Horace B. Carpenter

This documentary traces the history of the B-Western from it's silent movie origins to its demise in the early 1950s. The film contains a large number of scenes from early silents and seldom seen films, as well as old photographs of the stars and one-sheet advertisements for lost films.

American crime reporter John Jones is reassigned to Europe as a foreign correspondent to cover the imminent war. When he walks into the middle of an assassination and stumbles on a spy ring, he seeks help from a beautiful politician’s daughter and an urbane English journalist to uncover the truth.

Farmer Jabez Stone, about to lose his land, agrees to sell his soul to the devil, known as Mr. Scratch, who gives Jabez seven years to enjoy the fruits of his sale before he collects. Over that time, Jabez pays off his debts and helps many neighboring farmers, then becomes an advocate for the upstanding Sen. Daniel Webster. When Jabez's contract with Mr. Scratch concludes, he desperately turns to Webster to represent him in a trial for his soul.

Left by a con man, Belle De Valle, a dancer, finds him again in gold-rush Alaska running an honest casino/dance hall.

When transplanted Texan Bob Seton arrives in Lawrence, Kansas he finds much to like about the place, especially Mary McCloud, daughter of the local banker. Politics is in the air however. It's just prior to the civil war and there is already a sharp division in the Territory as to whether it will remain slave-free. When he gets the opportunity to run for marshal, Seton finds himself running against the respected local schoolteacher, William Cantrell. Not is what it seems however. While acting as the upstanding citizen in public, Cantrell is dangerously ambitious and is prepared to do anything to make his mark, and his fortune, on the Territory. When he loses the race for marshal, he forms a group of raiders who run guns into the territory and rob and terrorize settlers throughout the territory. Eventually donning Confederate uniforms, it is left to Seton and the good citizens of Lawrence to face Cantrell and his raiders in one final clash.

In Hoyt City, a statue of founder Ethan Hoyt is dedicated, and 100 year old Hannah Sempler Hoyt (who lives in the last residence among skyscrapers) is at last persuaded to tell her story to a 'girl biographer'. Flashback: in 1848, teenage Hannah meets and flirts with pioneer Ethan; on a sudden impulse, they elope. We follow their struggle to found a city in the wilderness, hampered by the Gold Rush, star-crossed love, peril, and heartbreak. The star "ages" 80 years.

Dave Crockett comes to the aid of ranchers living on the Yucca Strip, who want their area made part of the United States. A greedy land baron, however, wants the property as his own.

An easy-going cowboy is mistaken by the townsfolk for a notorious gunman. The cowboy decides it would be best to leave town, until he meets the gunman's girlfriend.

When Sheriff Hanley sends for Billy and his pals, they arrive to find him murdered and Ed Slade temporary Sheriff.

Viennese surgeon Dr. Braun and his daughter Leni come to a small town in North Dakota as refugees from Hitler. When the winds of the Dust Bowl threaten the town, John Phillips leads the townsfolk in moving to greener pastures in Oregon. He falls for Leni, but she is betrothed to the man who helped her and her father escape from the Third Reich. She must decide between the two men.

Boston pharmacist Tom Craig comes to Sacramento, where he runs afoul of local political boss Britt Dawson, who exacts protection payment from the citizenry. Dawson frames Craig with poisoned medicine, but Craig redeems himself during a Gold Rush epidemic.

A young woman arrives in the western town of Headstone and helps the locals outsmart a gang of outlaws.

The Shadow battles a villain known as The Black Tiger, who has the power to make himself invisible and is trying to take over the world with his death ray.

Roy and Gabby fight bad guys to save the town of Deadwood.

An evil land baron uses the local Indians as laborers and then finds legal methods to cheat them of their pay. The reservation physician Steve Monroe does his best to thwart the villain by peaceable methods.

The discovery of a perfectly preserved caveman prompts a mad scientist to attempt a daring brain transplant.

A ring of cattle thieves uses short-wave radio to communicate with each other. A trio of range detectives must find a way to capture the gang.

Cowboy Sunset Carson teams up with Frog Millhouse on a routine supply trip to Placer City. Before long, the duo find themselves ambushed by a team of dastardly highwaymen embroiled in an extortion ring. Sunset and Frog must then go undercover to set things right for a mining town under siege. Galloping hooves, spittin' six shooters, and all manner of disreputable behavior ensue.

