Imagine a “lost” silent film providing detailed views of where Laurel & Hardy, Roscoe Arbuckle, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, and Charlie Chaplin once filmed. This time it’s the 1918 Mack Swain L-KO comedy Adventurous Ambrose, a beautiful scanned print from the Library of Congress hosted on Joseph Blough’s wonderful YouTube channel.

Click to enlarge all the images. The fun begins when farmer Mack learns he has inherited a beach-side hotel. Hilarity ensues when guests with similar names create slapstick mistaken identity chaos. Above left, a husband catches the Venice Short Line trolley, on Venice Blvd. looking east at the SE corner of Main St. in Culver City, leaving his wife behind to catch the next train. A decade later Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy would flee the police at the same corner during The Second Hundred Years (1927), above right.

You can see the planters that once ran down the center of Main, both directly above, and in the above left movie frame. UCLA Library Digital Collections.

Working from the Lehrman (Lehrman Knock Out Comedies (L-KO) Studio, Roscoe Arbuckle and Buster Keaton filmed The Garage (1919) at the same corner, only running north. Notice the matching lamppost and fire hydrant. You can read How Roscoe and Buster Filmed in Culver City Before Stan and Ollie HERE.

Click to enlarge – next, Mack and his daughter drive their goat-powered wagon south down Ocean Ave. beside Palisades Park in Santa Monica where Charlie Chaplin flirted with Edna Purviance in the 1915 comedy By The Sea. Seen here, Charlie, Edna, and Bud Jamison likely filmed beside the open spot visible in front of Mack.

A view of the rustic wooden fence that once lined Palisades Park, inset with Buster Keaton in The Love Nest (1923) and Harold Lloyd in A Sailor-Made Man (1921). USC Digital Library.

Above, the wife waits for the next train. This was likely filmed at the Santa Monica trolley stop along Ocean Ave., pictured above. Huntington Digital Library.

Click to enlarge – the “BATH HOUSE” appearing with Mack lines up with this Bath House below the palisade, which also bears an identical “BATH HOUSE” sign on the front. The wife’s likely trolley station also appears (inset upper right). Huntington Digital Library.

As they continue south, they drive by the entrance to the Santa Monica Pier. What a time travel moment, a “live” motion picture driving by more than a century ago.

Above, Mack inset with a matching view of the Pier and the prominent Looff Carousel building – notice the front corner lampposts lower right. The carousel would play a prominent role in the 1973 “Best Picture” The Sting. Huntington Digital Library.

More than 100 years later the Looff Carousel is still a popular tourist attraction.

Harold Lloyd filmed By The Sad Sea Waves (1917) and Why Pick On Me (1918) at beach side parks including Santa Monica. At left Harold stands north of the Santa Monica pier in By The Sad Sea Waves that you may read more fully about HERE.

The second reel of Mack’s film is still missing, but toward the end of reel one Mack frolics with some non-Keystone bathing beauties beside the same distinctive rocks where Charlie Chaplin filmed The Adventurer in 1917 – read more How Charlie Made The Adventurer HERE.

The distinctive rocks beside Mack and Charlie appear near the center, with towering Haystack Rock, now demolished, at the left. USC Digital Library.

In closing, Buster Keaton filmed scenes for The Cameraman (1928) on the Santa Monica Pier, when Harold Goodwin drives Marceline Day and Buster home after their date. Buster has to sit in the outside rumble seat, and gets drenched in the pouring rain.

The scene was staged to look as if filmed on a street – the audience never sees the pier nor the ocean.  You can read more How Buster Keaton Filmed The Cameraman on the Santa Monica Pier HERE.

You can also see how Buster filmed at the Santa Monica Pier in my YouTube video Caught On Film – Buster Keaton’s The Cameraman, showing not just the locations, Buster’s move to M-G-M and his rented bungalow right outside, but hidden details reveal Buster filmed at long-familiar locales, and near where he had once worked happily with mentor/best friend Roscoe Arbuckle, which must have given Keaton some comfort during this difficult transition in life. Score by Jon C. Mirsalis.

Below, a view of the entrance to the Santa Monica Pier