When the movies were young (1925)

86 When the Movies were Young Biograph's new director produced, and his first Indian picture. Charles Inslee was the big-hearted Indian chief in the story and little Johnny Tansy played the child. The picture made little Johnny famous. He had as much honor as the movies of those days could give a child. Jackie Coogan was the lucky kid to arrive in the world when he did. When the New Theatre (now the Century), sponsoring high-class uncommercial drama opened, Johnny Tansy was the child wonder of the company. Here he fell under the observant eye of George Foster Piatt and became his protege. And so our Johnny was lost to the movies. We went to Little Falls, New Jersey, for "The Redman and the Child," which, at the time, was claimed to be "the very acme of photographic art." I'll say we worked over that Passaic River. Mr. Griffith made it yield its utmost. As there was so little money for anything pretentious in the way of a studio set, we became a bit intoxicated with the rivers, flowers, fields, and rocks that a munificent nature spread before us, asking no price. My memories of working outdoors that first summer are not so pleasant. We thought we were going to get cool, fresh air in the country, but the muggy atmosphere that hung over the Hudson on humid August days didn't thrill us much. I could have survived the day better in the studio with the breeze from our one electric fan. On Jersey days, work finished, back to our little Inn in a mad rush to remove make-up, dress, and catch the next ferry. Our toilet was often no more than a lick and a promise with finishing touches added as we journeyed ferrywards along the river road in old man Brown's buggy. Were we ever going anywhere but Fort Lee and Edge