Harold Lloyd Born in Nebraska in 1893, Harold Lloyd began his theatrical career at age 12 as a bit player in itinerant stock companies. In 1911, the Lloyds moved to San Diego, where, two years later, Harold's first involvement in the movies came when he was hired as an extra in an Edison production. Hoping to gain a more secure foothold as a movie actor, Lloyd moved to Los Angeles that same year. Appearing initially in one and two reelers for producer Hal Roach, Lloyd spent the next several years in search of an original comic style and character. His first attempt, Willie Work, gave way to the much more successful Lonesome Luke figure, essentially an amalgam of popular comic types of the day. Between 1915 and 1917, Lloyd made over 50 one- and two-reel Lonesome Luke comedies, but despite their profitability, he grew impatient with the character's limitations, later saying that he would become "an average, recognizable American youth and let the situations take care of the comedy." With the addition of a pair of horn-rimmed glasses, Lloyd's most successful and well remembered character was born. The "glasses character" was an inspired and immediate success. From 1918 onward, Lloyd progressed from one and two reelers to features, and throughout the 1920s he was producing such classic feature-length comedies as Grandma's Boy, Safety Last, Why Worry? and The Freshman. This character was always called Harold (Horne, Swift, Diddlebock, Hickory &c.), with the exception of one film, The Cat's Paw (a sound feature) in which his character is called Ezekiel Cobb. Harold played the Glasses character for the rest of his life. Unfortunately, the go-getter of the 1920s perished after the Wall Street crash of 1929. People could no longer identify with the character Lloyd has created. This explains the greatly reduced output after that year. However, Lloyds films are now regarded as some of the greatest of the silent era, and are as funny today as they were to those original audiences! Harold as Willie Work, a copy of the successful Chaplin. Harold's "office"  in Hollywood.. He started his comedy career as "Willie Work", who was, in common with many other silent comedians' characters, a rip-off of Chaplin. After this, Lloyd moved on to his character "Lonesome Luke", who was similar to Chaplin (with his moustache), but wore slightly different clothes. However, Lloyd was  a splendid imitator. Lloyd frequently appeared with Snub Pollard in these films. The Luke or Willie films can hardly be called comedy classics; they are probably only of interest to fans of Lloyds final alter-ego, the “Glasses Character”. "Grandma's Boy", Harold's first true feature film, released in 5 reels in September 1922, was initially intended to be a 2-reeler. But, the strength of the plot, which actually had been rummaging in Lloyd's head for years, made cutting anything out impossible. Its story (of a meek, cowardly youth who is given an idol, intended to inspire bravery in him, but who later realizes that not only is this talisman a phoney, but that the real bravery was always within him) was extremely inspirational for Lloyd's audiences. Harold received thousands of letters of gratitude for this film. Not only did this bevy of thanks spur him on to further stories of self-belief (Girl Shy, The Freshman and The Kid Brother are later films of his that take this notion a step further) but the days of short subjects were now over for Harold Lloyd: he was now a feature-comedy star, for good. Lloyd and his wife, his former leading lady Mildred Davis, raised three children, Click on the highlighted text to see more about Harold's life outside of the movies. In the near future we'll be adding images of "Greenacres", Harold's 16 acre estate in Hollywood with it's own golf course. The glasses were part of the costume no matter what part he was playing. Click on the picture above to see how Harold decides to end it all... We have included a dozen small Quicktime movies of Harold on this site. Follow the underlined text link to find the other movies.