By the time he made Boots and Saddles (1937), Gene Autry had starred in seventeen features in two years. One of the first "singing cowboys," he was extraordinarily popular, and these easygoing, hour-long westerns were mighty profitable for Republic Pictures. Boots and Saddles is one of the better entries, packed with entertainment value in a scant 53-minute running time. Autry plays the foreman of a ranch verging on bankruptcy. When its British owner dies, the heir to the place -- a bratty young boy known as the Earl of Granville -- arrives from England under pressure to sell, but Autry has an idea to save the ranch by selling horses to the local Army post. This incurs the wrath of a neighboring rancher (Gordon Elliott) who wants the horse contract -- and the Granville ranch -- for himself. Meanwhile, Autry molds the kid into a western man and romances the daughter (Judith Allen) of the Army post commander, who dislikes Autry. In the end, a sprawling horse race will decide matters.

It's an amiable film, with good action and stunts, that moves right along. As per usual in an Autry western, it's also full of comedy relief from sidekick Smiley Burdette -- as in the scene where he practices the bugle, unknowingly causing a post full of soldiers to race around answering his military calls. Additionally, Autry sings some pleasant songs including "Take Me Back to My Boots and Saddle" and "The One Rose That's Left in My Heart" (the personal favorite of Autry's second wife, Jackie).

When Autry made this picture, his salary was $5000 per film, with an extra $250 for the use of his wardrobe and horses and for doing publicity. He made enough movies per year that the numbers added up to make him the top-paid star at Republic. It was still relative: by contrast, the top moneymaking stars in all of Hollywood at the time made nearly $500,000 annually.

The film was shot in eleven days mostly in the Alabama Hills of Lone Pine, California, at a cost of about $43,000. Director Joseph Kane, a former editor, had made his directing debut with Autry's first starring feature, Tumbling Tumbleweeds (1935), and he would direct the star in eighteen musical westerns overall. Kane went on to helm hundreds of B westerns and TV episodes in a career that stretched to 1975.

Notable in the supporting cast is Bill Elliott, who would become a prominent star of B westerns himself the following year, thanks largely to the Columbia serial Wild Bill Hickock; afterwards, he was known as Wild Bill Elliott and was even billed as such in some films.

Leading lady Judith Allen, who emanates fun sass and spunk, had once co-starred alongside Bing Crosby in Too Much Harmony (1933), W.C. Fields in The Old-Fashioned Way (1934), Shirley Temple and James Dunn in Bright Eyes (1934), and in the Cecil B. De Mille picture This Day and Age (1933). A pretty, promising actress, her career was derailed by constant semi-scandals played up by the tabloids, especially her rancorous three-year marriage to boxer Jack Doyle. Later in her life, she became a minister near Palm Springs, Calif., where she died at age 85.

Also in the credits is the curiously named Ra Hould, as the young boy. A New Zealander, his birth name was Richard Arthur Hould, but he would mostly be known as Ronald Sinclair. He went on to a fascinating career. After this film, he signed briefly at MGM and appeared in more films at various studios, including A Christmas Carol (1938), Tower of London (1939), and That Hamilton Woman (1941). A few years after serving in World War II, he re-entered the film business behind the scenes, becoming a prominent film editor and then a sound editor in a career that lasted forty years. He was also president of the California branch of the Humane Society.

In a sign of Gene Autry's huge popularity, the low-budget Boots and Saddles became the first Autry film to play a Broadway movie house in New York City. It was also the first to garner a review in The New York Times. The paper dismissed the film in no uncertain terms, but trade papers recognized Autry's appeal, with the Motion Picture Herald deeming the star "in good form and in good voice," and Variety calling the picture "plenty horsey and tricky to sate the Alamo addicts... Autry is too good an asset for Republic." And Autry's films kept on coming.

By Jeremy Arnold

SOURCES:
Boyd Magers, Gene Autry Westerns: America's Favorite Cowboy
Todd McCarthy and Charles Flynn, Kings of the Bs: Working Within the Hollywood System
Holly George Warren, Public Cowboy No. 1: The Life and Times of Gene Autry