Leah Baird

I know virtually nothing about Leah Baird. The IMDb yields scant details; birth and death dates, name of spouse, and a very brief biography.

I, myself, have only seen one of her movies. It's a serial from 1918 titled Wolves of Kultur. (Yes, "kultur", not "culture".) Her character, Alice Grayson, becomes involved in an espionage plot, linked to WWI, in which she must defeat the bad guys and aid the war effort. She is joined by Bob (Charles Hutchison), taking on one after another of the evildoers.

The story isn't much. When one of the "Wolves of Kultur" is defeated, another member of the group takes his place. Alice and Bob are frequently captured, yet always manage to escape. Typical for a chapter serial, each installment ends with a cliffhanger.

It's addictive, though, even with the thin plot; you see the leads (and the supporting players) doing their own stunts. For Baird, this involved dealing with the long skirts and high-heeled boots of the era. Bob is less hampered by his clothing, of course, though his shoes couldn't have been convenient for scaling buildings or rocks, both of which he does here.

People are always being thrown, falling, or jumping into water, usually a river or the ocean. Alice and Bob shoot the rapids in a wooden canoe. Bob jumps on the top of a car, thunders down the road on a horse (with Alice keeping pace on another horse), and even jumps off a lighthouse in one scene.

These people could have been badly hurt, maimed, or killed, but they keep going, much like the characters they play. Watching it now, ninety years later, it doesn't appear that either of them thought of the possibility of injury. There's no hint of a "Wow! Look what I just did!" on anyone's face. There's a grim determination at work here.

Baird's character is a far cry from the helpless female so popular in fiction at the time. Yes, she does get kidnapped; yes, she is at risk often. It's a serial, after all. She also keeps going regardless of the threat to her personal safety, even regardless of the threat to Bob's personal safety. When, at the end of the serial, Bob is facing death at the hands of the last of the evil group, it is Alice - wandering through the woods in search of him - who blows away the villain with a rifle.

Here's to Leah Baird, pioneer stuntwoman.