CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · Arts & Letters

The Girl Who Ran Wild

1922 film directed by Rupert Julian

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 revisionMay 1, 2026
Entity authorityQ40889266 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Girl Who Ran Wild is a 1922 American comedy-drama film directed by Rupert Julian. It is a black and white silent film released by Universal which is based on the 1863 novella M’liss: An Idyll of Red Mountain by Bret Harte. It is a remake of the 1918 film M’Liss. The film was written by George C. Hull and features cast such as Gladys Walton (as M’liss), Marc Robbins (“Bummer” Smith), and Vernon Steele (The Schoolmaster). It is a western melodrama which was released on October 9, 1922. It was filmed in Seven Oaks, California.

Plot

As described in a film magazine, Melissa Bummer, whom everyone called "Old Man Bummer's Wildcat," told the world that she could take care of herself after her Dad died and left her alone in a shack in the hills. Shabbily clad, barefoot, her hair knotted and uncombed, M'Liss scorned the girls from the city who had Mamas and always had ribbons in their hair. But this was before the new Schoolmaster came, and she began to realize how sadly ignorant she was. Of course, he was handsome and well groomed.

Editorial summary

“The Girl Who Ran Wild” enters the record as 1922 film directed by Rupert Julian. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Girl, Wild 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—1922, 1863, 1918—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1922. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Girl, Wild and film.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“The Girl Who Ran Wild” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Girl, Wild and film provides the most credible route into that argument.

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 May 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q40889266. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1922, 1863 and 1918.

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 Girl Who Ran Wild”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Girl Who Ran Wild primary sources, The Girl Who Ran Wild archive and Girl 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 Girl Who Ran Wild”?
  2. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Girl Who Ran Wild” 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.