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Tour company worker Lucille Wiley tires
of merely talking about the Wild West and longs to go on an
adventure. Unknown to Lucille's fiancé, the rich and fussy
Cecil Phelps, Lucille's grandmother was Kansas Kate, a saloon singer
who lived in El Dorado, one of the tour destinations.
Determined to live a little, Lucille sneaks away on the tour bus
bound for El Dorado, but is found out and followed by Cecil and her
aunt Dolly.
When Cecil and Dolly refuse to let
Lucille continue on to El Dorado, which is now a ghost town, she
sabotages Cecil's car and begins to walk the remaining nine miles.
She is rescued by genial cowboy Roy Rogers, with whom she shares an
immediate attraction. Roy and his horse Trigger tow the car to
El Dorado, where Lucille begins to explore Kate's saloon, the Golden
Nugget. There she meets old prospector Gabby, who tells her
that she bears a striking resemblance to her lovely grandmother.
As Lucille looks through Kate's trunk,
she falls asleep and dreams of her grandmother. Kate is about
to perform when Gabby rushes into the saloon to tell her that he has
found gold. Kate, who grubstaked Gabby, is thrilled that she
and her partner will be rich, and she tells her boyfriend, Golden
Nugget owner Cyril Earle, that she, Gabby and her aunt Arabella will
be traveling to Tucson to file the claim. Cyril plots with his
henchmen, Lyle Fish and Buster Welch, to steal Gabby's map, but
wandering cowboy Roy Rogers frightens off the masked men when they
attack Kate's stagecoach. Cyril and his men succeed in
kidnapping Gabby and stealing his map, however, while Roy is
rescuing Kate's runaway coach.
Back in town, Kate allows the naïve Roy
to believe that she is a schoolteacher, and so Roy is angry when he
subsequently learns that she is the singer at the notorious saloon.
After Roy bests Buster in a fistfight, Cyril fires Buster and hires
Roy to be Kate's bodyguard. Hoping to learn if Kate was in on
the plot to steal Gabby's map, Roy accepts the job, and he and Kate
soon cannot resist their romantic impulses. Cyril orders
Buster to break up the couple if he wants his job back, but when Roy
again beats up the thug, Buster reveals that Cyril has Gabby's map.
Back at the saloon, Cyril pumps Gabby
for information about his map, which is in code. Cyril then
slips Gabby a "mickey," and shoots Buster with Roy's gun when he
discovers the men searching his office for the map. After Roy
is arrested for Buster's murder, Kate agrees to marry Cyril if he
arranges for Roy's release. Cyril pretends to agree but orders
his henchmen to kill Roy on his way out of town. Gabby helps
Roy to escape and Roy prevents the wedding by beating Cyril in a
fistfight. Cyril is then arrested and Roy and Kate happily
sing together. After Lucille awakens from her dream, she
confesses to Gabby that she does not want to marry Cecil.
Realizing that Dolly is a meddler, just as Arabella was, Gabby tells
the nosy aunt to mind her own business, and Roy offers to show
Lucille the West.
Notes
According to a May 29, 1945 HR news item, this picture was
partially filmed on location in Palmdale, California. Modern
sources include Gino Corrado, Frank Ellis, Tex Cooper and Bob Reeves
in the cast.
Songs include: "Belle of the El
Dorado" and "The Lady Who Wouldn't Say Yes," music and
lyrics by Jack Elliott; "Call of the Prairie" and "'Taint
No Use," music and lyrics by Ken Carson; "Go West, Go West
Young Man," music and lyrics by Gordon Forster; "I'm Awfully
Glad I Met You," music and lyrics by George W. Meyer and Jack
Drislane; "Be My Little Baby Bumble Bee," music by Henry I.
Marshall, lyrics by Stanley Murphy; and "When I Saw Sweet Nellie
Home, " music by Frances Kyle, lyrics by J. Fletcher. |
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