charlie left s & a for a more lucrative career in los angeles. >> and they literally one day were shooting a movie and just came in the afternoon and shut everything down and left. it was that quick. >> reporter: niles keeps his past alive with images of charlie and bronco billy and keeps its main street historically intact. >>> when we come back, the new technology at the time that gave us these lasting images of the 1906 earthquake. >>> thomas edison was a prolific inventor at the turn of the 20th century he put one of his inventions to work chronicling the news of the day. one of the places he made them was in san francisco after the 1906 earthquake. you will see some of edison's images on a story bob mackenzie did. >> reporter: pockets loaded with cash in a time of swaggering optimism. in this film we see the st. francis hotel looking much like it does today. but many of the surrounding buildings would not survive. their dreams were ability to be derailed. it struck an earthquake of terrifying force. in a city made by stacking one brick on top of another the quake was devastating. hund