The Man He Might Have Been

A young boy aspires to knowledge and higher education but his father, a plain man with narrow goals, is content with an ordinary school education for him and puts him to work despite the principal's protests. The principal even offers the father an opening by which his son could work during the day and attend school at night throughout a season, but the father declines. Disheartened by the life of drudgery, his father’s decision has wrought he travels the wrong road and goes from hopelessness to recklessness, trapped in an unhappy marriage and a life of hopelessness.

Barry O'Moore

The Boy

Mabel Trunnelle

The Boy's Sweetheart

Charles Ogle

The Boy's Father

Marc McDermott

The Principal

Bliss Milford

The Waitress

Elizabeth Miller

The Boy's Mother

Ida Williams

The Sweetheart's Mother

• Ashley MillerDirector
• James OppenheimStory

Release date

January 20, 1913

Status

Released

Original language

English

Runtime

20m

Genres

Drama

• The Wife

  1914

• 

  Thais

  1917

• Tim

  1912

• 

  The Show Girl

  1927

• Man's Enemy

  1914

• In the Watches of the Night

  1909

• 

  Her First Elopement

  1920

• 

  Second Hand Wife

  1933

• 

  In the Days of Famine

  1915

• And a Little Child Shall Lead Them

  1909

• The Eavesdropper

  1909

• The Broken Doll

  1910