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At Padre Park on the South Side of San Antonio—along the banks of the San Antonio River and near the Spanish Missions, runners and dog walkers pass by.
But just over a century ago, this was the location of the first movie set in Texas and one of the earliest places in the country where filmmakers shot the first authentic westerns.
Film historian Kathryn Fuller-Seeley says it was also the first shot in the battle over who would control American filmmaking.
“It was one of the earliest attempts to break away from the dominance of New York-based filmmaking,” she said.
Fuller-Seeley is a professor of media studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Her new book is “The First Movie Studio in Texas.” It was co-authored by Frank Thompson.
She says in early days of East Coast movie production was rough business. For example, The Thomas Edison Motion Picture Company didn’t want independent filmmakers infringing on patents or making competing films.
“Filmmakers ... tended to send gangsters out to break the cameras of their hated rivals,” Fuller-Seeley said.
Gaston Méliès, a French businessman, decided to make movies away from the mob. He picked San Antonio as a home base for his Star Film Company, sending a crew of about twenty actors and technicians to rent a ranch south of town.
And he had a clear strategy. “He decided what the market needed were authentic westerns, not shot in New Jersey. But in realistic settings. So, he chose San Antonio,” she said.
For about a year and a half, the crews turned out an assembly line of short films —each 15 minutes long — perfect for the era’s booming appetite for cheap entertainment.
“It was the days of the boom of nickel theaters — a lot like today’s boom in everybody watching YouTube videos and TikToks. The first movies were short. Entrepreneurs opened little theaters in closed shoe stores and some in funeral parlors,” Fuller-Seeley said.
Inside those makeshift Nickelodeons, the films played silently — but not quietly. “They were silent but had usually live piano accompaniment. They weren’t shown in silence.”
On set, the production was simple—and physically demanding. Everything was shot outdoors. Scenes were staged precisely at noon to avoid heavy shadows. If they needed an “interior,” they built a stage and hung bed sheets overhead to soften the light.
The filmmakers also made use of San Antonio’s picturesque locations.
"They shot a number of scenes along the San Antonio river, around the missions. They shot a few films in the sort of barrio neighborhoods in downtown San Antonio,” she said.
The stories leaned hard into action — fist fights, horse chases, threatened heroines, last-minute rescues. And Fuller-Seeley says the movies often gave women a prominent role. The breakout star was 17-year-old Edith Storey.
“She’d throw herself off cliffs and fall off horse. She’d do anything to make the film more exciting.”
Storey won the admiration of the cowboys on set for her riding skills. They said she could ride anything with hair on it. In her lifetime Storey made about 150 films and today she has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Another lead performer was Francis Ford, the older brother of John Ford, who would later become one of the most influential directors in American film.
“And he was good, he could ride and swim, and he was a very good actor, but he also didn't mind playing villains or fools,” Fuller-Seeley said.
The troupe even made an early Alamo film — a 15-minute epic they considered the highlight of their Texas run. The movie itself is lost, though photos and stills remain.
In their moment, Fuller-Seeley says, audiences loved these Texas-made Westerns—praised for scenery, action, and a sense of authenticity. But the industry moved quickly. By late 1911, the company broke apart, and the films faded from memory—just as filmmakers pushed farther west to Southern California.
Of the 70 films that Star Ranch produced almost all are lost — only four remain. In 2010 one film “Billy and His Pal” was discovered in New Zealand.
The hope is there are other lost Star Ranch films somewhere waiting to be found.
Click here to watch “Billy and His Pal.”
