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Good God, Sam Gill has a complete set of Special lobby cards!? Who would have thought that such a thing existed? Special was poised to take advantage of the 1920-21 change in market conditions that allowed Educational and Pathe to flourish over the next ten years, but it collapsed instead. Perhaps they overextended when they began signing ex-Sennett and other name comedians (Fazenda, Sterling, Conklin, Henry, etc.). As to signing Stan Laurel, in the same time frame they also signed G.M. Anderson to make westerns, so that was another juncture that their paths may have crossed in the early twenties.

So, were there any surprises in those lobby cards? Maybe the real first film appearance of the 13 year old Duke Morrison?

Frank Flood wrote:Good God, Sam Gill has a complete set of Special lobby cards!? Who would have thought that such a thing existed? Special was poised to take advantage of the 1920-21 change in market conditions that allowed Educational and Pathe to flourish over the next ten years, but it collapsed instead. Perhaps they overextended when they began signing ex-Sennett and other name comedians (Fazenda, Sterling, Conklin, Henry, etc.). As to signing Stan Laurel, in the same time frame they also signed G.M. Anderson to make westerns, so that was another juncture that their paths may have crossed in the early twenties.

So, were there any surprises in those lobby cards? Maybe the real first film appearance of the 13 year old Duke Morrison?

As I understand it from Sam, until sometime in the 1970's, there were any number of complete sets of Special Pictures lobby cards sitting at the original print shop who made them, then kept them due to non-payment of debt, and stored them until they cleared out the lot of them.

There will be some interesting stuff about Special Pictures in Volume Two of PAST HUMOR PRESENT LAUGHTER, because there is a definite Christie tie-in. Stay Tuned!

RICHARD M ROBERTS

Also thanks to your sharp eyes, Richard, for questioning the curious player.

And Frank, Sam's been collecting for ages. He's had loads of time and connections to amass all this stuff over the years. He's a great guy and I'm not so surprised he has all this stuff. I've even given him some rare old stills and stuff over the years. But I heard Sam's collection has gone overboard and he's near-drowning in it.

But I am surprised, Richard, he couldn't find Stan in a Neely Edwards/Charlotte Merriam scene with such a collection! Might have been another instance where Stan stole the show so they cut him from the film(?) or at least the lobby cards.

Lastly, here's a link to a pic of Owen Evans on a nice ad for Hamilton-White/Mermaid Comedies:

https://archive.org/stream/camera03unse#page/n595/mode/2up/search/%22Owen+Evans%22

Have a great weekend my friends – SteveR

That picture of Evans from CAMERA proves he is not the soldier with Stan in MIXED NUTS.

Didn't Stan have an ad of himself in a Special Pictures film in his scrapbook?

It will great to see a filmography of Special Pictures. Special Pictures had the talent to have been a major shorts player but somehow petered out.