The Navajo Ring (1915)

Jim Dace, town drunk and ne'er-do-well of a small Western town, becomes so abusive and neglectful of his family that his wife can stand no more and leaves him, taking their daughter Jess. He receives a shock next morning when he awakens and finds them gone. Later, he leaves town, reforms, and becomes prosperous, but the longing to see his family grows stronger as the years pass. He resolves to travel, cherishing a secret hope that he might in that way learn something of them. Meanwhile, his wife has a constant struggle to bring up Jess, and when the girl is 18, the mother can no longer stand the strain. The bread-winning falls upon Jess' shoulders. She loses her position and, unable to find other employment, she's faced with the double care of providing medicine and caring for her mother. Seeing a flashily-dressed woman leave a cafe door, the desperate girl enters the place. Approached by a loafer, Jess, terrified, takes out a Navajo ring her father had given her when she was a baby and asks him to buy it. At this moment Jim happens in, accompanied by an old friend from the East, and is at once struck by the incongruity of the girl's presence in that place, and by the strange feeling that he used to know this girl. The sight of the Navajo ring crystallizes this thought into instant recollection: the girl is his own daughter Jess. The loafer tries to force the girl to drink, and Jim interferes. Words are passed and Jim knocks the fellow down, then escapes with Jess. Safely outside, Jim learns the powerful motive behind the girl's action and tells her to take him to her mother at once; he believes that he is her father. There is a joyful reunion at the bedside of Jess' mother Mary; the following day, Jim takes his wife and daughter in his automobile to his beautiful home and establishes them in the midst of luxury.

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Summary Details
GenresShort Western
FilmmakersRole
Ulysses Davis Director
Fred R. Ashfield Writer
CastRole
William Duncan
Anne Schaefer
Patricia Palmer
George Kunkel