Trivia: Gene Autry, the archetype of the guitar strumming, singing Hollywood cowboy, is one of American cinema's most beloved figures. Born Orvon Autry, his entry to showbiz has a story book quality. During the 1920s he was working as a telegraph operator when American folk hero Will Rogers overheard him singing and convinced him to give show business a try. By 1928 he was singing regularly on a small radio station. Three years later, he was starring in his own national radio show (The National Barn Dance) and making records for Columbia. He first made his mark in films starring roles in the 13-part Republic serial Phantom Empire (1935) and the movie Tumblin' Tumbleweeds (1935). Then he went on to make dozens of Westerns, usually with his famed horse Champion and his comic sidekick Smiley Burnette. He was the top Western star at the box office from 1937-42, and is the only Western actor ever to make the list of Hollywood's top ten attractions, an achievement attained in 1940, '41, and '42. His career was interrupted by service in World War II (he served as a flight officer), during which his place was supplanted at Republic by singing cowboy Roy Rogers. Between 1947 and 1954, now working for Columbia Pictures, Autry trailed behind Rogers as the second most popular western star. His films focus exclusively on action, with little romantic interest. Autry's special twist, though, was to pause from time to time for an easy-going song, creating a new genre of action films that is considered by film historians to constitute a revolution in B-movies (one that went on to have many imitators). As a recording artist, he had nine million-sellers; and as a songwriter, he penned 200 popular songs including the holiday classic "Here Comes Santa Claus." After 20 years as a singing cowboy, Autry retired from movies in 1954 to further his career as a highly successful businessman (among many other investments, he eventually bought the California Angels, a major league baseball team). However, he continued performing on television until the '60s. In 1978 he published his autobiography Back in the Saddle Again, titled after his signature song.

Trivia: Smiley Burnette, said his longtime partner and boss Gene Autry, "couldn't read a note of music but wrote 350 songs and I never saw him take longer than an hour to compose one." Arguably the most beloved of all the B-Western sidekicks and certainly one of the more prolific and enduring, Burnette had been a disc jockey at a small radio station in Tuscola, IL, when discovered by Autry. The crooner prominently featured him both on tour and on Chicago's National Barn Dance broadcasts, making certain that Burnette was included in the contract he signed in 1934 with Mascot Pictures. As Autry became a major name in Hollywood, almost single-handedly establishing the long-lasting Singing Cowboy vogue, Burnette was right there next to him, first with Mascot and then, through a merger, with the newly formed Republic Pictures, where he remained through June 1944. The culmination of Burnette's popularity came in 1940, when he ranked second only to Autry in a Boxoffice Magazine popularity poll of Western stars, the lone sidekick among the Top Ten. Perhaps not everyone's cup of tea -- his style of cute novelty songs and tubby slapstick humor could, on occasion, become quite grating -- Burnette nevertheless put his very own spin on B-Westerns and became much imitated. In fact, by the 1940s, there were two major trends of sidekick comedy in B-Westerns: Burnette's style of slapstick prairie buffoonery, also practiced by the likes of Dub Taylor and Al St. John, and the more character-defined comedy of George "Gabby" Hayes, Andy Clyde, et al. Burnette, who would add such classic Western tunes as "Song of the Range" and "Call of the Canyon" to the Autry catalog, refined his naïve, but self-important, Frog Millhouse character through the years at Republic Pictures -- called "Frog," incidentally, from the way his vocals suddenly dropped into the lowest range possible. But the moniker belonged to the studio and he was plain Smiley Burnette thereafter. When Autry entered the service in 1942, Burnette supported Sunset Carson, Eddie Dew, and Robert Livingston before switching to Columbia Pictures' Durango Kid series starring Charles Starrett. But despite appearing in a total of 56 Durango Westerns, Burnette was never able to achieve the kind of chemistry he had enjoyed with Autry and it was only fitting that they should be reunited for the final six Western features Gene would make. Although his contribution to Autry's phenomenal success was sometimes questioned (minor cowboy star Jimmy Wakely opined that Autry had enough star power to have made it with any comic sidekick), Smiley Burnette remained extremely popular with young fans throughout his career, and although not universally beloved within the industry, he has gone down in history as the first truly popular B-Western comedy sidekick. Indeed, without his early success, there may never have been the demand for permanent sidekicks. When B-Westerns went out of style, Burnette spent most of his time in his backyard recording studio, returning for an appearance on television's Ranch Party (1958) and the recurring role of train engineer Charley Pratt on Petticoat Junction (1963-1967). He died of leukemia in 1967 at the age of 55.

