At the Capitol: Nell Shipman, “The Girl from God's Country" – with an Added Attraction, the Birmingham Auto Company, Nov. 21, 1921

The front of the Capitol Theatre, November 1921, all dressed up, with a log cabin effect, for *The Girl from God’s Country*. It is uncertain, but that might be manager Edward Abbey outside on the street for a photo moment. PMA, VR 2410 (Capitol Theatre).

“The Capitol Theatre has been specially decorated for this occasion[,] the front presenting the appearance of a log-cabin to suit the atmosphere of the feature picture.” – “At the Capitol,” Examiner, Nov. 12, 1921, p.15.

“In many ways, Nell Shipman was decades ahead of her time. A feminist, an environmentalist and a campaigner for animal rights long before such terms had ever been coined, she was a successful actress, screen-writer, animal trainer, producer and director and also performed her own stunts (which proved almost fatal on more than one occasion). Her films were distinguished for their portrayal of women in brave, strong-willed, adventurous roles, often coming to the rescue of the male lead . . .” – Silentfilmcalendar.org, Oct. 19, 2016.

“A meeting of the Citizens of Peterborough will be held in the Chamber of Commerce on Monday night (to-night) . . . for the purpose of organizing an industry in the city to manufacture Birmingham motor parts.” – Examiner, Oct. 17, 1921, p.1.

Not your everyday, ordinary picture: the 1921 screening of The Girl from God’s Country at the Capitol Theatre received a huge publicity push – and the theatre got a front-door facelift, complete with some rather slap-dash painting.

But more: along with its feature film, the theatre was showing “The Birmingham Cars and the Birmingham Factory,” presented by a company hoping to set up in Peterborough.

The two parts of the program had at least two things in common other than a coincidence in scheduling: both had U.S.-Canadian links; and both were giant, risk-taking projects that in the end proved unsuccessful.

The Capitol Theatre screened the two films from Monday to Wednesday, Nov. 14 to 16, 1921. Having scheduled, as its feature presentation, a new movie known especially for its vivid tale of the Canadian northwest, the theatre underwent special decoration, “the front presenting the appearance of a log cabin to suit the atmosphere of the feature picture.” Customers had to go inside those formidable doors to purchase their tickets.

*Motion Picture News*, Dec. 27, 1919, p.257. The theatre re-design in Peterborough was not exactly an original idea. Here, in Minneapolis, a theatre got a similar facelift, in the log cabin mode, for the earlier Shipman picture, *Back to God's Country* (1919).

Nell Shipman — born in Victoria, B.C., in 1892 as Helen Barham (marrying Ernest Shipman in 1910) — was a huge talent and attraction at the time. Although she left Canada at an early age, the films she helped to create in the 1910s were, as one group of scholars point out, “set in a mythical Canadian wilderness, ‘God’s Country.’” A previous movie, Back from God’s Country (1919), was a joint U.S.-Canadian production co-written by Shipman, who also played the lead role. It proved, according to film historian Peter Morris, “an enormous financial success . . . with qualities that seem almost modern.” One of the most successful films in Canadian history (and today said to be the earliest extant Canadian film), Back from God’s Country had “a heroine who, for once, is not a victim but an active protagonist.”

*Examiner*, Nov. 15, 1921, p.14. With the added attraction of “The Birmingham Cars and the Birmingham Factory.”

The Girl from God’s Country, released Sept. 18, 1921, played for three days at the Capitol, at that time a new state-of-the-art Famous Players theatre opened less than six months earlier. The Capitol orchestra — “the best in the city. No person disputes this fact” — provided accompaniment to the silent film. Shipman wrote, co-directed, and starred (in a dual role) in the movie, which was produced by her company, Nell Shipman Productions.

The advance publicity promised: “A picture that offers some real, exceptional thrills, a strong love interest, and an atmosphere of human emotion raised to the heights, with a versatile heroine who plays with lion cubs[,] kills her enemy in a breath taking struggle, and finally loves and marries the blind ‘eagle’ of wartime fame.”

The film fell into the wilderness-adventure genre, popular at the time. “It is made more attractive,” the Examiner promised, “by the wonderful backgrounds filmed in our own Canadian wilds, the Hudson Bay land which is the ‘God’s Country’ of the title.” In truth it was filmed in the United States, on location in Big Bear Lake, Big Bear Valley, and San Bernardino National Forest, Cal., and in the Louis B. Mayer Studio in Los Angeles. Unlike Back to God’s Country, it was entirely a U.S. production.

