Monogram Pictures' 1943-44 "Trail Blazers" series of Saturday matinee shoot-em-ups took the novel approach of casting former singing cowboys Ken Maynard and Hoot Gibson as themselves in a run of buddy westerns inspired by Republic Pictures' "The Three Mesquiteers." With Maynard in his late forties and Gibson having already turned fifty, Monogram executives hoped to infuse the franchise with a bit of youthful vigor but the notoriously pugnacious Maynard vetoed several potential series returnees. For the Trail Blazers' fourth saddle-up, Death Valley Rangers (1943), producer-director Robert Tansey secured the services of ex-Mesquiteer Bob Steele, who joined the team as its more spritely third wheel in the tale of bandits plaguing stagecoach business through the California desert. Though Maynard and Gibson were longtime friends, Maynard resented the addition of Steele, whose stature as a B-movie hero rivaled his own. Steele was not to be deterred, however, and it was Maynard who quit the team after the completion of Arizona Whirlwind (1944), to be replaced by Victor Daniels as the Trail Blazers' faithful Indian companion Chief Fire Cloud. The series concluded after its eighth installment, Sonora Stagecoach (1944), though Gibson and Steele stayed on for three more partnerships unrelated to the Trail Blazers series. Appearing in Death Valley Rangers as a henchman is stuntman-actor Glenn Strange, who achieved a measure of cinematic immortality by playing the Frankenstein monster in Universal's House of Frankenstein (1944) the following year.

By Richard Harland Smith