With The Old Curiosity Shop and David Copperfield, both released in 1911, and Nicholas Nickleby in 1912, Thanhouser established itself as producer of the best Dickens adaptations in American film.

Edwin Thanhouser re-made The Vicar of Wakefield in 1917 as a eight-reel feature film providing us with a frame of reference for the maturation of film language and cinematic techniques over the ensuing eight year period.

The first screen adaptation of Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel to star a black man in the title role.

A messenger boy is wrongfully accused of stealing bonds worth $20,000. Luckily, a film crew is shooting a moving picture on the same street. The boy's accuser has the police convinced, until...