Nearly 100 years later, a 1914 short titled A Thief Catcher, featuring a three-minute appearance by Charlie Chaplin as a clownish Keystone cop, was uncovered last year at a Taylor, Michigan antiques sale by film historian Paul Gierucki, reports NPR. The 16mm print is a marvelous find for film historians as Chaplin’s filmography hasn’t been altered for 60 years. Chaplin had once referenced a film in which he portrayed a cop but never gave a title. Studio records held no record of Chaplin’s appearance in the film, and the British Film Institute neglected to include it in his 1938 filmography. Yet there now exists physical nitrate proof.
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