Down in the boiler room Red Moran, determined to avenge the Chronicle’s exposé of his boss, plies the boilerman with booze and challenges him to a coal shoveling contest, having first closed off the steam line. Tension mounts as the camera cuts repeatedly to the pressure gauge slowly moving into the danger level, an audience suspense-building technique often used later by the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock.
Then … His sabotage causes an explosion and fire at the Chronicle headquarters; multiple alarms summon a frantic response from the city’s fire brigade.
… a vintage photo … here’s a 1915 photo image showing the Chronicle Building as it was when the movie was filmed.
… and Now, the building, also seen earlier in the movie, is still there today at 690 Market on the corner of Kearny Street. It has since been remodeled and doubled in height to create the swanky condominiums of the Ritz-Carlton Club and Residences.
Then … Firehouses in San Francisco and in Los Angeles were filmed for the response scenes. The director jumps all over the place with random cuts between the locations but for this post shots from the same firehouse are presented together. After this first truck exits the firehouse (top left) the camera cuts to a wider view allowing us to see where it was filmed.
… in 1950 … here’s that location, unchanged even though this c. 1950 photo was taken 25 years later. The arched doorway at the bottom right corner is where the fire engine exited, top left above. In San Francisco, this is the Truck Company 1 firehouse at 418 Jessie Street, South of Market, in what’s now known as Mint Plaza (map).
… and Now, a recent view of Mint Plaza today, again mostly unchanged except the firehouse is no longer there; today it’s the restaurant Burma Love, now readdressed as 8 Mint Plaza.
Then … In this shot the building on the left looks familiar …
… and Now, that’s because we are still in Mint Plaza alongside the old Mint Building. The restaurant that replaced Truck Company 1’s firehouse is over on the right side and the building facing us is the one on the left, two images above.
Then … Inside the next firehouse a message is received on a Gamewell Punch Register (top corner) that identifies the source of the originating alarm on a ticker-tape. Firemen waste no time manning a fire engine (on the left) and a fire truck (on the right). Fire engines usually carried water; fire trucks usually did not , instead carrying a rescue ladder and other equipment such as jaws of life.
Then … As the fire engine leaves, the firehouse name is the clue to its location; this was filmed at the Engine Company 24 / Truck Company 1 firehouse in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo district at 204 South Hewitt Street (map).
… in 1922 … here’s a vintage 1922 photo showing the station three years earlier. At that time a different truck company, No. 5, shared the building with Engine Company 24.
… and Now, the station, on the corner of S. Hewitt and E. 2nd Streets, is no longer there; the space is now a parking lot. What a waste of a fine old building.
Then … Two engines from Engine Company 2 at 460 Bush Street in San Francisco’s Financial District are the next to respond. The compact 1908 firehouse, at far left, was the first firehouse rebuilt following the 1906 earthquake. The columned building next to it was a Pacific Telephone & Telegraph Company building at 444 Bush Street.
… and Now, the classy Beaux Arts firehouse building is still there but it has been converted to office space.
Then … Clarence happens to be parked across from the police station when the police arrive; he sees them hustling Ray McDonald inside. This was filmed in Hollywood as evidenced by the stores behind him - Ford & Ford Chiropractic on the right was listed in the 1925 Los Angeles city directory at 5911 Hollywood Blvd and Star Cleaners was listed at 5913 Hollywood Blvd.
… and Now, the chiropractor’s office at 5911 is now Sparadise Massage & Spa; Star Cleaners at 5913 is now Bread and Butter lunch and coffee shop. Note the lamppost in the center - remarkably it appears to be the same one a century later as in the movie shot above.
Then … He rushes over to see what’s going on; inside he is astounded to hear that Ray is being charged with accepting a $50,000 bribe; he is helpless as Ray is manhandled, protesting the whole way, to a jail cell.