Trivia: Even as an infant, Gail Davis was "playing" characters younger than herself; she won the Most Beautiful Baby in Arkansas contest at the ripe old age of two. While a student at Texas University, Davis performed in a camp show, where she caught the eye of visiting celebrity Gene Autry. Placed under contract by Autry, she co-starred in 15 of his films and twice as many episodes of his various TV series, often cast as a pre-teen tomboy. From 1952 to 1956, she was starred on the Autry-produced TVer Annie Oakley. Even when production ceased on this series, Davis remained under contract to Autry, performing in his traveling rodeo as a rider, roper, and trick shooter. During this period, she was forbidden to cut off her trademarked Annie Oakley pigtails; it wasn't until 1959 that she was able to let down her hair, so to speak, as a guest star on The Perry Como Show. After a few more TV appearances, Gail Davis retired from acting; she later became a partner in a company that managed other celebrities.

Trivia: The living image of the man on the Monopoly cards, Thurston Hall began his six-decade acting career on the New England stock-company circuit. Forming his own troupe, Hall toured America, Africa and New Zealand. On Broadway, he was starred in such venerable productions as Ben-Hur and Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch. In films from 1915, Hall appeared in dozens of silents, notably the 1917 Theda Bara version of Cleopatra, in which he played Mark Antony. After 15 years on Broadway, Hall returned to films in 1935, spending the next 20 years portraying many a fatuous businessman, pompous politician, dyspeptic judge or crooked "ward heeler." From 1953 through 1955, Hall was seen as the choleric bank president Mr. Schuyler on the TV sitcom Topper. Towards the end of his life, a thinner, goateed Thurston Hall appeared in several TV commercials as the Kentucky-colonel spokesman for a leading chicken pot pie manufacturer.

Trivia: General purpose actor Harry Lauter began showing up in films around 1948. Long associated with Columbia Pictures, Lauter appeared in featured roles in such major releases as The Big Heat (1953), Hellcats of the Navy (1957) and The Last Hurrah (1958). He also acted in the studio's "B"-western and horror product. Making occasional visits to Republic, Lauter starred in three serials: Canadian Mounties vs. the Atomic Invaders (1953), Trader Tom of the China Seas (1954) and King of the Carnival (1956), Republic's final chapter play. On TV, he co-starred with Preston Foster in Waterfront (1954) and was second-billed as Ranger Clay Morgan in Tales of the Texas Rangers (1955-59). After appearing in Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971), Harry Lauter retired from acting to concentrate on painting and managing his art and antique gallery.

Trivia: American actor Dick Curtis may have started out as an extra, and it's true that he seldom rose above the ranks of western supporting actors, but he still managed to get himself a full-page photo spread as a "typical" villain in the 1957 coffee table book The Movies. In this book, as in most of his movies, Curtis was seen squaring off in a series of bare-knuckle bouts with his perennial opponent, cowboy star Charles Starrett. Most of Curtis' career was centered at Columbia Pictures, where he scowled and skulked his way through bad guy roles in the studio's "B" pictures, westerns, serials, and two-reel comedies. Sometimes he'd get to wear a business suit instead of frontier garb, as in his role of a jury foreman in the Boris Karloff thriller The Man They Could Not Hang (1939), but even here he was unpleasant, unsympathetic, and fully deserving of an untimely end. A more lighthearted (but no less menacing) Dick Curtis can be seen in his many two-reel appearances with Charley Chase, Hugh Herbert and The Three Stooges. As Badlands Blackie in the Stooges' Three Troubledoers (1946), Curtis' acting is gloriously overbaked, and perhaps as a reward for long and faithful service to Columbia he is permitted to deliver outrageous "double takes" which manage to out-Stooge his co-stars.

Trivia: Actor Harry Harvey Sr. started out in minstrel shows and burlesque. His prolific work in Midwestern stock companies led to film assignments, beginning at RKO in 1934. Harvey's avuncular appearance (he looked like every stage doorman named Pop who ever existed) won him featured roles in mainstream films and comic-relief and sheriff parts in B-westerns. His best known "prestige" film assignment was the role of New York Yankees manager Joe McCarthy in the 1942 Lou Gehrig biopic Pride of the Yankees. Remaining active into the TV era, Harry Harvey Sr. had continuing roles on two series, The Roy Rogers Show and It's a Man's World, and showed up with regularity on such video sagebrushers as Cheyenne and Bonanza.

Trivia: Towheaded child actor Tommy Ivo played Cousin Arne in I Remember Mama (1948) but is perhaps better remembered for his appearances opposite Charles Starrett in Columbia's long-running "Durango Kid" Western series. Ivo popped up in no less than six entries, often mistaking the masked avenger for a real bandit but always wanting to emulate him by the fadeout -- just like the front-row kids of the day. Ivo was fairly busy in television in the late '40s and early '50s as well, so busy in fact that he earned the nickname "TV Tommy Ivo." When his career slowed down in the late '50s, Ivo found a new outlet for his talents -- as a professional hot rod driver.