Beyond Hell's Gate Pass is territory controlled by a man who calls himself King Carter; he uses a variety of schemes to prevent the railroad from being built, for fear it will finish his control of (what he considers) his land.

Just after the Oklahoma Panhandle was annexed into the united states an ex-lawman turned newspaper man arrives to town to civilize it. He brings along Frog, a photographer and Sunset Carson as muscle. The seedy element in the territory doesn't want law and order and they plot against them and try to stop Sunset Carson being sheriff.

A honest cowboy is falsely accused of the murder of a rancher.

It's 1860 and the old Spanish land grants are being surveyed. Montez is after part of Don Regas' rancho and gets the surveyor to alter the boundary. But Don Regas still has the original grant written on a bandanna. Montez sends Indians after it but Bill Cody and Gabby fight them off and a wounded Gabby unknowingly ends up with the missing million dollar deed wrapped around his arm for a bandage.

A singing entomologist (Roy Rogers) acts meek to help a juggling sheriff (George "Gabby" Hayes) solve ranch raids.

The spoiled daughter of a Georgia plantation owner conducts a tumultuous romance with a cynical profiteer during the American Civil War and Reconstruction Era.

In this epic Western, Wade Hatton, a wagon master turned sheriff, tames a cow town at the end of a railroad line.

A retired auto manufacturer and his wife take a long-planned European vacation only to find that they want very different things from life.

The queen of Egypt barges the Nile and flirts with Mark Antony and Julius Caesar.

Ted Hayden impersonates a wanted man and joins Gentry's gang only to learn later that Gentry was the one who killed his father.

James Kincaid controls the local water supply and plans to do away with the other ranchers. Government agent Sandy Saunders arrives undercover to investigate Kincaid's land swindle scheme, and win the heart of one of his victims, Fay Denton.

South western Pennsylvania area of colonial America, 1760s. Colonial distaste and disapproval of the British government is starting to surface. Many local colonists have been killed by American Indians who are armed with rifles supplied by white traders.

When Sheriff Jake sees a man at the safe and then finds the payroll gone, he trails him. Just as he is about to arrest him, the man saves his life. Still suspicious, he joins up with the man and later they learn that Melgrove, the towns leading citizen, is trying to take over the area's ranches by having his gang stop all incoming supply wagons. With the ranchers about to sell to Melgrove, the two newcomers say they will bring in provisions.

Federal Agents Tipton and Bridger have been sent to Wyoming where the vote on statehood is imminent. Plummer and his gang are out to make sure the vote fails. When Plummer's men kill Bridger, Tipton fights on. He sends fake telegrams that trap some of Plummer's men. Then he organizes the ranchers and on election day they descend on the town barricaded by Plummer's gang.

An ex-vaudeville actor is working as the assistant to a doctor who has Frankenstein aspirations. The ex-vaudeville actor kills the doctor and decides to assume the identity of the dead physician.

The Arizona Kid carries out his mission as a Robin Hood-type bandit while posing as a wealthy and carefree miner. He falls for an eastern girl, Virginia Hoyt, accompanied by presumably her brother, Dick Hoyt, actually her husband. The Kid's mine is raided and two of his friends are killed and he learns that Dick and Virginia are the culprits...

A movie serial in 12 chapters: After gold is discovered in the town of Nugget, the titular band of thieves and cutthroats inundates the frontier settlement. A group of three compatriots -- upstanding ex-sheriff Jack Woods, his harmonica-playing friend Laramie and tricky, smooth-talking gambler Deacon -- combine their respective skills in a fateful struggle to deceive and disarm the gang.

When mild mannered Friendly Fields is sent to the Blair ranch to work, he is mistaken for the notorious outlaw Blackie Burke. When a drought develops and the ranchers look for new grazing land, he plays the part and forces them to give he best plot to his boss Miss Blair. But no sooner than his mother arrives to expose the hoax, the real Blackie also arrives.

Lawyer Bowdre has started a war between the ranchers and the homesteaders planning to take over the homesteaders land when they are wiped out. Rancher Dan Stockton, having just married homesteader Gail Dawson, is caught in the middle. He suspects Bowdre is behind the war and it's not long before he gets a chance to prove it.

Homesteaders are moving into the valley settled many years ago by rancher Craig Dolan. He wants to keep them out by legal means but his nephew Bart brings in outlaws to drive them out. The Lone Ranger is on hand to help the homesteaders battle Bart's men as he overcomes traps, ambushes, burning buildings and other obstacles in his attempt to bring peace to the valley.

Ken and his sister are separated while young when the Indians attack their wagon train. Ken, now grown, is sent after the outlaw known as the Golden hair Girl only to find that she's his long lost sister.

When Tim Hanlon arrives to tell Ruth McArthur her long lost brother has been killed, she mistakes him for her brother. He stays on to help her retain control of the dam her farther started. But DeLong is after the dam and having had McArthur killed, he now sends his man after Tim.

A New York radio talent scout turns up at a barn dance.

The Rangers in New Mexico are being disbanded but Bob Houston gets them to make one more ride. They go after the outlaw gang led by Hashknife. They catch Hashknife, but he escapes taking Barbara with him and Bob and Slim have to go after him again.

Caldwell and Nixon have their men rob the stage and then critcize the Sheriff for not catching the robbers. With her father the Sheriff under pressure, Mary sends for Hoppy who finds the stolen money and sets a trap to bring in the entire gang.

Days of Jesse James is a 1939 American film directed by Joseph Kane and starring Roy Rogers. Bank robbery pulled off by the bank officials, not the usual James gang.

A doctor has a rough time obtaining the money for his services in a lumber town until he delivers quintuplets.

A young man forges a check in order to help his mother, but is caught and sentenced to 14 years in prison...

Jeff Scott is sent to investigate problems with wagon trains attempting to make the journey to Oregon. Sam Morgan has sent his henchmen, under lead-henchman Bull Bragg, to stop the wagon trains in order to maintain control of the fur trade in the area.

The three Mesquiteers try to recover the gold stolen by a gang in its effort to ruin the banker/mayor who ordered them to leave town.

A dog living in a junkyard learns that all stray dogs will be exterminated by 3 o'clock that afternoon, so sets off to find a master before the deadline.

Brad Buckner has just bought a ranch. Murdock keeps his rustled cattle on the ranch and sends his men to kill Buckner just as they did the previous owners. But Buckner and his men foil their attempts and decide to search the ranch. To throw Buckner off he kidnaps Buckner's girlfriend and the Sheriff and makes plans to drive the cattle across the border.

A former outlaw eludes the authorities by masquerading as a cowboy.

A wealthy woman's wild lifestyle finally drives her husband to take their two children, move out of the house and file for divorce. Positive she'll lose her children unless she shows the judge that she's changed her wild ways, she takes in two poor street kids, a brother and sister.

When Tasker kills Roy Rogers he takes one of his young sons. Fifteen years later the other son Roy arrives buying a ranch in the valley where Tasker now controls the water supply. Roy organizes the ranchers for a showdown with Tasker not knowing that his brother is Tasker's chief henchman.

A reformed gunfighter battles a crooked sheriff who used to be a member of his gang.

Hoppy's brother has been murdered and he is on the trail of the murderers. To get them he makes himself seem to be a wanted man.

Night riders are terrorizing homesteaders, and the town doctor tries to keep the locals from forming a vigilante group. After more towns people are killed, however, the rest of the town makes the doctor the town sheriff and tells him to clean up the gang.

Joe has Cowboy-Race Driver Brent drive him to the border where his men slug Brent, and he shoots Stafford and takes his bonds. Brent's old friend Chuck arrives and the two head out to find the gang and recover the bonds.

When his father is falsely convicted and sentenced to die for a murder committed aboard ship, the man's son signs on as a crewman to discover the real killer and clear his father.

Jules Lemaire, a happy-go-lucky French-Canadian lumberman, arrives at the Nemo lumber camp carrying a baby. His love for the child wins him the respect of Joy Farnsworth, the daughter of the camp's foreman, but this arouses the jealousy of Big Jim Burgess, the camp bully.

Graehme, Ned Stewart's father, was accused of adultery and killed being innocent. Ned decided to avenge his father, but got captured and sent to the long journey to death "la longue traverse".