Charlotte Walker was a Broadway theater actress from Galveston, Texas

Galveston, Texas

Galveston is a coastal city located on Galveston Island in the U.S. state of Texas. , the city had a total population of 47,743 within an area of...

. She was the mother of character actress Sara Haden

Sara Haden

Sara Haden was a character actress in Hollywood films of the 1930s through the 1950s.She was born Sarah Haden on November 17, 1899 in Galveston, Texas. Haden was the daughter of another character actress, Charlotte Walker, who was active in silent films and early talkies...

Stage Actress

Walker made her stage debut as a teen. At nineteen she performed in London in a comedy called The Mummy. She performed with Richard Mansfield

Richard Mansfield

Richard Mansfield was an English actor-manager best known for his performances in Shakespeare plays, Gilbert and Sullivan operas and for his portrayal of the dual title roles in Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

 and later returned to her native Texas

Texas

Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

.

Walker is most noted for her performance as June in Trail of the Lonesome Pine, in 1911. She would later reprise the role in Cecil B. DeMille

Cecil B. DeMille

Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...

's 1916 screen version

The Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1916 film)

The Trail of the Lonesome Pine is a 1916 drama film directed by Cecil B. DeMille. It is based on the novel of the same name. A surviving motion picture at George Eastman House, Rochester.-Cast:* Charlotte Walker - June Tolliver...

. David Belasco

David Belasco

David Belasco was an American theatrical producer, impresario, director and playwright.-Biography:Born in San Francisco, California, where his Sephardic Jewish parents had moved from London, England, during the Gold Rush, he began working in a San Francisco theatre doing a variety of routine jobs,...

 noticed her in On Parole.
He signed her for starring roles in plays The Warrens of Virginia, Just A Wife, and Call The Doctor. Each of the Belasco productions was staged prior to World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

.

She continued to act on the Broadway stage. In 1923 she played with Ethel Barrymore

Ethel Barrymore

Ethel Barrymore was an American actress and a member of the Barrymore family of actors.-Early life:Ethel Barrymore was born Ethel Mae Blythe in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the second child of the actors Maurice Barrymore and Georgiana Drew...

 in The School For Scandal. It was produced by the Player's Club.

Motion Pictures

Walker's motion picture career began in 1915 with Kindling

Kindling (film)

Kindling is a 1915 drama film produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Charlotte Walker, in her film debut. The film is based on a 1911 Broadway play by Charles A...

and Out of the Darkness. Sloth (1917) is a five-reeler which features Walker. In the third reel of this film she plays a youthful Dutch maid who is about sixteen years old. The setting is an old Dutch settlement on Staten Island, New York. The theme stresses the perils of indolence to a nation of people. It cautions against permitting luxury to replace the simplistic life led by America's forebears. In her later silent film work Walker can be seen in The Midnight Girl (1925) starring alongside a pre-Dracula

Dracula (1931 film)

Dracula is a 1931 vampire-horror film directed by Tod Browning and starring Bela Lugosi as the title character. The film was produced by Universal and is based on the stage play of the same name by Hamilton Deane and John L...

Bela Lugosi

Béla Lugosi

Béla Ferenc Dezső Blaskó , commonly known as Bela Lugosi, was a Hungarian actor of stage and screen. He was best known for having played Count Dracula in the Broadway play and subsequent film version, as well as having starred in several of Ed Wood's low budget films in the last years of his...

. The Midnight Girl is one of Walker's few silents that survives and can be viewed on home video.

As a movie actress Walker continued to perform in films into the early 1930s. Her later screen performances include roles in Lightnin (1930), Millie (1931), Salvation Nell (1931), and Hotel Variety (1933).

Personal life

Walker's first husband was physician Dr. John B. Haden. A daughter Sara Haden

Sara Haden

Sara Haden was a character actress in Hollywood films of the 1930s through the 1950s.She was born Sarah Haden on November 17, 1899 in Galveston, Texas. Haden was the daughter of another character actress, Charlotte Walker, who was active in silent films and early talkies...

 was born of this marriage and there may have been other children. After her divorce, she returned to the stage. Her second husband, Eugene Walter

Eugene Walter (playwright)

Eugene Walter was a playwright.-Biography:He was born on November 27, 1874 in Cleveland. He was married to actress Charlotte Walker, but the marriage ended in divorce sometime before 1930, when he secretly married Mary Kissel in Mexico. She was a New York artists' model.He died on September 26,...

, was a playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

 who adapted the novel The Trail of the Lonesome Pine for the Broadway stage. The second marriage also ended in divorce in 1930.

Charlotte Walker died in 1958 at a hospital in Kerrville, Texas

Kerrville, Texas

Kerrville is a city in Kerr County, Texas, United States. The population was 20,425 at the 2000 census. In 2009, the population was 22,826...

 at age 81. Her daughter Sara Haden became a well known character actress.