Trivia: Veteran movie villain Kenne Duncan began plying his wicked trade in 1933. He hit his stride in the 1940s, when he was under contract to Republic Pictures. Duncan sneered and skulked his way through scores of westerns and serials, usually as the raffish aide-de-camp of the principal heavy (as in the 1941 serial The Adventures of Captain Marvel). When Republic slowed down production in the mid-1950s, Duncan reluctantly found himself in the circle of Hollywood "fringies" who populated the films of immortal bad-movie maven Ed Wood Jr. One of Kenne Duncan's final screen appearances was as phony mystic and erstwhile vampire Dr. Acula in Wood's Night of the Ghouls

Trivia: Al Wyatt was a Hollywood film and television stuntman for nearly 40 years. He got his start in 1946 working as a stunt double for Jon Hall in The Last of the Redmen. In addition to working as a double for such stars as Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea, and George Montgomery, Wyatt has also been a stunt coordinator and a second unit director.

Trivia: Vaudeville and stage performer Pat O'Malley was a mere lad of seventeen (or thereabouts) when he inaugurated his film career at the Edison company in 1907. A dependable "collar-ad" leading man possessed of an athlete's physique, O'Malley rose to stardom at the Kalem Studios during the teens. From 1918 to 1927, O'Malley hopscotched around Hollywood, appearing at Universal, First National, Vitagraph and Paramount; he starred in war films (Heart of Humanity [1918]), westerns (The Virginian [1922]) and adaptations of bestsellers (Brothers Under the Skin [1922]). His talkie debut in 1929's Alibi would seem to have heralded a thriving sound career, but O'Malley had aged rather suddenly, and could no longer pass as a romantic lead. He worked in some 400 films in bits and supporting roles, frequently showing up in "reunion" films in the company of his fellow silent screen veterans (Hollywood Boulevard [1936], and A Little Bit of Heaven [1941]). O'Malley remained "on call" into the early '60s for such TV shows as The Twilight Zone and such films as The Days of Wine and Roses (1962). Pat O'Malley's film credits are often confused with those of Irish comedian/dialectian J. Pat O'Malley (1901-1985) and Australian performer John P. O'Malley (1916-1959).

Trivia: One of the most popular, and recognizable, character actors in B-Western history, pudgy, mustachioed Bud Osborne (real name Leonard Miles Osborne) was one of the many Wild West show performers who parlayed their experiences into lengthy screen careers. Especially noted for his handling of runaway stagecoaches and buckboards, Osborne began as a stunt performer with Thomas Ince's King-Bee company around 1912, and by the 1920s he had become one of the busiest supporting players in the business. Rather rakish-looking in his earlier years, the still slender Osborne even attempted to become a Western star in his own right. Produced by the Bud Osborne Feature Film Company and released by low-budget Truart Pictures, The Prairie Mystery (1922) presented Osborne as a romantic leading man opposite B-movie regular Pauline Curley. Few saw this little clunker, however, and Osborne quickly returned to the ranks of supporting cowboys, often portraying despicable villains with names like Satan Saunders, Piute Sam, or Bull McKee. Playing an escaped convict masquerading as a circuit rider in both the 1923 Leo Maloney short Double Cinched and Shootin' Square, a 1924 Jack Perrin feature Western, Osborne even demonstrated an affinity for comedy. The now veteran Bud Osborne continued his screen career into the sound era and became even busier in the 1930s and 1940s. As he grew older and his waistline expanded, Osborne's roles became somewhat smaller and instead of calling the shots himself, as he often had in the silent era, he now answered to the likes of Roy Barcroft and Charles King. But he seems to pop up in every other B-Western and serial released in those years, appearing in more than 65 productions for Republic Pictures alone. By the 1950s, the now elderly Osborne became one of the many veteran performers courted by maverick filmmaker Edward D. Wood Jr., for whom he did Crossroad Avenger: The Adventures of the Tucson Kid (1954), an unsold television pilot, Jailbait (1954), Bride of the Monster (1955), and Night of the Ghouls (1958). When all is said and done, it was a rather dismal finish to a colorful career.

Trivia: Often cast as American Indians, tough-looking stunt man/supporting player Boyd Stockman appeared in more than 50 B-Westerns and serials between 1946 and 1956, and was equally busy on such television shows as Gene Autry Show, The Range Rider, Adventures of Wild Bill Hickock, and Sky King. A namesake son (1938-1992) also worked as a Hollywood stunt man in the 1950s.

Trivia: From In Old Santa Fe (1934) and all through the television years, songwriter/steel guitarist Frankie Marvin (born Frank James Marvin) was a highly visible member of Gene Autry's onscreen coterie. Marvin, who had earlier performed with Autry on radio, would occasionally play a minor role as well, often as Gene's foreman, a ranch hand, or a cowboy. He would even join the bad guys in non-Autry vehicles such as the 1941 serial Adventures of Red Ryder, in which he attempted to poison the Circle R's water supply. In all, Marvin appeared in more than 80 feature Westerns and at least six serials.