Block Signal

Description Veteran train conductor Joe Ryan realizes he's become color blind with age. Prospective engineer Bert Steele takes advantage of Joe's predicament during an evening train ride with him, and disaster results. Although Joe is demoted, the railroad is suspicious of Bert's motives and puts a plan in motion to show him up and put Joe back in the operator's cab. Illinois-born Ralph Lewis was a stage actor before beginning his film career; he appeared in many shorts and was then cast as Austin Stoneman in D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915). Jean Arthur got started in the movie business during the latter half of the silent era; her career eventually took off with talkies, where she was cast by John Ford for The Whole Town's Talking (1935) and Frank Capra for Mr. Smith Goes to Washington(1939). Accomplished vaudeville actor George Chesebro played leading roles in silents; he then embarked upon a prolific film career consisting of B-Westerns like Custer's Last Stand (1936) and Saddle Mountain Roundup (1941). Director Frank O'Connor grew up in New York and had an extensive acting career beginning with silents and continuing on through television. Among the movies he helmed were One of the Bravest (1925) and The Masked Angel (1928).