desiring to re-marry, the girl's stepmother conspires to get her out of the way.

The first, and apparently only, surviving film produced by the Colorado Motion Picture Company, Pirates of the Plains is a quite well-made story about two brothers, one a champion rodeo rider, the other a horse thief.

Col. Landers adopts two children, "How," an Indian boy, and Bess, whose parents were killed in an Indian uprising. When the children are grown, How proposes to Bess, whom he has loved since his childhood. She accepts his proposal, thus angering Clayton Craig, Lander's nephew who also wants to marry her. After Lander's death, How is exiled from the ranch, so he and Bess buy new land. One day, after he has been away, How returns to his cabin to see Bess and Craig embracing. How grants Bess her freedom after which she marries Craig and moves to New York. Some time later, How discovers oil on the land that he gave Bess, so he follows them to New York. There he finds that Craig has been unfaithful to Bess. In the end, Bess rejects Craig so that she and How can remarry and find "a trail to happiness together." -From TCM.com Database, powered by the AFI.

Mabel Madden, thrown upon her own resources, inherits a saloon from her father. She is somewhat infatuated with Tom Mason, against whom suspicions have been aroused of rustling cattle from the neighboring ranchmen. But she is also a great admirer of the intrepid sheriff.

A feud between the families of Gourd and Fork Ranches

Pete Larson is a brute whose battered wife, Anne, finally finds courage to leave. The woman gets lost in the wilderness and is taken in by a young hunter, who later proposes marriage. Mistakenly believing her husband to be dead, Anne accepts only to find her first husband returning to perform a bit of blackmail.

Jim Cameron becomes desperate at his failure to get work, and resolves to hold up the stage in order to provide necessities for his wife and sick child, Mildred.

Jimmy Hayes joins the Texas rangers. He causes much merriment by introducing to his new friends an ugly horned toad, around the neck of which he has tied a bright ribbon. He has named the horned toad "Muriel," and it is his constant companion, having a domicile within his flannel shirt.

Carl Stockdale, the sheriff of Boise County, is given a case of valuable jewels to deliver, but determines to keep them for himself.

Society man Arthur Lee is in love with society belle Helen Robinson, who is also admired by James Holden, a wealthy mine owner from the West. At her father's country place, Lee is unhappy because of her popularity but is appeased when she finally accepts his proposal and ring. Holden interrupts and claims a moment's talk. Telling Lee to wait for her in a favorite nook of the veranda, she goes with Holden while Lee strolls in the garden to await her. After proposing, Holden leaves her and hastens to the nook, seating himself with his back to the French windows. Lee is nearby in the garden finishing his smoke. He sees Holden in his chair, by the light of the latter's cigarette, and then sees Helen come from the lighted ballroom, approach the chair and throw her arms about Holden, sit in his lap and kiss him. Lee turns away in despair and anger and leaves the grounds.

Broncho Billy loses his job and is forced to go west in search of employment. He lands in a small western town, where he takes up gold mining. Stockdale, a westerner, also meeting with bad luck, consults Broncho Billy, and the two determine to hold up the stagecoach that day.

The ranchman's daughter is in love with Jack of the Rancho and becomes engaged to him, but Pa comes on their lovemaking and rudely separates them. Following an idea which he worked on during a visit to New York, Pa writes to a Frenchman, a lawyer there, and tells him he will marry his daughter to a count the lawyer will provide. The lawyer accordingly looks up an Italian cook, decks him out with a red sash, etc., and sends him west for the easy money.

Tom Bates is living in the city enjoying a liberal fortune left him by an uncle recently deceased. When Tom received his fortune he was working on a ranch as a cowboy and was a top-notcher, too. In the city he has met May, a charming and beautiful girl, who is engaged to marry him. Tom rescues a forlorn girl in the park from a ruffian. May breaks the engagement.

Old Harry Todd and his daughter, Marguerite, are in the west prospecting for gold. They meet Broncho Billy, who takes dinner with them and later continues on his way. As he is riding across the plains thinking of Marguerite, he happens to see an Indian at the top of a hill, looking down upon the prospector and his daughter. Broncho Billy warns Todd and his daughter.