It was an ambitious, extravagant, expensive film, packed with stunts and thrills. Shipman and her co-director (and relatively new companion) Bert Van Tuyle managed to get financing from a syndicate headed by theatre magnate William H. Clune, who officially “presented” the movie and arranged an opening at his Broadway Theater in Los Angeles. Shipman and Van Tuyle arranged general distribution with F.B. Warren Corp. The film, considered one of the top attractions of the season, received a huge publicity push.

The completed movie, Shipman wrote in her autobiography, was “a real sockeroo, twelve reels of whizz and bang.” But under pressure she and Van Tuyle admitted that it was far too long for an average theatre program and cut it down, first to 10 reels and then to 8. “The lost two reels sacrificed much of the character development but left a snappy, fast-moving Melo-drama.” Still, the Hollywood investors were not happy, and much to the filmmakers’ surprise the film was re-edited again before general release – they “re-edited it badly,” said one historian. It ended up at 7 reels, losing 14 minutes of explanatory content, and Shipman was displeased. “The result is a stupid, meaningless affair that is a disgrace to its author, director, star, exchange, and distributor.” It would have been this 7-reel film that was screened in Peterborough in November 1921.

The movie got mixed reviews. While not quite a disaster, it was not successful enough to earn back its investment, putting Shipman’s production company “deep” into the red. Shipman complained about the film’s treatment in a loud, full-page ad she placed in trade magazines, which did not endear her to the industry. She made a few more films in the 1920s but would never again find the success she achieved with Back to God’s Country. Her company eventually went bankrupt. She died, destitute, in 1970.

The Girl from God’s Country (1921) is one of those many silent films considered to be lost, possibly never to be seen again. Back to God’s Country (1919) has survived, available on YouTube.

Peterborough gets an auto manufacturing company . . . but not for very long

Along with its feature film – the main attraction — the theatre’s program offered a little something extra, too, with local interest.

*Examiner*, Nov. 15, 1921, p.14. The Birmingham film.

As a kind of public service, the Capitol screened a short film of the new “Birmingham cars and the Birmingham factory.” At the time the Birmingham auto company, founded in Birmingham, Mich., with its manufacturing plant in Falconer, near Jamestown N.Y., was proposing to set up a second factory in Peterborough. One of its biggest goals in autumn 1921 was to rally local money by selling shares.

In October 1921 the company closed a deal to take over the old Henry Hope & Sons factory property in the South End, on Monaghan Road north of Lansdowne (a site later home to Outboard Marine and then the Canadian Canoe Museum). It had an office set up at the location by December.

Byron Lederer, managing director of the Canadian branch of Birmingham Motors, arrived in the city to take charge of business – including selling shares. One of the first things he did was arrange a screening at the Capitol to introduce the locals to the company – showing the construction of cars and a demonstration of a Birmingham auto on the road. He also made sure to present a private showing at noon that day to “a number of prominent business and professional men.”

The company appointed a local man, H.R. Buckley, as factory superintendant. It advertised jobs, and had many applicants. In December a purchasing agent, Leo W. Wickson, arrived in Peterborough from Detroit. “Plans for a Canadian Company are about completed and the Company will shortly be incorporated,” they announced. They were, of course, absolutely certain about the quality of their product. The Birmingham auto, with its new type of axle, had “Better riding qualities and at least 50 per cent cheaper upkeep.”

Meanwhile, a warning went out to the public “to refrain from investing in the company’s stock offering.” It would be a matter of “speculation.” People should be cautious. But reassurances were made, and a factory in Jamestown would soon be manufacturing autos. Why not Peterborough? Shares were sold. We know of one man who, in spring 1922, lost his wallet in a downtown bank – and it contained $200 worth of shares. The company was trying to reach a goal of $300,000 in shares sold.

*Examiner*, Feb. 18, 1922, p.10. “ . . . the biggest enterprise in Canada.”

By the end of December the Peterborough plant was getting ready for action. In the new year, ads went out in an attempt to find salesmen to sell shares. The newly furnished Birmingham factory on Monaghan Road showed moving pictures and to spread the news it had “chalk talks” — illustrated lectures in which a speaker draws pictures on the spot. The company had purchased its own “moving picture projection machine.” It brought in office furniture and equipment and “Standard and Special Parts, Standard Hardware and Tools and Supplies.” It had “Motor Cars in the course of construction.”

Byron Lederer made clear that he was disappointed in the response of Peterborough business men and public officials to the enterprise. They had not been particularly welcoming, he said, unlike other cities. A message went out “to Birmingham Shareholders and Shareholders to Be” – “We will have Birmingham Cars Built in Our Peterborough Plant – on the roads of Canada for the Spring Trade. ‘Enough Said.’”

