Tex Palmer Movies

The Range Riders - Ray "Crash" Corrigan, John "Dusty" King and Max "Albi" Terhune-ride the range once more in Monogram's Kid's Last Ride. Sent to a wide-open town to stem the activities of the local criminal element, our three heroes almost immediately get mixed up in a deadly feud between local land barons Harmon (Al Bridge) and Bart (Glenn Strange). The Range Riders patch things up by deflecting Harmon's son Jimmy (Edwin Brian) from a life of crime, thereby also expediting the romance between Jimmy and Bart's daughter Sally (Luana Walters). Then, almost as an afterthought, the do-gooding trio trounces the villains. Like most of the The Range Riders' entries, Kid's Last Ride was cheap but profitable. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Apparently hoping to break out of the series' formula rut, the producers of the "Range Riders" western Tumbledown Ranch in Arizona employ a clever and amusing framing device. At the beginning of the picture, the son of Range Rider John "Dusty" King (played by King) meets the son of Dusty's old pal Ray "Crash" Corrigan (played by Corrigan) in college. After the boys exchange a few reminiscences of their dads' exploits, Dusty's son is knocked out by an accidental blow on the head. When he awakens, he finds he has been transported back to the Old West, and has assumed his father's identity. Once this has been established, the plot proper gets under way, wherein Dusty, Crash and Alibi (Max Terhune) try to stem the criminal activities of the villains (Quin Ramsyey, James Craven, Jack Holmes) and to champion the cause of the heroine (Sheila Darcy). By the time the heroes finally return to the Wild Frontier, the picture is half over, forcing the screenwriters to telescope 6 reels' worth of plot and action into 25 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Hoof and mouth disease reared its ugly head in this unusual Tex Ritter singing Western from Monogram. Ritter played Tex Rocketts, the sheriff of Sundown who is forced to quarantine the valley's cattle to prevent the spread of the disease. The desperate ranchers, all of whom are in debt to banker Cyrus Cuttler (George Pembroke) and his son Nick (Carleton Young), attempt to get their livestock to market anyway. When one of their number, Steve Davis (Dave "Tex" O'Brien), is arrested and jailed by Tex, the ranchers blame the lawman for their plight. Cuttler advises Steve to kill Tex but the latter, with assistance from government agent Bret Stockton (Glenn Strange), is able to prove that Cuttler's crew has been treating the cattle with acid to generate false symptoms of hoof and mouth disease. In between saving Sundown from the nefarious Cuttler gang, Ritter performed his own I've Done the Best I Could, a song reportedly inspired by the work of African-American folk musician Hudie "Leadbelly" Leadbetter. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Carl Krusada (aka Val Cleveland) was credited with the screenplay for this typically inferior Jack Randall oater from Poverty Row company Monogram. In reality, the story of a drifter helping a sheriff catch a gang of smugglers was as old as the hills of Chatsworth, CA, where The Kid From Santa Fe was filmed in little under a week. Appointed deputy sheriff by Sheriff Holt (Forrest Taylor), the Santa Fe Kid (Randall) is soon framed in the murder of Kent (George Chesebro), one of the outlaws. Escaping from jail courtesy of the sheriff's lovesick daughter (Clarene Curtis), the Kid is trailed by Millie (Claire Rochelle), Kent's girlfriend who succeeds in knocking him into the river. Presumed to have drowned, the Kid returns to town very much alive and ready to track down the real killer, Bill Stewart (Tom London), the murdered man's partner. Randall, who was nearing the end of his four-year Western sojourn, was the brother of popular B-Western star Robert Livingston. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this western, a U.S. marshal impersonates an outlaw and rides to Texas to find the looters who have been raiding supply shipments. He finds them and infiltrates their gang. He soon finds out that the desperadoes have commandeered a ranch and are holding the rancher and his family prisoner while they await the next shipment. Trouble erupts, but justice prevails as the marshal captures the badguys and frees the frightened family. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The first Tex Ritter Western from Monogram Pictures, Starlight Over Texas contained the singing cowboy's trademark mix of furious fist-fight, ornery Charles King, and a slew of musical numbers. Unfortunately, Monogram also inherited Ritter's main weaknesses: idiotic sidekicks (Horace Murphy and Snub Pollard), slipshod direction (by Al Herman), meandering plots, and the aforementioned slew of musical numbers. At least Starlight Over Texas featured an eye-catching fiesta in addition to Ritter's warbling of such tunes as Pickens by A.J. Brier and Starlight Over Texas by Harry Tobias and Al Von Tilzer. Ritter played Tex Newman, a United States Marshal assigned to look into a series of Indian raids on the border to Mexico. As it turns out, the raids are committed by a gang of outlaws only masquerading as Indians. The leader of the gang, Kildare (Karl Hackett), murders a marshal and assumes his identity. Tex. of course, does not fall for the masquerade for long and the inevitable chase across the border ends with the capture of Kildare. Executive producer Edward F. Findley moved his entire "Boots and Saddles" operation from the floundering Grand National to Monogram without missing a beat. Along for the ride, in addition to sidekicks Murphy and Pollard and director Herman, were music director Frank Sanucci, assistant director Bobby Ray, cinematographer Francis Corby and film editor Frederick Bain. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this western, a good-guy must halt a battle between cattle ranchers and settlers. An outlaw exploits the feud by working on both sides and then buying up all of the land for peanuts as the two factions murder each other. The hero soon figures out the outlaw's scheme and brings him to justice via a showdown. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Rolling Caravans was one of four Columbia B-westerns designed to make a star out of utility actor Jack Luden. Harry Woods, a fixture of the Luden series, fills the villain role, while Eleanor Stewart is the heroine once more. The story concerns the efforts of a homesteader named Breezy (Luden) to ward off the bad guys, who've determined that there's gold on his property. By the time the heavies have discovered that Breezy's "treasure" consists primarily of topsoil, the hero has settled accounts with his fists and deposited his enemies in the local calaboose. At one point, Jack Luden indulges in a bit of ventriloquism, suggesting that perhaps he would have been better off as a comedy sidekick rather than a leading man. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Pals of the Saddle is one of the more engaging entries in Republic's Three Mesquiteers Western series. Ray Corrigan and Max Terhune repeat their standard roles of Tucson Smith and Lullaby Joslin; the role of Stony Brooke, recently vacated by Bob Livingston, is here played by none other than John Wayne. The Mesquiteers films fluctuated between period stories and contemporary tales. This time around, we're in 1938, and Stony is chasing after foreign agents who are trying to steal and smuggle a secret weapon, the deadly chemical "monium," out of the United States. Director George Sherman paces this 55-minute effort like a Republic serial, with excellent results. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

