Did the nubile young woman ever really get tied up and left on the train tracks or the saw mill conveyor belt?
All the references to young women menaced by a moustache-twirling bad guy as he tied her to the railroad tracks or sawmill conveyor are homage to the first serialized movie story, The Perils of Pauline, first released in 1914. Each episode ended with Pauline caught in a cliffhanger, which wasn’t resolved until the following week.
It was a man who was first known to be tied to the railroad tracks:
“Augustin Daly’s first play which was not an adaptation from another work was the wildly successful melodrama Under the Gaslight (1867). In the climactic scene, the hero, Snorkey, a wounded veteran of the war, is tied to railroad tracks as a train approaches and Laura, the heroine is locked in a shed that serves as a station next to those tracks where she can see what is about to happen.”
As for The Perils of Pauline, each episode was self-contained; Pauline was rescued (or, occasionally, she rescued the “hero”) at the end of each segment. It wasn’t even the first thriller serial: that was The Adventures of Kathlyn, a year earlier.
By the way, the clip most used to show this situation is from a Mack Sennett comedy, Teddy at the Throttle, which was a parody of the genre.
I bow to your superior knowledge of the Silent Era, Eve. But you have me at a disadvantege, having been there at the time. 
Impudent young puppy—Beware, lest I strike you with my gold-headed walking stick!
“But I can’t pay the rent!”
“You MUST pay the rent!”
[QUOTE=Eve]
It was a man who was first known to be tied to the railroad tracks:
"Augustin Daly’s first play which was not an adaptation from another work was the wildly successful melodrama Under the Gaslight (1867). In the climactic scene, the hero, Snorkey, a wounded veteran of the war, is tied to railroad tracks as a train approaches QUOTE]
Curious: how did one stage a train approaching on the 1867 stage?
They rigged up some amazing stage effects in the 19th century, and Daly was a master at it—there was one play where the heroine was saved from being thrown over a waterfall; and the Ben Hur chariot race was always a good jaw-dropper.
Snorkey?!?!?!?!?
So, do I take it that the dragon/damsel in distress shtick was a decision to get medieval with the perils of Pauline? Wasn’t Snorkey one of the H. R. Pufnstuf characters?
Re: saw mill conveyor belt
Clearly, you have never seen “The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini”
I wrote a semi-expert article about firsts in DiD scenes by polling a group of guys at a discussion page devoted to bondage in mainstream media. Curiously enough, the “chained to the rr track” scene was never mentioned, but about everything else was. Here’s the first 15 results (the names at the end are the sources who provided the scenes. It’s not a complete list by any means … betcha Eve could add to it … but it’ll give you an idea or two …
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First bondage scene, period, – Linda Arvidson (AKA Mrs. D.W. Griffith) in The Red Girl (1908) – Honk
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First gag, period – An Awful Moment" (1908) Linda Arvidson – Honk
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First (implied) nude bondage scene. ("Implied"means the actress is clearly nude but her nipples and genitals are blocked in some way, as by conveniently place props, etc. I threw out the first House of Wax film on the grounds that somebody whose body is entirely covered by a sheet is not really naked. Strategically place vines or hair, however, seems like nudity. Arbitrary? Yeah, but we’re open to suggestions for a better standard.)
A) Sign of the Cross, 1932 – woman chained naked and spreadeagled in the Colosseum – Tony Wood
B) Silent “educational” films of the early 20th Century – DB (The exact dates of these films are not know, but they were very naked and very explicit)
C) Roman Scandals, 1933, about 20 nude women chained to a pillar – Tony Wood
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First genuine nude bondage scene (nipples and/or genitals and/or all of butt visible) Ginger, Cheri Caffaro, 1971 (probably this is predated by some European “art” film, but as no definite candidates have been established, we’ll use Ginger as a default)
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First nude bondage scene with the Full Treatment (gagged and bound) Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, 1974
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First nude bondage scene with sex – “Ginger” 1972.
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First appearance of a full head harness in a mainstream TV series – Reyes y Reyes, Spanish language (ball gag) 1999. First U.S. series, Amazon, Fabiana Udenio (bit gag).2000.
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First nude bound and gagged sex scene (the Full Treatment) Over the Wire with Griffin Drew, 1995 (the Ginger movies did not, to my knowledge, feature any scenes of bound AND gagged women being made love to).
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First Tied and Tickled – The Brothers Karamazov – 1958 – FrankJ
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First Ponygirl Scene – Alien Abduction, Intimate Secrets, 1995, Pia Reyes (also first nude ponygirl scene, also first lesbian ponygirl scene). Yum.
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First Topless Flogging – Lash of the Penitentes, 1937 – Tony Wood
Actually, I’ve since updated number 12 – there’s a 1914 Italian film called “Cabiria” that predates it with a scene of a topless woman being whipped while chained to a post for daring to attempt to rescue her child from being sacrificed to Moloch.
There’s more to the list, but I think I’ve made my point, whatever it was.
Of course not. It was invisible.
Well, um, er … good point. 