S.O.S. Tidal Wave
1939 film by John H. Auer
S.O.S. Tidal Wave is a 1939 American crime film directed by John H. Auer and written by Gordon Kahn and Maxwell Shane. The film stars Ralph Byrd, George Barbier, Kay Sutton, Frank Jenks, Marc Lawrence and Dorothy Lee. It was released on June 2, 1939 by Republic Pictures.
Plot
Reporter Jeff Shannon stops trying to expose political corruption after his son and wife are threatened. On election day, corrupt politicians broadcast the 1933 apocalyptic science-fiction film Deluge on the news, hoping to trick voters into believing that New York City has been hit by a tidal wave to discourage them from voting.
Cast
Ralph Byrd as Jeff Shannon
George Barbier as Uncle Dan Carter
Kay Sutton as Laurel Shannon
Frank Jenks as Peaches Jackson
Marc Lawrence as Melvin Sutter
Dorothy Lee as Mable
Oscar O'Shea as Mike Halloran
Mickey Kuhn as Buddy Shannon
Ferris Taylor as Clifford Farrow
Don "Red" Barry as Curley Parsons
Raymond Bailey as Roy Nixon
Production
Republic Pictures acquired the rights to the 1933 disaster film Deluge, which begins with a special-effects sequence of Manhattan being destroyed by a tsunami.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “S.O.S. Tidal Wave” as 1939 film by John H. Auer. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as 1939 film by John H. Auer. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q21528010. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1939 and 1933.
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
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Three-step research path
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- Expand the search: follow S.O.S. Tidal Wave primary sources, S.O.S. Tidal Wave archive and Tidal research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “S.O.S. Tidal Wave” 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.