After directing the first few Bob Baker westerns for Universal, Joseph H. Lewis passed the cudgel to George Waggner, who did his usual efficient job on Western Trails. Singing cowboy Baker stars a Bob Mason, who comes to the aid of heroine Alice (Marjorie Reynolds) when the latter's ranch is plagued by a mysterious band of desperadoes. The head of the gang is actually Alice's boyfriend Rudd (Carlyle Moore), who is in cahoots with the girl's weakling brother Ben (John Ridgely). By the time the smoke clears in the final reel, practically no one is left standing but Bob and Alice, who seems oblivious to the fact that two of the people she cared most about in the world are now pushing up daisies. In addition to the film's "human" cast, Western Trails features a talented horse named Apache and an equally engaging mutt named Wimpy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Singing cowboy Jack Randall does his usual in Monogram's Danger Valley, Randall's second starring film. When someone discovers gold in them thar hills, several disreputable promoters try to take financial advantage of the ensuing rush. By producing a packet of forged papers, two of these crooks manage not only to fleece the prospectors, but to set up an "outlaw colony" in a rattletrap ghost town. Randall and his pal Lucky (Hal Price) do their best to protect the miners and rout the villains. Though a passable singer, Jack Randall is somewhat stiff as an actor; he was far more natural in a reel of Monogram outtakes, in which he constantly curses himself out after blowing his lines. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The third entry in a series of 22 Jack Randall Westerns, Stars Over Arizona was the last to be directed by the veteran Robert North Bradbury. Apparently losing confidence in the Randall vehicles early on, Monogram producer Maurice Conn would henceforth assign Randall lesser talents such as J.P. McGowan, Robert Hill, and Raymond K. Johnson. Randall played Jack Dawson, a government agent assigned to return the kidnapped son of Arizona's governor. The kidnapper proves to be Ace Carter (Warner Richmond), a nasty cattle rustler operating out of Tuba City, AZ, and the governor sends enforcement consisting of four former convicts who all owe Jack their lives. Although one of the convicts betrays him, Jack manages to rescue the kidnapped youngster (Sherry Tansey) and bring Carter and his gang to justice. Randall's sidekick, Grizzley, played earlier by George Cooper, was here portrayed by weatherbeaten Horace Murphy, an appealing comic character actor. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

The Fred Scott musical westerns were high in audience appeal, but invariably handicapped with syrupy titles like Moonlight on the Range. On this occasion, our hero is suspected of being an outlaw, but the real culprit is his look-alike half-brother (Scott plays both roles). At first hoping to wreak vengeance on his crooked sibling. Scott relents at the end, bringing brother dear in unharmed in hopes of reforming the boy. The film's highlight is a fierce gun battle between hero and villain, with director Sam Newfield doing an excellent job differentiating the two brothers. In the course of events, Fred Scott sings four songs, several of them for the benefit of leading lady Lois January. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide