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A tall Irish type, Walter James offered at least two unforgettable portrayals in the late silent era: as Mary Pickford's gentle policeman father in Little Annie Rooney (1925) bestowing good cheer and sage advice to all and sundry in his downtrodden Lower Eastside precinct; and even more imposing, as Harold Lloyd's bearish sheriff father in The Kid Brother (1927). James became a semi-regular member of Lloyd's stock company, appearing with the bespectacled comedian in Cat's Paw (1934) and Professor Beware (1938). Much earlier in his career, the strapping actor from Tennessee had been the Chief Eunuch in swimmer Annette Kellerman's A Daughter of the Gods (1916) and a native chief in D.W. Griffith's The Idol Dancer (1920).