Filmography

Silent

• Kindling
  Kindling (film)
  Kindling is a 1915 drama film produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Charlotte Walker, in her film debut. The film is based on a 1911 Broadway play by Charles A...
  
  (1915 Paramount)(Extant)
• Out of the Darkness (1915)
• The Trail of the Lonesome Pine
  The Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1916 film)
  The Trail of the Lonesome Pine is a 1916 drama film directed by Cecil B. DeMille. It is based on the novel of the same name. A surviving motion picture at George Eastman House, Rochester.-Cast:* Charlotte Walker - June Tolliver...
  
  (1916 Paramount)(Extant)
• The Seven Deadly Sins (1917)
• Pardners (1917)
• The Seven Deadly Sins (1917 Triangle)
  • Sloth(episode)
  • The Seventh Sin(episode)
• Pardners(1917 Mutual)(Lost)
• Mary Lawson's Secret (1917)
• Just a Woman (1918 US Exhibitor's Booking Corp.)(Lost)
• Men (1918 US Exhibitor's Booking Corp.)(Lost)
• Every Mother's Son (1918 Fox)(Lost)
• Eve in Exile (1919 Pathe)(Lost)
• The Lone Wolf (1924 Associated Exhibitors)(Lost)
• The Sixth Commandment (1924 Associated Exhibitors)(Lost)
• Classmates
  Classmates (1924 film)
  Classmates is a silent drama film starring Richard Barthelmess, produced by his company Inspiration Pictures, and distributed by Associated First National Pictures....
  
  (1924 First National)(Lost)
• The Mad Marriage (1925 Rosemary)(Lost)
• The Midnight Girl
  The Midnight Girl
  The Midnight Girl is a 1925 drama film directed by Wilfred Noy, starring Lila Lee and featuring Béla Lugosi.-Story:Lugosi plays, according to an intertitle, "Nicholas Harmon, the immensely wealthy patron of music" who "loved his weaknesses — and his favorite weakness was Nina," his mistress, an...
  
  (1925 Chadwick) (Extant)
• The Manicure Girl (1925 Paramount) (Lost)
• The Savage (1926 First National)(Lost)
• The Great Deception
  The Great Deception
  The Great Deception is a 1926 silent era American film starring Basil Rathbone, Ben Lyon and Aileen Pringle. It is based on a novel about WW1 era espionage by writer George Gibbs. This film is currently a lost First National film. -Cast:...
  
  (1926 First National)(Lost)
• The Clown (1927 Columbia Pictures)(Lost)
• Annapolis (1928 Pathe)(Extant)

Sound

• Paris Bound
  Paris Bound
  Paris Bound is a 1927 play by Philip Barry. It was made into a movie in 1929, directed by Edward H. Griffith and starring Ann Harding and Fredric March.- Plot :...
  
  (1929 Pathe)(Extant)
• South Sea Rose (1929 Fox) (Lost)
• Double Cross Roads (1930 Fox) (Extant)
• Three Faces East
  Three Faces East (1930 film)
  Three Faces East is a 1930 talking picture directed by Roy Del Ruth and starring Constance Bennett. Produced by Daryl Zanuck and released by Warner Brothers it is based on a 1918 Broadway play about WW1 spies, Three Faces East. A print of the film is preserved at the Library of Congress. It was...
  
  (1930 First National)(Extant)
• Scarlet Pages
  Scarlet Pages
  Scarlet Pages is a 1930 drama film starring Elsie Ferguson and directed by Ray Enright. It was produced and distributed by Warner Brothers. The film simultaneously marked the first time Ferguson talked on screen and the last picture she ever made. It is actually based on a 1929 Broadway play of the...
  
  (1930 First National)(Extant)
• Lightnin (1930 Fox)(Extant)
• Millie
  Millie
  Millie may refer to:* A diminutive of the female given names "Emily", "Millicent", "Mildred", "Camilla" or sometimes "Amelia"* millie, an affectionate or pejorative term for a young working-class womanMillie may specifically refer to:...
  
  (1931 RKO)(Extant)
• Salvation Nell
  Salvation Nell
  Salvation Nell is a 1931 film drama produced and directed by James Cruze and distributed by Tiffany Films, a company then on the brink of ceasing operations. It is based on Edward Sheldon's 1908 Broadway play which starred Minnie Maddern Fiske. Two silent versions were produced ie, in 1915 with...
  
  (1931 Tiffany)(Extant)
• Hotel Variety (1933 Capitol Film Exchange)(Lost)
• Scattergood Meets Broadway (1937 RKO)(status?__)

External links

• Charlotte Walker stills University of Washington Sayre Collection(enter her name)
• Broadway portrait of Charlotte Walker circa 1910
• Charlotte Walker; PeriodPaper