Volume II: Filmography

WHY TOM SIGNED THE PLEDGE

Advertisement from The Moving Picture World, June 9, 1912.(F-460)

British release title(?): WHY FOUR SIGNED THE PLEDGE

June 14, 1912 (Friday)

Length: 1 reel, this part 355 feet in length (split with A Night Clerk's Nightmare at the beginning)

Character: Comedy

Cast: Riley Chamberlin (Tom's father), Viola Alberti (Tom's mother)

Notes: 1. This film marked Riley Chamberlin's first film appearance. Earlier, he had been associated with Edwin Thanhouser as a stage comedian in Thanhouser's stock company in Milwaukee. 2. A listing of this film in The Bioscope, April 10, 1913, indicates that in Great Britain the film was publicized as Why Four Signed the Pledge. It is not known if this was the British release title or whether it was listed as such because of a typographical error. A reading of the synopsis reveals that just two people "signed the pledge."

SYNOPSIS, The Moving Picture World, June 8, 1912:

"Deacon Prim is as prim as his name, and a shining light in the cause of temperance. His son Tom, however, thinks along different lines. The deacon tries, without success, to get Tom to sign the pledge. One evening Tom goes out with some of his fast friends, while the deacon attends a temperance meeting and is quite the star of the evening. On his way home, however, the deacon has the misfortune to fall, and breaks his eyeglasses. He also gets his clothing rather dirty. As he blunders along the street, half blind, he meets with one disaster after another. He bumps into a lamp post, blocking his eye. Robbers despoil him of his belongings, and smash his hat. The man against whom he stumbles, beats him. Finally, a friendly drunken man pours a gallon of whiskey over him. So when the deacon arrives home, he looks as if he had been having a very gay night. His explanations are received with scorn, and his wife insists that he sign the pledge, which he finally does. But good comes out of evil, for Tom is so affected by his father's supposed fall from grace, that he signs the pledge himself, being sure that he will never want to drink again, after seeing his father in such an awful state."

REVIEW, The Morning Telegraph, June 16, 1912:

"Tom is the son of a deacon who is a stern prohibitionist. But Tom is of a different turn of mind from his father and imbibes too freely. One night while Tom is out on a spree his father attends a temperance meeting and on the way home loses his glasses, which causes him all manner of trouble. He falls down, is robbed, receives a black eye, many bruises and finally a drunkard douses him with whisky. When he reaches home his wife and family think he has been on a spree, too, and so the son is set such an example that he gladly signs the pledge with his father. The comedy has its subtle moral and is as amusing as entertaining."

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