Volume II: Filmography

THE GIRL REPORTER

August 16, 1910 (Tuesday)

Length: 970 feet

Character: Drama

Note: Girl reporters were popular film subjects, as suggested by this film and such later releases as The Girl Reporter's Big Scoop (Kalem, 1912), The Girl Reporter (Crystal, 1913), and the serial, Perils of Our Girl Reporters (Niagara Film Studios-Mutual, 1917).

ADVERTISEMENT, The New York Dramatic Mirror, August 20, 1910:

"Here is a delineation of the grinding of a great modern newspaper mill as the public best likes to see it - from the inside. It is an intimate study of press and politics and it will be a revelation to you and it of course includes one of those Thanhouser love affairs that your patrons so yearn for."

SYNOPSIS, The Moving Picture World, August 20, 1910:

"May Merrill and Will Marshall are sweethearts and both reporters on the Daily Wave. Will leaves the paper to accept a position of private secretary to Blake, commissioner of public works. Shortly after Will takes up his new work Blake is threatened with exposure and punishment on his charge of accepting a bribe. In order to save himself, Blake makes it appear that Will is the guilty party. May is sent to investigate the matter for the Wave. When she discovers that Will is accused, she determines to devote all of her time to clearing him, and with this end in view, she applies for the vacant position of private secretary to Blake. Assisted by Pete, faithful office boy from the Wave, who follows her to her new position, May does some clever detective work and, clearing Will, manages to fix the guilt where it belongs, on the shoulders of Blake."

REVIEW by Walton, The Moving Picture News, August 20, 1910:

"This film points a moral and adorns a tale. Clean as a hound's tooth, sweet as a nut. Full of life. The tale of the triumph of a courageous girl, backed by an inimitable office boy, and the downfall of the grafter are well planned and well rendered. The copy room set our mind flying back to our own 'cub' days. By the way, the paper on the wall of the traction company office is somewhat weird. A good, healthy, vigorous production in every sense."

REVIEW, The Moving Picture World, September 3, 1910:

"A love story with the scenes laid in a newspaper office, and requiring some clever detective work on the part of the girl. Anyhow she succeeds in clearing her sweetheart of false accusations and places the blame where it belongs, on the shoulders of his former employer."

REVIEW, The New York Dramatic Mirror, August 27, 1910:

"This film story has melodramatic interest, and the acting is good, but the means by which some of the incidents are brought about will not stand the acid test. For instance, if a political boss wants to 'shake down' a traction company for $5,000, would he submit the proposition in writing? A young man reporter, who is in love with a girl reporter, has become the private secretary of the boss, and is the person who delivers the demand for the $5,000. The traction officials mark the bills and deliver the money, but the boss 'gets wise' and shifts the suspicion on his secretary, who is arrested. But the girl comes to the rescue. She engages herself as the secretary's successor and succeeds in getting the boss' accomplice to tell all about the deal, while witnesses in hiding are taking down his words. The scenes in the newspaper reporters' room would have been more convincing in the first scene if the staff had been more busy in writing copy instead of waving their arms and moving about."

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