The Last Edition - Scandal
Then … Clarence happens to be parked across from the police station when the police arrive; he sees them hustling Ray McDonald inside. This was filmed in Hollywood as evidenced by the stores behind him - Ford & Ford Chiropractic on the right was listed in the 1925 Los Angeles city directory at 5911 Hollywood Blvd and Star Cleaners was listed at 5913 Hollywood Blvd.
… and Now, the chiropractor’s office at 5911 is now Sparadise Massage & Spa; Star Cleaners at 5913 is now Bread and Butter lunch and coffee shop. Note the lamppost in the center - remarkably it appears to be the same one a century later as in the movie shot above.
Then … He rushes over to see what’s going on; inside he is astounded to hear that Ray is being charged with accepting a $50,000 bribe; he is helpless as Ray is manhandled, protesting the whole way, to a jail cell.
Police Station 6 appeared earlier in the movie. It’s on the right side in this vintage photo where it shared a building with LAFD’s Engine 27 from 1913 to 1930.
… and Now, what’s more, it wasn’t opposite where Clarence was parked; it was a good 7 or 8 blocks away at 1629 N. Cahuenga Blvd. Check the location now, completely rebuilt. (Note the adjacent brick building partially visible at far left, above, - it’s still there today).
As a close friend of the McDonald family Clarence can’t bring himself to call the shocking news into his newspaper, leaving it instead to the local beat reporter who doesn’t hesitate to call the city editor. With eighteen minutes to press time it’s all hands on deck to rewrite the front page in time for the day’s last edition.
Then … In the next sequence the audience gets to see step-by-step how a newspaper story is created - from its initial composition to the final printed page. It begins with the copy editor receiving the story outline from the city editor. He writes the story and sends it on to linotype machine operators who turn his words into metal ‘slugs’ - lines of text cast from molten metal as fast as the operator types them in.
This and the sequence of operations that follow were all filmed in the Chronicle’s newly built 901 Mission Street building in San Francisco’s Soma district (map); the 1920s photograph below shows the composing room where the linotype machines were filmed.
Then … The metal slugs and an etched photo plate are arranged by compositors at makeup tables (on the left, below) into a full page format (on the right). The words and images are reversed, like a negative, so that when printed they will read in normal format.
The makeup tables were in the same composing room as the linotype machines. This photograph of them also shows a linotype battery at far right.
Then … When the page is complete a sample sheet is printed out and checked for errors. A papier-mâché sheet is then beaten against the completed layout to form a mold (called a ‘flong’) which in turn is used to cast a curved metal plate (called a ‘stereotype’) which will pair with a rotary press to print the newspaper page.
Here’s a photo taken at 901 Mission Street of the same equipment being used to cast stereotype plates.
Then … With time running out the finished plate is winched down to the press room below. Tom’s supervisor grabs it and sends it along a conveyor to Tom, waiting at a press. He bolts it into place, jubilant, knowing they’ve pulled it off - the presses start rolling just in time for the day’s last edition.
This 1920s photo taken in the Chronicle’s press room looks from the opposite direction along the plate conveyor seen above. Alongside it are the massive rotary printing presses, 14 of them in a row.
Tom’s celebration is cut short when he sees the front page with a photograph of his son under a huge headline trumpeting the bribery charge. Enraged, he has to be physically subdued from shutting down the presses.
Meanwhile down in the boiler room Red Moran, determined to avenge the Chronicle’s exposé of his boss, plies the boilerman with booze and challenges him to a coal shoveling contest, having first closed off the steam line. Tension mounts as the camera cuts repeatedly to the pressure gauge slowly moving into the danger level, an audience suspense-building technique often used later by the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock.