Fans of the Sunday morning newspaper “funnies” might
remember that
Red Ryder rode the comic
strip range in those pages from 1938 to 1964.
The strip was illustrated for most of its run by artist Fred Harman, who
drew upon inspiration from an earlier strip he did from 1933 to 1938 entitled
Bronc Peeler. Ryder was a “peaceable” cowpoke who lived on the
Painted Valley Ranch owned by his aunt—known as “The Duchess” (not my best
friend from high school, of course)—in the Bianco Basin of the San Juan
Mountain Range out Colorady way, and engaged in two-fisted western heroics
assisted by Little Beaver, his young Native American sidekick…who unfortunately
spoke in the same pidgin English that plagued the Lone Ranger’s Tonto. (Little Beaver’s phrase “You betchum, Red
Ryder” eventually made its way into the pop culture vernacular—I will
sheepishly admit that I use it myself from time to time though I probably
shouldn’t.)
Red Ryder was not
only a popular newspaper strip, it was also a mainstay in the comic book racks
from 1940 to 1957 under various titles (
Red
Ryder Ranch Magazine,
Red Ryder Ranch
Comics)—though for a brief period during its lengthy run those books were
comprised of reprints from the comic strip.
Red Ryder was a merchandising fool: clothing, sporting goods, books,
toys, etc. The strip’s longest-lasting
contribution to pop culture was the “
Red
Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle BB gun with a
compass in the stock and a thing which tells time”—featured, of course, in the Yuletide
movie perennial
A Christmas Story
(1983). (A friend of mine was completely
unaware of Red’s history, once remarking: “I thought that was just something
they created for the film.”)
Red
Ryder also appeared on radio, airing on the Blue Network and Mutual
(mostly on the West Coast) from 1942 to 1951, and featuring at various times the
likes of professional narrator Reed Hadley, Carlton KaDell, and Brooke Temple
as “America’s favorite fighting cowboy.”
Red Ryder came to
the silver screen in 1940 in a twelve-chapter Republic serial entitled (what
else?)
The Adventures of Red Ryder, with Don Barry playing the titular hero…and
making such an indelible impression that he spent the remainder of his movie
career frequently billed as “Don ‘Red’ Barry.” By the time Republic committed to a B-western
series based on the property in 1944 (the first entry being
Tucson Raiders), however, the studio
cast “Wild” Bill Elliott in the part…and after making a total of 16
Red Ryder features Elliott was replaced
by Allan “Rocky” Lane for seven more outings (the studio wanted to move “Wild”
Bill into bigger and better things).
Republic’s
Red Ryder series
ended in 1947…but only because of a clerical error on the option-renewal date; the
owner took advantage of this loophole to hold out for more money. (Republic decided “Nuh-uh” and continued to
make thirty-eight non-
Red Ryder films
with Lane until 1953.) There was one
last gasp at resurrecting the
Ryder franchise
at Eagle-Lion between 1949-50 with Jim Bannon as Red; these four films were
made in Cinecolor and two of the features that survive in this process were
released as
a
“double feature” from VCI in 2004.
VCI is the reason why I’m doing a “B-Western Wednesdays”
post today, by the way. I received an
e-mail flier from the company back in the latter part of December, and though I
know better not to do this I clicked on the link for their “Clearance Sale”
just for a browse. (I’m an idiot, I
know.) Ostensibly, I had planned to just
buy a copy of
Chariots
of the Gods (1974) for my fadduh (it was on sale for $3.00) because…well,
in addition to his obsession with reality TV shows and MSLSD, he also watches a
lot of those UFO-themed programs—you know, the ones where the narrator refers
to people as “ancient astronaut theorists” because he’s too polite to say “wacko
birds.” Anyhoo, while browsing the
stacks I also found copies of two of their
Red
Ryder volumes (
11
and
12)
for sale at $6 each and before you could say “Classic movies never go out of
style” all three were nestled snugly in the online shopping cart and on their
way to the House of Yesteryear.
Volume 11 kicks off with
Vigilantes of Dodge City (1944), an excellent example of how the
Red Ryder series represents Republic at
the apex of their B-western powers. Red
does not reside in his usual Painted Valley environs (I think they only used
that locale in the first film in the franchise), but rather in the hamlet that
required a U.S. marshal with “a chancy job” that “makes a man watchful…and a
little lonely”: Dodge City. Red is
breeding horses for a U.S. Cavalry contract, and while inspecting his stock
with Little Beaver (Robert “Bobby” Blake) and cowpoke Denver Thompson (Tom
London), hears gunshots not far from where his horses are situated. The trio rides hard towards the source of the
shooting, but arrive too late to stop the robbery of $40,000 from a freight
wagon (and the murder of two men, including the driver).
The wagon belongs to The Duchess (Alice Fleming), who
operates a freight line in addition to her ranch; she and Red are unaware that
the robberies are being staged by Luther Jennings (LeRoy Mason), a local banker
(what else?) who very much wants to buy out “Auntie” Duchess but she refuses to
sell. (Jennings hopes that the robberies
will result in the freight line’s inability to continue obtaining insurance…and
fortunately, he’s enlisted the help of Walter Bishop [Hal Taliaferro], the man
who’s collecting the policy premiums.)
With the help of his chief goon Ross Benteen (Bud Geary), Jennings
concocts an
eevill scheme to rustle
Red Ryder’s horses…and then pin the theft of those equines on Red himself! Our hero is in a sticky situation…but it all
comes out in the wash, as he rounds up the bad guys and brings them to justice.
Boyd Magers at
Western
Clippings gives
Vigilantes of Dodge
City four stars and calls it “high energy, non-stop action.” He’s not exaggerating, either; the highlight
of the movie is a climactic chase where bad guys Jennings and Bishop have
kidnapped Little Beaver and are making a run for it in a wagon while Red and
Denver give chase with a stagecoach. The
wagon is carrying a shipment of dynamite, and at one point in the action the
vehicle is set ablaze as Red and Jennings fight to the finish. The stunts in this little programmer are
incredible; it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that the second unit
director on the movie was one of the motion picture industry’s finest stuntmen,
Yakima Canutt. It’s got a great cast of
oater veterans: Mason, Taliaferro (he played a good guy in the
Red Ryder serial), London, Geary, Kenne
Duncan, Stanley “The Old Ranger” Andrews, and The Man with the Perpetual Sneer—Bob
Wilke. (
TDOY fave/Republic serial queen Linda Stirling plays the ingénue in
this one—she was in quite a few of the
Ryder
films—but she doesn’t get much to do, sadly.)
Paired with
Vigilantes
is
Sheriff of Las Vegas (1944);
Magers isn’t quite as enthusiastic about this one (two stars) but it’s not all
that terrible. In this entry, Red is
appointed sheriff of that titular berg (this was before the casinos, of course)
and has his hands full trying to solve the murder of prominent jurist Homer T.
Blackwell (John “Great Caesar’s Ghost!” Hamilton), who gets croaked shortly
after announcing to The Duchess and schoolteacher Ann Carter (Peggy Stewart)
that he’s having banker-lawyer Arthur Stanton (Selmer Jackson) write his
no-account son Tom (Jay Kirby) out of his will.
Suspicion in Blackwell’s demise falls upon Tom, of course—though it was
really Tom’s disreputable buddy (and saloon owner) Dan Sedley (William Haade)
what done the dirty deed.
I was entertained by
Sheriff
even though I’m convinced the movie’s major flaw is that you never really
understand the motivation behind Sedley’s killing of Judge Blackwell (it’s sort
of explained at the end, and even that clarification is weak). (Then again, the only reason why Shakespeare
had Don John in
Much Ado About Nothing is
that he needed a bad guy.) Geary,
Duncan, and Wilke are on hand for this one (playing different characters,
natch), and the movie also benefits from the presence of old pros like Hamilton
and Jackson. There’s a bit more emphasis
on comic relief in
Sheriff (much of
it at the expense of Little Beaver) …but I wouldn’t be telling you the truth if
I didn’t say I smiled at some of the lighter moments from time to time.
The
Red Ryder
westerns run a little less than an hour (slightly longer than a TV episode from
that 50s era) but when they’re
en fuego
with the action and stunts they’re entertaining as all get out. Robert Blake, fresh off being an obnoxious
kid (sorry,
Baretta fans—but it’s true) with the
Our Gang comedies at MGM, would play Little Beaver throughout the
Bill Elliott and Allan Lane incarnations of the franchise—Don Kay “Little Brown
Jug” Reynolds replaced him in the Bannon Eagle-Lion Ryders. (Alice Fleming portrayed The Duchess in the
Elliott films, Martha Wentworth in the Lane entries, and Marin Sais in the
Bannon vehicles.) I highly recommend
these unpretentious little oaters for the dedicated B-western fan, and will
hopefully return to some more of them on the blog in the future.
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