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The Children’s Hour

A frame from The Children’s Hour

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The story

“In Longfellow’s beautiful poem, he tells of the children’s hour—that time of day when the little ones are permitted to meet their elders on equal grounds. He describes the love that exists between the grandfather and the three little grandchildren, who each night insisted upon coming into his study, where, for one golden hour, they reigned supreme, and he was their willing and devoted servant. As the poet says, speaking of his hero -

They climb into my turret

O’er the arms in back of my chair

If I try to escape they surround me

They seem to be everywhere.

“The grandfather entertains the children with fairy stories that never grow old, and the evening passes as happily for him as it does for them.”

Summary from The Moving Picture World · 15 November 1913

Another synopsis, from Reel Life · 8 November 19131 min

“Longfellow’s love for his three little girls he immortalized in ‘The Children’s Hour,’ one of the sweetest poems in our literature. Everybody remembers the stanzas, beginning:

Between the dark and the daylight

When the night is beginning to lower,

Comes a pause in the day’s occupations

That is known as the Children’s Hour.

“The poet conjures up a beautiful picture of ‘grave Alice and laughing Allegra—and Edith with golden hair’—as they storm the study at twilight, to climb on his knees, and listen to stories in the firelight—almost devouring their father with kisses—twining their little arms about him—calling out all the tenderness and gentle humor and poetic fancy, of ‘the children’s poet.’ The Thanhouser Company has reproduced Longfellow’s poem—and the film is one of the rare and attractive offerings among the new plays. It is scarcely a play itself—rather, an intimate glimpse into old Craigie House in Cambridge—into the happy home of America’s ‘sweetest singer.’ To see it, is distinctly a privilege. The poem is enacted, stanza by stanza. The children are ready for bed. We see them in their rooms, in their nightgowns—and then the poet sitting in the study below, listening to the ‘patter of little feet’—and the sweet, soft voices, as they tiptoe down the hall stair, and cluster together, laughing and whispering, plotting to take him by surprise. He ‘plays possum’—and they are delighted to find him, to all appearances, asleep in his chair. It is delicious to clamber up over the high back and over the arms—and tickle his face and pull his long, white hair—and have him wake up, so surprised to find them there! Then there is storytelling until nurse and mother come and carry them off to bed. And after they are gone, the poet sits, dreaming in the firelight, smiling to himself. The two beautiful closing quatrains of the poem express his reverie. He falls asleep there—and in the room overhead, three little faces lie on the pillows, with eyes shut fast.”

Background of the scenario

The Children’s Hour is one of the best known poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Released in 1894, it was a great success. Longfellow, born in Portland, Maine in 1807, a descendant of a colonial family, was educated at a private school and later at Bowdoin in Maine, where he was a classmate of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Bowdoin offered him a professorship of modern languages, under which he traveled in Europe for several years. At the institution he taught and contributed to periodicals. His work attracted the attention of Harvard, which offered him the Smith professorship, which he accepted. At Harvard he taught for 18 years and became a significant figure in the Cambridge community. In 1843 Longfellow married T. G. Appleton’s sister, whom he had met a few years earlier in Europe, and who was a model for the heroine in Hyperion (1839). Longfellow achieved great fame in America and abroad, and his works saw numerous translations into foreign languages. Following the 1861 death of his wife, his creative instincts were stilled. The next several years were spent translating Dante and touring Europe, an effort which garnered him several degrees. Following his death in 1882 he became the only American to be enshrined in the Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey. His works were known for a style that was at once gentle and mellow, sweet and romantic. These attributes, which brought a wide acclaim to his poems during his life, formed the basis for numerous criticisms following his death.

What the papers said

4 reviews · 1 advertisement

“This exceedingly attractive and dainty little film is a delicate rendering of Longfellow’s charming poem and is reproduced with a tenderness and playful charm which is as fanciful as it is free from maudlin sentimentality. The poet sits in his armchair by the fire. It is the children’s bedtime, and he hears them romping in their night nursery overhead, and …

Read in full · 1 min

“This exceedingly attractive and dainty little film is a delicate rendering of Longfellow’s charming poem and is reproduced with a tenderness and playful charm which is as fanciful as it is free from maudlin sentimentality. The poet sits in his armchair by the fire. It is the children’s bedtime, and he hears them romping in their night nursery overhead, and knows well that this is the hour when his privacy will be invaded, and he will be held, a willing captive, only to be ransomed from the imprisonment of their caresses by the accustomed recital of their favourite fairy stories. One by one they creep down the stairs, intent on startling him into the surprise which he never fails to show. Then the well-known stories are retold, and the shadowy corners of the firelit room are peopled by those constant friends of children through all ages—Old Mother Hubbard, Red Riding Hood, Little Jack Horner, and all their company—until father and mother [sic; inconsistent with nurse and mother mentioned in the preceding synopsis] carry them off to bed and happy dreams. The children are as charming as they are beautiful, and play with a spontaneity and grace which are delightful. It is a relief to think that film children can go peacefully to bed without the certainty that a candle, left by a studiously careless maid, will presently reduce the curtains and bed hangings to a smother of smoke and red fire. It is a relief to find a play so devoid of sensation and excitement, and so full of interest and charm. It will not only delight the children, but will be welcomed by all who have a tender place in their hearts for the little ones, and of the latter, we should imagine, ten-tenths of any average audience is composed.”

The Bioscope · 15 January 1914

“Longfellow’s poem, The Children’s Hour, in which he expressed some of his regard for his three daughters, is the basis of this beautiful film. It is not really a story. Rather it is a scene from the family life of the poet. The poem is enacted stanza by stanza in a charmingly natural manner.”

The Morning Telegraph · 16 November 1913

More reviews2 · 22 November 1913

22 November 1913The Motion Picture News1 min

This review is reprinted in the narrative section of the present work.

22 November 1913The Moving Picture World1 min

“A slight, but pretty and generally pleasing picture, illustrating Longfellow’s well known poem, The Children’s Hour. The old poet himself is seen at his fireside and the children gather round to hear him read. The words of the poem are shown at intervals. The pillow fight will appeal particularly to young observers.”

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8 November 1913Reel Life1 min

“In Longfellow’s beautiful poem he tells of the children’s hour, that time in the day when the little ones are permitted to meet their elders on equal ground. He describes the love that existed between the grandfather and his three little grandchildren, who each night insisted upon coming into his study, where for one golden hour they reigned supreme, and he was their willing and devoted servant.”

Cast and crew

Director: Eugene Moore
Cast: Harry Benham as the grandfather
: Helen Badgley as his grandchildren
: Lila Chester as the wife
: Lloyd F. Lonergan
: Madeline Fairbanks
: Marion Fairbanks
: Riley Chamberlin as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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More about this film

Bowers’ notes: The roles of the grandfather and of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow are taken by two different actors. In the original poem, the father represented the poet himself; there was no grandfather. 2. In The Motion Picture Magazine, June 1914, the title of this film appeared as The Childless Hour, a curious error indeed!
Posters and media

From Volume II: Filmography of Q. David Bowers’ Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, reproduced with permission and unchanged. Read the history of 1913 →

Cite as: Bowers, Q. David. Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, “The Children’s Hour”. thanhouser.org/films/the-children-s-hour/

Where copies are held

Held by: Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc.
Completeness: Incomplete
Restored by: Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc. · 2013 · Silent (no music)
Note: A 16mm print, missing its head and tail but otherwise complete, was donated to Thanhouser Company Film Preservation by Bob King in 2009.

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