Birmingham car demonstration, National Photo Company Collection, Library of Congress. Not in Peterborough, but a similar demonstration. According to a newspaper report, the car successfully went through 112 of these demonstrations in different places. Competitors who attempted the same “rough ride,” according to the hype, “have had their cars wrecked.”

In April a Birmingham auto – said to be the ““First Made-in-Peterboro Car” – was demonstrated, with special wooden planks placed on Water Street to make the ride all the more difficult. In the block between Simcoe and Charlotte, a “large crowd of spectators cheered” as the car “dashed over the log roadway at thirty-five miles an hour.” The company announced that it expected to be “turning out cars in a short time.”

In the end it was shareholders who were taken for a ride. It was not a scam – the company did, it seems, actually plan to manufacture and sell cars, and it did produce a few, including, possibly, one in Peterborough – but it failed to generate enough capital to satisfy its manufacturing dreams. It didn’t help that in the summer of 1922 Birmingham Motors in the United States came under attack for using the mails to defraud people, with an indictment following in October. After that the company understandably had difficulty selling shares, and was unable to meet its financial obligations. It was later vindicated in the matter of defrauding through the mail, but by then it was too late.

To add to the dilemma, Byron Lederer died of a heart attack while he was staying in a Toronto hotel on Oct. 23. On the very same day reports were issued that he was hopeful of getting production moving at the Peterborough plant.

On Nov. 16, 1922, the Examiner published a bankruptcy notice, which must have startled many shareholders. By December 1923 the company had closed down. The shareholders had been encouraged to transfer their shares to another new company, in Montreal, paying a little more for the privilege, but most likely the bulk of them decided not to go down that route. In all the company built somewhere between 20 and 50 of the Birmingham autos, and none of them survived.

Though, unfortunately, not this time. *Examiner*, Feb. 21, 1922, p.1.

People in Peterborough had been understandably quite excited about the prospect of autos being manufactured locally, but over time more than one company has proved unable to raise the necessary capital or to develop the means to compete with the giants of the industry. Auto production is a complicated and expensive business. “Building cars is just so bloody difficult,” says Canadian historian Dimitry Anastakis. Given the money and the expertise required, “The likelihood of success is zero.” While Peterborough seemed to have as good a chance of success as any, with its existing well-established manufacturing base and “great connections to the outside world” (in the words of local historian Elwood Jones), the 1921–22 auto project simply joined many other failed auto ventures. But perhaps it helped to make for a diverting evening at the picture show.

With thanks to the Trent Valley Archives and Peterborough Museum and Archives.

Sources for Nell Shipman

Armatage, Kay, Paul Moore, and Louis Pelletier, “The Absence of Canadian Women in the Silent Picture Industry,” in Jane Gaines, Radha Vatsal, and Monica Dall’Asta, eds., Women Film Pioneers Project (New York, N.Y.: Columbia University Libraries, 2013), wfpp.columbia.edu/essay/the-absence-of-canadian-women/.

Armatage, Kay, The Girl from God’s Country: Nell Shipman and the Silent Cinema (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003).

Canadian Women Film Directors Database, Nell Shipman, Notes about The Girl from God’s Country, femfilm.ca.

Nell Shipman Papers, 1912-1970, Archives West, Boise State University Library, Special Collections and Archives, on-line overview, archiveswest.orbiscascade.org.

NorthernStars: The Canadian Film Database, Nell Shipman – Biography, northernstars.ca.

Progressive Silent Film List, The Girl from God’s Country, silentera.com.

Silentfilmcalendar.org, “The Silent Film Listing Site,” “Kennington Bioscope at the London Museum, Lambeth, Oct. 19, 2016 (screenings of The Girl from God’s Country (documentary, dir. Karen Day, 2015) and Back to God’s Country (1919).

Trusky, Tom, “Nell Shipman,” in Jane Gaines, Radha Vatsal, and Monica Dall’Asta, eds., Women’s Film Pioneers Project (New York, N.Y.: Columbia Universities Libraries, 2013), wfpp.columbia.edu/pioneer/ccp-nell-shipman/.

Nell Shipman, Abandoned Trails (New York: Dial Press, 1932).

American Film Institute (AFI) website, The Girl from God’s Country.

IMDb, website, Nell Shipman, The Girl from God’s Country.

Sources for Birmingham Motors

Peterborough Examiner, 1921–22.

“Auto Man Dies Suddenly,” Evening Star, Washington, Oct. 24, 1922, p.4 (death of Byron Lederer).

Elwood Jones, “Birmingham Motors: Briefly in Peterborough,” Heritage Gazette of the Trent Valley, vol.18, no.4 (February 2014).

Canadian Automotive Museum, “Lester Pearson and the Auto Pact,” CMA talk, Nov. 16, 2023, www.youtube.com/.