- A beautiful but timid young woman named Marcia comes to a backwoods logging camp, where she is wooed and won by a young city boy, Fosdick. Marcia is put off by the gruffness of the camp's foreman, Barnes, but soon learns that Fosdick is a coward whose sole determination is self-preservation at all costs, and she begins to see that foreman Barnes is the better catch.—Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>
- Marcia Judd owns an abandoned ranch which she inherited from her mother. She works with John and Hannah Carson, serving meals to lumbermen at the Lost River camp, in the northwest. Hannah sends Marcia with a note to Jim Barnes. Barnes is the powerful boss of the lumber camp. Along the way, Marcia walks into the path of a falling tree, but is rescued by an easterner, Arthur Fosdick. Fosdick has not been a success as a lumberman, and finds his co-workers rude and disgusting. He and Marcia are drawn to each other. Marcia delivers the note to Barnes; the note informs the boss that one of his workers, Black Mike, is carrying liquor. Before the stunned eyes of Marcia, Barnes takes the bottle away from Mike and gives him a terrible beating.
During supper, Barnes notices Marcia taking some food to Fosdick in a clearing and realizes the pair are falling for each other. One day when Marcia brings a pitcher of milk to Fosdick, Barnes stops her and drinks it himself. Fosdick knocks down Barnes, and the two fight, with Barnes administering a thrashing. Then Barnes relents, knowing how Marcia feels about Fosdick. But he warns Fosdick that after the young man marries Marcia, he had better treat her right.
Fosdick and Marcia are wed, and Fosdick goes to work on the ranch, but soon tires of it. With his rich uncle urging him to come home, Fosdick packs up and slips away during the night, deserting Marcia. When Barnes learns what has happened, he rides to the train station, where he gives Fosdick a beating, throws the man onto the train, and warns him never to return. With Marcia left to fend for herself, Barnes pays her a visit, but she draws her pistol in fright. He snatches it away and leaves. Marcia asks Rossiter, an elderly prospector, to stay with her. Rossiter hides when Barnes returns with Marcia's pistol, and hears the boss confess that he really is in love with Marcia and is trying to keep her safe. After Barnes leaves, Rossiter tells Marcia that Barnes is "a real man."
Meanwhile, back east, Fosdick has been living an idle life, so his uncle throws him out. When Fosdick reads that oil has been discovered in Lost River, he heads back to the camp. The lumbermen are taken ill by a fever sweeping through the camp. Marcia is taken ill by the fever. When Barnes goes to see her, he meets Fosdick, who, frightened for his own life, is ready to run away again from his wife. But Barnes forces Fosdick to stay and nurse Marcia, while Barnes keeps an eye on him. Barnes falls asleep, which enables Fosdick to sneak away. But as he runs along the road, he is taken ill with the fever, and collapses, dead. Barnes awakens, and finds Marcia is recovering. A doctor arrives and informs them what has happened to Fosdick, then declares that Marcia is out of danger. The winds have carried the pestilence away from the camp. Marcia realizes that Barnes is her true love.
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Top Gap
By what name was The Man from Lost River (1921) officially released in Canada in English?
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