'A splendid anthology' —Kevin Brownlow, author of The Parade's Gone By and Hollywood: The Pioneers. This pathbreaking work will become our most valuable resource on the performers of the American silent screen. Hollywood was the new frontier of the 20th century. ('The last Klondike,' Gary Cooper called it.) Here are brief biographies of 176 people who won leading roles plus more dramatic reports on 33 of them—how they reached fame and fortune, 'some sad and happy endings,' analyses of the images of America they presented. Two special chapters: Pickford and Fairbanks, Swanson and Valentino.