Police Station 6 appeared earlier in the movie. It’s on the right side in this vintage photo where it shared a building with LAFD’s Engine 27 from 1913 to 1930.
… and Now, what’s more, it wasn’t opposite where Clarence was parked; it was a good 7 or 8 blocks away at 1629 N. Cahuenga Blvd. Check the location now, completely rebuilt. (Note the adjacent brick building partially visible at far left, above, - it’s still there today).
As a close friend of the McDonald family Clarence can’t bring himself to call the shocking news into his newspaper, leaving it instead to the local beat reporter who doesn’t hesitate to call the city editor. With eighteen minutes to press time it’s all hands on deck to rewrite the front page in time for the day’s last edition.
Then … In the next sequence the audience gets to see step-by-step how a newspaper story is created - from its initial composition to the final printed page. It begins with the copy editor receiving the story outline from the city editor. He writes the story and sends it on to linotype machine operators who turn his words into metal ‘slugs’ - lines of text cast from molten metal as fast as the operator types them in.
This and the sequence of operations that follow were all filmed in the Chronicle’s newly built 901 Mission Street building in San Francisco’s Soma district (map); the 1920s photograph below shows the composing room where the linotype machines were filmed.
Then … The metal slugs and an etched photo plate are arranged by compositors at makeup tables (on the left, below) into a full page format (on the right). The words and images are reversed, like a negative, so that when printed they will read in normal format.
The makeup tables were in the same composing room as the linotype machines. This photograph of them also shows a linotype battery at far right.
Then … When the page is complete a sample sheet is printed out and checked for errors. A papier-mâché sheet is then beaten against the completed layout to form a mold (called a ‘flong’) which in turn is used to cast a curved metal plate (called a ‘stereotype’) which will pair with a rotary press to print the newspaper page.
Here’s a photo taken at 901 Mission Street of the same equipment being used to cast stereotype plates.
Then … With time running out the finished plate is winched down to the press room below. Tom’s supervisor grabs it and sends it along a conveyor to Tom, waiting at a press. He bolts it into place, jubilant, knowing they’ve pulled it off - the presses start rolling just in time for the day’s last edition.
This 1920s photo taken in the Chronicle’s press room looks from the opposite direction along the plate conveyor seen above. Alongside it are the massive rotary printing presses, 14 of them in a row.
Tom’s celebration is cut short when he sees the front page with a photograph of his son under a huge headline trumpeting the bribery charge.
At a local police station the Chronicle’s courthouse reporter slips a cigar to the desk sergeant then seeks the quid pro quo: “Do you have anything for me today?”
Then … In a later scene we are shown where this took place - Police Station 6 (although the interior scene may have been filmed in a studio).
… a vintage photo … John Bengston’s excellent website silentlocations.com revealed the location of this police station - read his detailed post about it here. It was set in San Francisco but was filmed at 1629 N. Cahuenga Blvd in Hollywood (map). The station - it shared a building with the Fire Department’s Engine 27 - was there from 1913 to 1930 during which time it appeared in many silent movies including comedies by Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton.
On a trivia note this fun photo taken in 1928 in front of Station 6 provided ample evidence that a cop’s day is not all work and no play.
… and Now, the music publishing company Real Songs, readdressed as # 1635, now sits squarely on the old fire/police station site. But the 2-story hotel on the left has survived (it’s partially visible in the vintage photo of the station, above).
The reporter is in luck; he calls the Chronicle’s city editor with a scoop: the police have set their sights on Sam Blotz, a suspected bootlegger.
Then … At far right the city editor asks a young staffer to bring him everything they have on Blotz.
… and Now, this was filmed on the 3rd floor of the San Francisco Chronicle’s 901 Mission Street building where reporters continue to work 100 years later in the same, albeit modernized, space.
Then … The newspaper’s librarians dig out information on Blotz.
… a vintage photo … here’s that same library in 1924 at the San Francisco Chronicle’s 901 Mission Street building. The wall-mounted files seen above are arrayed along the side wall. Note in both images the radiator alongside the column.
