Actor Bobby Harron was facing a great future in cinema. After his association with director D. W. Griffith for 10 years, he was beginning a four-movie package with Metro Pictures. He traveled to New York City on September 1, 1920 to attend the premier of Griffith's 'Way Down East' when he began unpacking his clothes in a hotel room. A gun he had tucked into his suitcase fell to the floor and discharged, sending a bullet into his chest. He was immediately rushed to the hospital. On the road to recovery, Harron suddenly died four days later at the young age of 27.
Harron's last surviving movie was December 1919's "The Greatest Question," directed by Griffith and co-starring Lillian Gish. He had just finished his first movie for Metro, 'Coincidence,' which was previewed the same evening as 'Way Down East' in New York. 'Coincidence' is considered lost. The irony of "The Greatest Question" is the film deals with death and spirituality, a spooky ending for a career that began for Harron at 14 as an errand boy for Biograph Studios. Griffith, the primary director for Biograph, noticed the boy when he appeared in a few shorts, and gave him a role in 1909's 'The Lonely Villa.'
Harron had acting parts in three of Griffith's most ambitious films, 1914's 'Judith of Bethulia,' 1915's 'Birth of a Nation,' and his most prominent role in 1916's 'Intolerance.' Throughout his career he was protrayed on screen as a naive or sensitive boy, eliciting from viewers sympathetic feelings.
Critics peg Harron's finest role in his later movies in June 1919's "True Heart Susie," also directed by Griffith with Lillian Gish as his secret romantic heartthrob. Harron was cast as a simple boy who, after gratuating from theology college, marries the wrong woman instead of childhood friend Lillian. His acting showed a maturity that struck an emotional chord with his female audience.
Such rave reviews were practically guaranteeing Harron a very promising future. But because, as Harron described, he tried to keep his gun away from his "hard to handle" younger brother by packing it into his suitcase, he paid the ultimate price dying from an accidental gunshot.
