GREENPORT, N.Y. (1010 WINS) — A Long Island film archivist and his intern made a historic discovery when they found the reels of “The Heart of Lincoln”, a 16-millimeter silent film from 1915 that was long considered lost.
Joe Lauro, of Historic Film Archives in Greenport, said that his intern Dan Martin was going through old donated reels in the summer of 2024 when he came across the film.
“He shows up at my door looking startled, and he goes, ‘I think we found something really unusual,’” Lauro told 1010 WINS. “And it turns up on the Library of Congress’ listing of lost American feature films.”
Studios in the early days of cinema often saw reels as disposable after their theatrical runs, leading them to discard the films, and many others were destroyed due to the highly flammable and difficult to preserve nitrate film stock.
Poor preservation practices from the era have led to a loss of thousands of silent films, many of which have ended up on the Library of Congress’ list that is over 7,000 strong.
“Turns out we wound up with the only known print,” Lauro said. “All the others have long deteriorated.”
Francis Ford—older brother to Academy Award-winning director John Ford—directed and starred in “The Heart of Lincoln,” which tells the story of President Abraham Lincoln and life during the Civil War. The 65-minute feature was released by Universal.
“‘The Heart of Lincoln’ is a love story to one of the great presidents, a man that had compassion,” Lauro said. “And the film is about every decision sending people into the line of fire during the Civil War.”
Film archivist Eliot Kissileff cleaned up and digitized the movie so that it could not again be lost to time.
Lauro hopes to continue to restore the film and add a score to it so that it can once again be available to audiences.