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1915Thanhouser CompanyTwo reelsDrama

The Six-Cent Loaf

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

“Mary Quinn is a plucky factory girl, who supports herself and her little brother, Joel, and sister, Norah. John Rapley, head of the Associated Baking Companies, never has heard of Mary Quinn. However, she is vitally affected by a business coup which he executes, thereby raising the price of bread to six cents a loaf. The higher price of bread means that Mary cannot buy as many loaves as formerly. She stints herself, so that the children may not go hungry. She grows weaker and weaker and is discharged from the factory. Another girl with more energy is put in her place. Rapley lavishes gifts on his wife and children, little realizing that he is mainly responsible for the fact that Mary Quinn, mainstay of little Joel and Norah, is starving. One day, outside his bread shop, he finds a girl faint from hunger and ill. She tells him the tragedy of bread at six cents a loaf. Rapley has Mary and the children taken care of. Realizing now that her plight is but one instance of innumerable cases of suffering brought on by his taking advantage of war conditions to clear a big profit, he removes the extra cent on bread.”

Summary from Reel Life · 29 May 1915

What the papers said

2 reviews · 2 articles

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

The Moving Picture World · 12 June 1915

“Showing the horrible effect among the very poor occasioned by the recent advance of one cent in the price of bread, this two-part picture is a strong moral preachment against avarice among those controlling the necessities of life. It presents its lesson in an able and convincing manner, and shows a strong contrast between the methods of living between the rich and the poor.”

The New York Dramatic Mirror · 30 June 1915

Articles2 · 22 May 1915 – 12 June 1915

22 May 1915Reel Life1 min

“The huge work-room of a certain New York factory filled with girls, became suddenly the mise-en-scene, the other day, for one of the most thrilling scenes in The Six-Cent Loaf, a Thanhouser sociological drama. Many of the girls had long dreamed of becoming motion picture actresses. But when, right in among them, as they sat at their machines, came the motion picture camera, director, company and stars, they were so overcome with astonishment that they hardly knew how to make the most of the opportunity. They supported no less a star than Florence LaBadie who, dressed exactly like one of them, came into the room and took her place at one of the machines, so naturally that at first the girls thought she was a new employee. Then, somebody, a Mutual movie fan, recognized her, and there was a regular ovation.”

12 June 1915The Moving Picture World1 min

“In one of the simplest and most fundamentally appealing roles she has had to play this year, Florence LaBadie exercises all her undeniable fascination as the little factory girl, Mary Quinn, in The Six-Cent Loaf, a two-reel Thanhouser release in the Mutual program. She is ably supported in this drama of poverty and courage in the face of misfortune and impending starvation. Leland Benham, seven, and Helen Badgley, the Thanhouser Kidlet, appears as Miss LaBadie’s brother and sister for whose sakes the difficult struggle is made. Ethyle Cooke and Harris Gordon are also in the cast.”

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Cast and crew

Cast
Arthur Bauer
Eldean
Eldean Steuart
Ethel Jewett
Ethyle Cooke as Maude, his wife
Florence La Badie as Mary Quinn, the little girl in the factory
Harris Gordon as John Rapley
Helen Badgley as Norah, her sister
Leland Benham as Joel, her brother
Loel Steuart
Lowell Steuart as children of John and Maude Rapley
N.S. Woods
Nick S. Woods
William Ray Johnston as hard-boiled factory foreman

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More about this film

Bowers’ notes

Thanhouser designated this film as two reels, although it was only 1,300 feet in length.

From Volume II: Filmography of Q. David Bowers’ Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, reproduced with permission and unchanged. Read the history of 1915 →

Cite as: Bowers, Q. David. Thanhouser Films: An Encyclopedia and History, “The Six-Cent Loaf”. thanhouser.org/films/the-six-cent-loaf/

Where a print is held

Held by
No print known