From the Archives: Actress Sally Long goes to traffic school over 30 mph speeding violation

Actress Sally Long had been arrested for a speeding — 30 mph — on Santa Monica Boulevard. Her punishment: traffic school taught by Judge Louis P. Russill.

A story in the Oct. 21, 1926, Los Angeles Times reported:

Sally’s going to be a good girl now.

She, meaning Sally Long, motion-picture actress, promised that to Municipal Judge Russill yesterday after Paul Brunette, court bailiff, brought her before the jurist on a warrant because she had failed to appear recently to answer to a traffic violation.

Sally was arrested as she was leaving the Hall of Justice yesterday after she had spent the afternoon visiting the courts of Municipal Judges Georgia Bullock and Samuel Blake.

“Yes,” she admitted laughingly, “I was listening to them try Mrs. (Aimee Semple) McPherson, but I certainly would never have come had I known they were going to arrest me.”

But Sally’s coming back again now. Judge Russill ordered her to report for traffic school instruction under him next Monday afternoon. Meantime she must memorize all the sections of the California Motor Vehicle Act.

Miss Long was arrested on Santa Monica Boulevard September 27, last while traveling at an asserted speed of thirty miles an hour …

A short article in the Oct. 26, 1926, Los Angeles Times reported on Long’s day in traffic school:

Sally Long got an “A” for her recitation in Municipal Judge Russill’s traffic school yesterday and the judge himself admitted that she was just about the “best student he had ever had.”

Though he asked her questions about every section in the California Motor Vehicle Act, she answered them all, and perfectly …

Judge Russill believes in the fair play, so he told Sally, along with twenty-five other students in his traffic class, that by next Monday she must submit to him a 500-word essay setting forth her impressions of his traffic school and its teacher — who is none other than Municipal Judge Russill himself.

She can flatter or criticize, condemn or condone, just as she wishes and the judge won’t get mad and send her to jail: he promised that …

Her case will be disposed on the receipt of her essay, Judge Russill said yesterday.

Long, according to the IMDb website, has 16 film credits, most of which screened in the 1920s. Her last film was in 1930. She died in 1987 at age 85 in Newport Beach.

The above photo was not published in 1926. The print was archived by the Los Angeles Times library under “womens’ fashion-1926.

This article was originally published on April 24, 2014.

See more from the Los Angeles Times archives here