Santa Clarita Valley History In Pictures
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Harry Carey Sr. in 'Overland Red' (1920)
Actor & Saugus Resident


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Old-style (generally pre-1920s) lobby card advertising Harry Carey (second from left, pointing) in a 1920 Universal feature, "Overland Red."

Card measures 7"x9", but only because it has been cut down from the original 8"x10". It would have had a white border. Two pinholes show it hung in a teater lobby to advertise this coming attraction.

The 6-reel, 60-minute feature was shot in the Mojave Desert, but we know not where. Notice the Joshua tree at right.

At the time, Carey was living on his San Francisquito Canyon ranch, 5 miles north of downtown Saugus.

Carey made a lot of pictures with John Ford during this period (until 1922) — but this wasn't one of them. The director was Lynn F. Reynolds (1891-1927), who made a number of pictures starring Tom Mix.

The cast of "Overland Red" includes Charles Le Moyne, Harold Goodwin, David B. Gally, C.E. Anderson, Joe Harris, J. Morris Foster and Vola Vale. The latter is suspected of being a love interest of William S. Hart at one time. Hart and Vale starred together in 1917's "The Silent Man," 1918's "Wolves of the Rail" and 1921's "White Oak." Vale appeared opposite Carey again in 1922's "Good Men and True" and 1923's "Crashin' Thru."


About Harry Carey Sr.

Actor Harry Carey (Sr.) acquired a homestead at the mouth of San Francisquito Canyon in 1916 and established a rancho. The ranch included the Carey's wooden ranch home as well as several outbuildings and the Harry Carey Trading Post, which was a tourist attraction that included billed entertainment from Navajo Indians and other performers, along with a store that sold Western and Indian curios. The ranch was occasionally used for filming. The Careys' son, Harry Carey Jr. (Dobe), who would follow in his father's acting footsteps, was born in the Carey ranch home in 1921.

The trading post washed away in the St. Francis Dam disaster of March 1928 and was not rebuilt. The Indians left about a month earlier, son Dobe said in a 2005 interview. Dobe said a shaman saw "a big crack and predicted it would break." The ranch house was situated at a higher elevation and survived the flood, only to burn down in 1932. The Careys replaced it by building a Spanish adobe home, which they sold with the rancho in 1945.

Harry Carey was born Henry DeWitt Carey II on January 16, 1878 on 116th Street in the Bronx section of New York City. His father was a special-sessions judge and president of a sewing machine company. Harry attended a military academy but declined an appointment to West Point, instead trying his hand as a playwright.

According to the Internet Movie Database: In 1911, his friend Henry B. Walthall introduced him to director D.W. Griffith, for whom Carey was to make many films. Carey married twice [correx: 3 times; see here], the [third] time to actress Olive Fuller Golden (aka Olive Carey), who introduced him to future director John Ford. Carey influenced Universal Studios head Carl Laemmle to use Ford as a director, and a partnership was born that lasted until a rift in the friendship in 1921.

During this time, Carey grew into one of the most popular Western stars of the early motion picture, occasionally writing and directing films as well. In the 1930s he moved slowly into character roles and was nominated for an Oscar for one of them, the president of the Senate in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" (1939). He worked once more with Ford, in "The Prisoner of Shark Island" (1936), and appeared once with his son, Harry Carey Jr., in Howard Hawks' "Red River" (1948).

He died Sept. 21, 1947, in Brentwood, after a protracted bout with emphysema and cancer. Ford dedicated his remake "3 Godfathers" (1948) "To Harry Carey — Bright Star Of The Early Western Sky."

Carey would appear in at least 233 films, including short features, between 1909 and 1949.

Further reading: Harry Carey Ranch: Historic American Buildings Survey No. CA-2712.


LW2412: 9600 dpi jpeg from original lobby card.
HARRY CAREY SR.

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FULL MOVIE:
Broken Ways 1913

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FULL MOVIE 1938

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Fan Reply Card <1928

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Marriages

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Marked Men 1919

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A Fight for Love 1919

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Harry & Olive 1919


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Overland Red 1920

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Canyon of the Fools 1923

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The Seventh Bandit 1926 (Mult.)

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Satan Town 1926

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Burning Bridges 1928

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Trader Horn 1931

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The Vanishing Legion 1931 (Mult.)

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The Devil Horse 1932

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Rustler's Paradise 1935

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Last of the Clintons 1935

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Port of Missing Girls 1938

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With U.S. VP John Garner 1940

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The Shepherd of the Hills 1941 (Mult.)

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Hollywood Walk of Fame

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Nat Levine 1988

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