What's even more amazing watching Harold Lloyd's antics is the knowing the comedian was involved in what could have been a career ending accident a few months earlier. While in production for his movie "Haunted Spooks," Lloyd was posing for promotional photos using a bomb as a prop. He lit the prop, which turned out to be a potent bomb that was long thought to have been discarded by studio workers because of its explosiveness. But somehow it was mixed in with other normal, non-lethal bomb props. When it exploded in Lloyd's hand, the bomb sheared off two of his fingers as well as part of his face, sending him to the hospital for a 16-day stay.
"I thought I would surely be so disabled that I would never be able to work again," Lloyd said years later. "I didn't suppose that I would have one five-hundredth of what I have now. Still I thought, 'Life is worth while. Just to be alive.' I still think so."
With perseverance and a four-month physical rehabilitation, along with a prosthesis glove over the artificial fingers to hide the injury, Lloyd finished "Haunted Spooks," released in March 1920.
The injury didn't stop the comedian from performing his own stunts for his upcoming films, which was especially difficult since he was right handed and the lost fingers were on his right hand. But not once did he complain. And the handicap doesn't show through his post-accident movies, even with him hanging by his fingertips onto the ledge in "High And Dizzy."
"I thought I would surely be so disabled that I would never be able to work again," Lloyd said years later. "I didn't suppose that I would have one five-hundredth of what I have now. Still I thought, 'Life is worth while. Just to be alive.' I still think so."
With perseverance and a four-month physical rehabilitation, along with a prosthesis glove over the artificial fingers to hide the injury, Lloyd finished "Haunted Spooks," released in March 1920.
The injury didn't stop the comedian from performing his own stunts for his upcoming films, which was especially difficult since he was right handed and the lost fingers were on his right hand. But not once did he complain. And the handicap doesn't show through his post-accident movies, even with him hanging by his fingertips onto the ledge in "High And Dizzy."