Sally Winters Movies

Bob Steele's talkie debut was the usual story of cattlemen versus sheepmen. Steele, the son of a cattle rancher, naturally belongs to the former group and is soon falsely accused of murdering an old sheepherder. The dead man, alas, is the father of Steele's girlfriend (Louise Lorraine) and the young cowboy is desperate to prove his innocence. While Bob Steele's career continued to rise in talkies, Louise Lorraine, the widow of silent Western star Art Acord, retired following this film. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Penny-pinching producer-director J.P. McGowan splurged on canned music and special effects for this otherwise standard Bob Custer Western in which a couple of drifters (Custer and comedian Bobby Dunn) search for a missing millionaire (Henry Roquemore). The rotund capitalist has been kidnapped by nasty a rustler (Tom Bay), but Custer, without too much trouble, manages to return him to the loving arms of his pretty daughter (Vivian Ray). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

This inexpensively produced early sound Western was diminutive cowboy star Bob Steele's second to last for poverty row company Syndicate Film Exchange. Steele appeared as a young cowboy in love with the sheriff's daughter (Jean Reno). There is a rival, of course, a crooked deputy (Perry Murdock) who is the mastermind behind a daring robbery. Steele foils a scheme to murder the sheriff, unmasks the crooked deputy, returns the stolen money and wins the pretty girl, all in the final reel. Steele left Syndicate following Breezy Bill (1930), but went on to appear in scores of budget Westerns, many directed by his father, Robert North Bradbury. To non-Western fans, he is perhaps best remembered for playing the bully, Curley, in Of Mice and Men (1939) and as the killer, Canino, in The Big Sleep (1946). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Producer-director J.P. McGowan's Syndicate Film Exchange, a forerunner of Monogram Productions, Inc., caught action heroes on their way down or up -- mostly down. Covered Wagon Trails, one of the last full-length silent westerns produced, starred the laconic Bob Custer, a screen cowboy whose career was decidedly in the doldrums. The story wasn't exactly fresh either, something about a cowboy battling smugglers -- and heroine Phyllis Bainbridge's weakling brother (Perry Murdock) -- on the Mexican border. This below-average modern-dress oater was far from the sweeping epic the title suggests but did come with a synchronized music score. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Veteran action specialist J.P. McGowan both produced, wrote, directed and co-starred in this late silent western starring the strapping Tom Tyler. McGowan played Tom Dorgan, a convicted train robber and suspected murderer who escapes from prison during a fire. The railroad company hires Phil Sampson (Tyler) to chase down the escapee and recover the stolen loot. Sampson's investigation leads him to the ranch belonging to Dorothy McClure (Charlotte Winn), the daughter of the murdered man. Dorgan has placed a couple of henchmen -- Bull Bradley (Tom Bay) and Spike Harkness (Mack V. Wright) -- on the ranch to watch Dorothy's every move. Harkness, who pretends to be the girl's cousin, pumps off his colleague during a scuffle, and after being caught by Sampson, Dorgan confesses that the dead man, his son, was the real killer of Dorothy's father. McGowan's penny-pinching Syndicate Film Exchange, which produced silent westerns well into 1930, later merged into Monogram Pictures. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

This cheap western produced by J.P. McGowan's Syndicate Film Exchange was given an almost too prophetic title. One of the last silent westerns, The Last Roundup told the oft-told tale of a cowboy (Bob Custer) saving a pretty girl (Hazel Mills) from being kidnapped by a gang of cattle rustlers headed by the crooked ranch foreman (Bud Osborne). The only interesting aspect of this film is the hero's name, "Denver Dixon," which of course was the moniker sometimes used by Gower Gulch entrepreneur Victor Adamson. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this western, a wagon train is massacred by Indians and the only survivors are two children, a brother and a sister. They take the girl, adopt her into the tribe and name her "Black Fawn." Meanwhile, the cavalry saves the boy. He grows up to join them. Eventually the siblings are reunited after the boy thwarts an attack. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Veteran producer-director J. P. McGowan helmed this minor western starring one of the very best of the late silent-era cowboys, New York-born Tom Tyler. Tyler had begun his screen career with FBO, but as that studio started gearing up for talkies (eventually merging into what would become RKO), the strapping actor moved over to McGowan's Syndicate Film Exchange operation. Releasing silent westerns with synchronized scores and a few sound-effects long after most other firms had switched to talkies, Syndicate's patrons were small theaters not yet fully equipped for sound. Almost all the films were directed by McGowan himself and scripted by Sally Winters, utilizing the same casts and as few sets as possible. The Lone Horseman tells the story of a rancher who, just released from the hospital, learns that his property has been sold by a treacherous friend to someone named Pat. Intending to administer "Pat" a solid beating, Tyler discovers that the bearer of the name is actually an elderly widow (Emma Tansey) who lives with her pretty niece (Charlotte Winn). Drawn to the niece, Tyler hangs around incognito long enough to rescue the women from a gang of outlaws who have discovered that there is gold in them thar hills. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Veteran director J.P. McGowan's moth-eaten Syndicate Film Exchange, a division of W. Ray Johnston's Rayart Pictures and commonly known as something of a graveyard for former silent western heroes, offered a synchronized soundtrack on Riders of the Rio Grande. Syndicate caught 'em on the way down, mostly cowboy refugees from Film-Booking-Office (FBO). One such was Bob Custer, the star of Riders of the Rio Grande. Custer plays a cowboy posing as an outlaw in order to infiltrate the gang of counterfeiters who has kidnapped leading lady Edna Aslin. The story (by Syndicate's resident scribe Sally Winters) was hardly fresh in 1929 and would see repeated service in the years to come. Organized in 1928, Syndicate was doomed to be swallowed up in 1931 by a new Johnston organization, the often maligned (and sometimes justifiably so) Monogram Pictures, Inc. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Minor cowboy star Bob Custer finds his newly purchased land overrun by outlaws and claim-grabbers in this minor silent western released by the poverty row company Syndicate. He bravely stands up to the villains and manages to save not only his own property but also that of his neighbor (Lafe McKee), whose daughter (Peggy Montgomery) he covets. Director J.P. McGowan, a veteran of the serial boom in the mid-1910s, plays an unscrupulous lawyer. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

The once-popular, now-forgotten western star Bob Custer heads the cast of Law of the Mounted. Custer dons the red coat of the Northwest Mounted Police in this location-filmed outing. He gets his man when he foils a gang of fur smugglers. The ringleader is played by the film's director, J.P. McGowan, who comports himself like a road-company Erich Von Stroheim. Fragments of Law of the Mounted later showed up on the early-1960s syndicated TV filler Billy Bang Bang. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide