Magic lantern - Life model sets

part 4

A rather extensive collection of beautiful life-model sets of
magic lantern slides


Go to:	part 1	part 2	part 3	part 4	part 5	part 6	part 7	part 8	part 9	part 10

Cripple Tom: or 'knowing is loving and loving is doing'. A set of 17 life model slides made by G.M. Mason, England, after Mrs Walter Searle's song 'Cripple Tom: or, knowing is loving, and loving is doing'. This is how the story starts..... In one of the deplorably miserable East London homes, in a dark, wretched room at the top of a house, lay a cripple boy, greatly neglected and comparatively unknown. When quite young his parents had died, leaving him to the mercy of an aged relative, whom he called “Granny”. Born a cripple, he had always been a sufferer, but as long as he was able, he had swept a crossing on his crutches, or gone on short errands to earn a few pence. But soon after his parents‘ death the boy had to take to his bed. Very ungraciously the old woman allowed him to occupy the top room in her house, which room he never left again.


1. In a wretched room a cripple boy lay.	2. He swept a crossing on his crutches.	3. In the Mission Hall for the sake of warmth.

4. He one day consulted Granny about it.	5. Up the creaking stairs came noisy Jack Lee.	6. A bright new shilling for you Tom, lad.


7. He returned with a beautiful shilling Bible.	8. Tom hugged the book to his breast.	9. After a month's reading Tom knew his Bible well.


10. Tom dropped his text into the noisy street.	11. So you are the lad who drops texts from the window.	12. The little paper fell on my hat, I opened it.
	I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. John 9:4 King James Bible
13. Cripple Tom's Text.		14. The Homes for Cripple Lads.

15. The strong man knelt by the boy's bedside.	16. A Mission Hall, built on his own ground.	17. The post brought a parcel containing Tom's much prized Bible.
Daddy. Set of nine magic lantern slides made by the most producing manufacturer of life model slides, Bamforth & Co. (1896) after the song 'Daddy' by Mary Mark Lemon and A.H. Behrend.


1. Take my head on your shoulder, daddy, turn your face to the west.	2. The day has been long without you, daddy, you have been such a while away.	3. But I've got you, and you've got me. So everything seems right.

4. Why do your big tears fall, daddy? Mother's not far away.	5. (Effect) I often seem to hear her voice falling across my play.	6. And it sometimes makes me cry, daddy, to think it's none of it true.

3 rpt. But I've got you, and you've got me. So everything seems right.	7. I'm sometimes afraid to think, daddy, when I am big like you.	8. If, when we get up to Heaven, and mother was waiting there.

3 rpt. But year by year still sees no change.	9. Daddy, good night, dear daddy, good night.	Detail.
A little girl tries to comfort her father after the death of their mother and wife: Why do your big tears fall, daddy? Mother's not far away. I often seem to hear her voice falling across my play. Slide #3 is two times repeated, after #6 and #8.

The song 'Daddy' has been depicted by several other manufacturers too, like G.M. Mason, England; York & Son, England; and finally an unknown manufacturer who replaced the girl by a boy to play the leading part. Bamforth also produced a reissue of 'Daddy', containing 16 slides. You'll find the complete Mason set at the item 'I love you!'.
Meg and her brother Ben

1. Meg selling water cresses	2. Meg at the Cathedral door	3. The Dean's brother introduces himself

4. Cats' Court	5. Meg's lodgings	6. Ben sings Rosalie, the Prairie Flower

7. The Dean visits Cats' Court	8. The last night in Cats' Court	9. The Choristers

10. The accident	11. The Hospital	12. The visit to the Hospital
	At the end of the story slide # 9, The Choristers' was repeated as slide 13. The manufacturer of this set of 12 slides is York & Son, the story is by the English writer Emily Searchfield. She wrote the book 'Aim at a sure end'. This story may have been included in this book.

		True as Steel This set of 24 magic lantern slides is made after a story by Annie Eden. Other stories of Annie Eden include "Left Alone", "Father Come Home" and "Loved Unto Death". Annie wrote 'True as Steel' as Story 11 of the collection Horner's Penny Stories. Fanny Eadon Horner was born in 1849 in Yorkshire. Her father, the publisher William Blackwell Horner, was specialized in penny fiction for which she produced numerous novellas under the pseudonym "Fannie Eden." In 1868, she married architect John Edward Harley. She wrote a few longer works, including 'Mark Strathmore's Renunciation'(1901). She died in 1945. Horner's Penny Stories was a small tabloid story-paper published by W.B. Horner & Son based in London. It was first published in September 1893. The manufacturer of the slides is unknown.

1. 'Come! be off with you'	2. 'Beg pardon, Sir!' said the old man	3. 'Come on, Willie!'

4. 'Tell me about mother'	5. Lifting poor tired Willie	6. 'No supper! -- we'll see'

7. Resting on a grassy bank	8. Willie dropped asleep	9. Nipping off the young leaves

10. 'Will he let us in?'	11. 'Please, Sir,' said Bobby	12. Singing about 'the Friend'

13. The people were passing out	14. 'What are you crying for?'	15. On a bundle of straw, sat Willie

16. A sweet-faced woman entered	17. 'To Mary Clay'	18. Beside his crossing

19. Bobby leaned against the wall	20. What do you think he saw	21. 'Oh! grandmother'

22. 'Drank of her fragrant tea'	23. 'Is that Willie?'	24. 'My first week's earnings'
Two orphan boys are discovered by the verger of a country Chapel sitting at its door. He roughly orders them away, but the minister invites them to return. On the next Sabbath they do so, and both are brought to Jesus by the sermon of the minister. Willie, the younger of the boys, falls ill, and is discovered by his Grandmother almost on the verge of death. Bobby is away sweeping crossings to earn a few coppers to get something for them both to eat, and, after an unsuccessful evening's toil, comes back and is greatly amazed at what he finds: Willie lying now in a nice cot, and his Grandmother feeding him with nourishing food. The minister is very kind, and gets them settled in a little cottage, and takes Bobby on as his gardener. (Catalogue of lantern slides: season 1901-2 Dundee: Peter Feathers, 1901)
	More life model slides....