Gene Autry Building His Base

A White-Hat Revue: Yodelin' Kid From Pine Ridge (1937)

Someone must have been giving Gene Autry horse lessons in that first season, for here, in a second, he's doing saddle leaps and hard rides like old mentor Maynard (as in Ken). The squawk is between cattlers and "turpentiners," the latter drawing such from pine trees the cow men want to cut down. Earlier Autrys were trial/error, Republic in search of a formula; outcome being unpredictable make them fun. Pine Ridge of the title is in Georgia, not the expected Southwest, even if filming was limited to latter. Republic got outdoors to places we like seeing in westerns, if not Lone Pine, then parks/lakes within a trucked crew's access. 1924's Peter Pan Betty Bronson is Gene's hillbilly love interest --- according to expert Boyd Magers, she got $250 for six day's work (Magers' book, Gene Autry Westerns: America's Favorite Cowboy, being excellent and highly recommended). The author notes too that PCA authorities made Republic tone down excess violence in Yodelin' Kid's pitch battle finish, a notable instance of censorship riding herd on a series western. Looked to me as though Paramount's previous year Trail Of The Lonesome Pine had influence here, much of Yodelin' Kid reminiscent of 1936's Technicolor triumph, minus, of course, the color. Just realized: Even though he's the Yodelin' Kid, I don't recall Gene actually yodeling in this --- did I just fail to notice?