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Queen of the Northwoods

1929 film by Spencer Gordon Bennet

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionFeb 20, 2026
Entity authorityQ248464 ↗
Source-derived summary

Queen of the Northwoods is 1929 American silent Western film serial by Pathé, directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet and Thomas Storey, with a story by George Arthur Gray. Known cast members were Walter Miller, Ethlyne Clair and Frank Lackteen. This serial was silent, had ten episodes and is believed to still exist in an incomplete state (missing a few episodes).

Plot

A mysterious masked villain known as the Wolf Devil tries to drive all of the non-native settlers out of Alaska. Walter Miller plays a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer named Inspector Steele. The Wolf Devil kidnaps the heroine, Miss Moreau.

Cast

Walter Miller - Inspector Steele

Ethlyne Clair - Miss Moreau

Tom London - Garvin / The Wolf-Devil

Frank Lackteen - Jacques De Brun

Edward Cecil - Fergus

George Magrill - Sergeant Bolt

Nelson McDowell - Flapjack

Jean Diamond - Moon River Lady

Arthur Taylor

Fred Burns

Arthur Dewey

The Wolf Devil

The villain of the serial is one of film's first werewolves (in the traditional sense of a man masquerading and acting like a wolf rather than the now more common film wolfman). This villain, The Wolf Devil, wears a wolf skin headdress that completely covers his face. The supernatural atmosphere is enhanced by his apparent ability to control a pack of wolves.

Editorial summary

“Queen of the Northwoods” enters the record as 1929 film by Spencer Gordon Bennet. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Queen, Northwoods and film can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA productive route into publication, performance and collection histories when the underlying object or edition remains clearly identified. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1929—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1929-01-01. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Queen, Northwoods and film.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Queen of the Northwoods” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Queen, Northwoods and film provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q248464. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1929.

Critical limits

Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Queen of the Northwoods”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Queen of the Northwoods primary sources, Queen of the Northwoods archive and Queen research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Queen of the Northwoods”?
  2. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Queen of the Northwoods” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.