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Research dossier · Arts & Letters

The Decoy (1916 Mutual)

1916 film by George Lederer

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 revisionApr 8, 2026
Entity authorityQ8849941 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Decoy is a 1916 silent film crime drama directed by George Lederer and distributed by Mutual Film Company.

Re-releases

The film was rereleased in 1920 by C. B. Price under State Rights basis. In 1922 an independent company, Signet Film, rereleased the film under the title The Faithless Sex with Henry J. Napier listed as the director.

Cast

Frances Nelson - Glory Moore

Gladden James - Harvey Dix

Leonore Harris - Mrs. Lawrence

Robert Frazer - Jim Danvers

Frank Beamish - Milt Bannon

Lois Wilson -

Preservation status

This film survives in the Library of Congress collection and the BFI National Archive.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Decoy (1916 Mutual)” is 1916 film by George Lederer. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Decoy, Mutual and film, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1916, 1920, 1922—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Decoy, Mutual and film is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “1916 film by George Lederer” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q8849941. The first chronological checks are 1916, 1920 and 1922.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. 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 “The Decoy (1916 Mutual)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Decoy (1916 Mutual) primary sources, The Decoy (1916 Mutual) archive and Decoy 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 “The Decoy (1916 Mutual)”?
  2. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
  3. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Decoy (1916 Mutual)” 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.