Lost1912Thanhouser CompanyOne reelDrama

His Father’s Son

Name: His Father’s Son
Genre: Drama
Released: 1912-09-06

No copy you can watch online. No print is known to survive. What follows is what does: the release, the cast, the story, and what the trade press said at the time.

The story

“A contractor who had amassed a fortune through handling big jobs thoroughly disapproved of his big son. He regarded the youth as a dude, and feared that he was fast developing into one of the idle rich class. The son, though educated as a civil engineer, was perfectly willing to idle along and live upon the money his father gave him. The two quarreled constantly until finally there came a day when the boy tired of his father’s constant sneers and declared that he would prove he could make his way in the world himself. Fortune led him to a section of the West where men in his father’s employ were carrying on a gigantic piece of work. Under an assumed name he secured a position, and by strict attention to the business and native ability rapidly forged ahead. One of the division superintendents, although an excellent workman, was a victim of drink, and after repeated warnings, was discharged. The ‘son of his father’ was advanced to his vacant position, and gained the bitter enmity of his predecessor, not only because he had supplanted him, but because the daughter of the general superintendent seemed to look with favor upon the newcomer, and the disgraced employee had long admired her.

“It was generally known that the new engineer’s job depended upon his concluding his section of the task within the time limit. The old engineer plotted with an anarchistic workman and offered him a sum of money if he would wreck the work. The plot was overheard by a child who had received many favors from the superintendent’s daughter. He ran over to warn her, and found the girl alone in the house. She realized that there was no time to summon assistance, found the bomb and at the risk of her life carried it to a nearby stream, where she hurled it into the water. The villains were captured by the girl’s father and lover, who were hard at work in their office and knew nothing of the plot until they heard the explosion. The young superintendent advanced rapidly in his chosen profession and the girl’s father gladly consented when the young man asked his consent to marry the daughter. The old contractor also heard of his new employee and as the day of the wedding approached decided to travel a few hundred miles out of his way to meet him. The reunion was a joyful one, for the older man found that the one-time dude was a chap to be proud of and through adversity had really become his father’s son.”

Summary from The Moving Picture World · 31 August 1912

What the papers said

3 reviews · 1 advertisement

Read in full · 1 min

“Continuing the recent policy of combining topical and semi-topical events with imaginary stories, the Thanhouser Company has been effected a strikingly one play of more than passing interest. The son of a rich contractor leaves home to make a man of himself and secures employment as a laborer on one of his father’s jobs under an assumed name. He meets the daughter of the superintendent and assists her to start her auto, which breaks down. Later he saves her from the insult of a drunken foreman. The superintendent wires the contractor of the incapacity of the foreman and recommends the new man for the position. The father wires confirming the information and instructs the superintendent to follow out his desires. The son is appointed, and under his able supervision the aqueduct is soon completed. The discharged foreman decides to destroy the works in revenge for being discharged. His little girl overhears the plot and runs to the daughter of the superintendent and gives warning. The older girl succeeds in throwing away the bomb in the nick of time; the discharged man is caught, and the works are thus saved. The father of the new foreman arrives for a visit and asks to be presented to the young man whom the superintendent thinks good enough for his daughter and meets his own son. The views of the big aqueduct and dam are finely taken, the actors appear with the regular workman and look like them, instead of like players as in many such films. The story holds, the photography is fine and the direction is excellent.”

The Morning Telegraph · 8 September 1912

Read in full · 1 min

“A very pleasing melodramatic picture whose chief background, shown only near the close, is a beautiful concrete bridge. The father of the picture’s hero is a big contractor, and a superintendent is in charge of the work. The boy has been a spendthrift and his father has told him he is worthless. He changes his name and gets work, unrecognized by the superintendent on the job. We now see that the superintendent’s daughter is to be the heroine and that a foreman (he is soon discharged) is to be the villain. Later, this man attempts to dynamite the ‘finished work’ of the promising young engineer who had come on the job and then supplanted him. Word is brought to the heroine by a poor little boy whom she had helped, and she throws the bomb into the river where it explodes, making a splash. The superintendent is glad to give his daughter to the new foreman and introduces him to the contractor, who recognizes his son. The acting and photography are all they ought to be. It is a good film.”

The Moving Picture World · 14 September 1912

More reviews

11 September 1912The New York Dramatic Mirror1 min

“The theme of this picture drama has been well worked out, and, except for small details, it is a faithful production. The engineer on the job sets up his instrument with remarkable celerity, more swiftly, in fact, than real engineers would be able to do it, and the bomb planted by the villain would probably have done no more harm than to blow out a little dirt, since it was planted so lightly. Solid walls of modern construction are not blown apart by placing a bomb near them and covering it with a little dirt. The idle son of a contractor resolves to make a man of himself, and he gets a job under one of his father’s superintendents, using an assumed name. He soon displaces a foreman, and does capable work in the matter of finishing a viaduct. The discharged foreman hatches a scheme to destroy the work of his rival and the bomb is planted. A child tells the daughter of the superintendent about it, and the girl rushes to the place, seizes the explosive, and throws it in the river. When the contractor visits the work later to see the young man whom the superintendent considers worthy of his daughter, he is delighted to find that his son has become a man.”

31 August 1912The Moving Picture World1 min

“This is one of those ‘dynamiting stories’ that this producer can put on more realistically than any other. There is the usual unusual Thanhouser plot and you are spared no thrills in the working out of it. More gripping, more intense, more exciting than On the Stroke of Five.”

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Cast and crew

Cast: Jean Darnell

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More about this film

Bowers’ notes: This film was erroneously advertised for release on August 30, 1912 (in an Thanhouser advertisement in The Moving Picture World, August 31, 1912, for example).

From Volume II: Filmography of Q. David Bowers’ Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, reproduced with permission and unchanged. Read the history of 1912 →

Cite as: Bowers, Q. David. Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, “His Father’s Son”. thanhouser.org/films/his-father-s-son/

Where a print is held

Held by: No print known