Musicals

Fiddlin' Ken Maynard was the first singing cowboy. The "hippest" was recording star Herb Jeffries. The popularity of his musical westerns encouraged other recording stars to saddle up---Harry James, Vaughn Monroe, Louis Jordan, and Smith Ballew to name a few. Crooner Russ Columbo was Gary Cooper's sidekick in "The Texan." Crooning ukulele player Cliff Edwards played sidekick for The Durango Kid before he became the voice of Jiminy Cricket. And Jimmy Dodd was a Mesquiteer before he became a Mousketeer.

In "Stagecoach War," Hopalong Cassidy battled Eddie Dean and The King's Men quartet. "Woman Haters" was a Three Stooges musical. And "You'll Find Out" was a musical that starred horror favorites Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff. But a stranger sight was tiny Carmen Miranda, The Brazilian Bombshell, balancing fruit on her head and singing Chatanooga Choo Choo in Portugese. Tex Beneke and the Glenn Miller Orchestra took their revenge with "Sun Valley Serenade" and "Orchestra Wives." Blonde, beautiful Peggy Lee was a show stopper in just about every picture she ever made, but especially with the Benny Goodman Orchestra in the wartime musical "Stagedoor Canteen." Gracie Fields, Ethel Merman, Harry Babbitt and Kay Kyser were featured in that one. What's that you say? You don't remember those cats? Well, how about Ish Kabibble and Boopy Doopy Doop? They were hot.