The editor shows the files and photographs to Clarence Walker (Polly McDonald’s suitor), assigning him the task of writing an exposé of Sam Blotz.
Tom has arranged to pick up his daughter Polly at work - she’s employed by the telephone company as a switchboard operator supervisor. Outside the building on the sunny side of the street he blows the horn.
Then … Two buildings were used to represent where this was filmed. First we are shown the Pacific Telephone building downtown in SoMa at 140 New Montgomery Street (map). This is the northwest-facing side taken from the old Call Building (now known as the Central Tower Building) a few blocks away on Market Street. The flag touts Bell Telephone’s bell logo and the east bay is out there somewhere in the distance. (However, don’t be fooled, the scene above wasn’t filmed in SoMa - neither as we will see was it filmed in San Francisco).
… and Now, when completed in 1925 during the economic boom of the Roaring 20s the beautiful white Art Moderne building (“A shimmering, gleaming monument to Talk” per the SF Examiner), was the tallest in San Francisco. In this recent Google 3D image it continues to stand proud, unchanged as it nears its centennial.
A street-level look at the northeast side on New Montgomery Street makes nostalgists amongst us pine for the days when highrises had class and majesty. Now a for-lease mixed-use building, it has been completely modernized inside (while retaining its spectacular period lobby). Note the Bell logo above the main entrance at bottom (photo by Alexis Madrigal).
Polly (Frances Teague), pert and pretty in the fashionable style of the flapper era, hears the car horn…
… she grabs her coat, gets her hat, leaves her worries on the doorstep then heads out, on the way pausing to chat to the switchboard girls. But - where was this filmed? Not, as it turns out, at 140 New Montgomery in San Francisco...
This clipping from a 1925 industry newspaper describes where actress Frances Teague was taught how to operate the switchboard for her movie scenes - Southern California Telephone Company’s new Whitney telephone exchange, so the exchange interiors may have been filmed there.
Then … When she skips down a set of steps as she leaves the building this exterior was definitely filmed in Los Angeles - check out the addresses on the employee entrance doors behind her:
Business Office, 740 S. Olive Street
Public Station, 6099 Sunset Boulevard
… in 1926 … CitySleuth thanks reader Notcom for coming up with this filming location - the Southern California Company Exchange building in Hollywood at 1429 N. Gower Street (map) , indicated below in a 1920s photo by the round circle. It’s a half block from the public station at 6099 Sunset Blvd referenced on the doorway above and it’s across from a group of low budget film studios, aka ‘Poverty Row’, which included FBO Studios who distributed The Last Edition. What’s more, the fence alongside California Studios at 1432 N. Gower indicated by the elliptical circle is where Tom’s vehicle was filmed in the first image in this post.
Further confirmation that the telephone building was here came when silent movie czar John Bengtson spotted the same building in the 1925 spoof movie short Hollywouldn’t in a scene filmed on N. Gower Street. (Watch it here - https://www.eastman.org/hollywouldnt). There are two palm trees on the lawn whose leaves are reflected in the entrance door panels in The Last Edition ‘Then’ image above. The wall plaque mostly hidden by the tree, below left, reads ‘Southern California Telephone Building’, stacked vertically; its final letters can also be made out in The Last Edition image.
… and Now, here’s a recent image of 1429 N. Gower today, much changed and expanded but still a telephone company property.
Confirmation of where Tom parked follows: In this frame of him pulling in to the kerb note the gate hinge near the bottom of the fence, the row of patterned holes near the top and the shadow of the tree against the fence…
Another scene from the 1925 movie short Hollywouldn’t filmed on N. Gower Street across from the telephone building captured the same fence hinge, patterned holes and (!) the real clincher, the identical tree shadow…
… and here at lower right we get a closer look at the fence, abutting the California Studios building at 1432 N. Gower Street.
