Review of Sons of the Pioneers

The Sons of the Pioneers are actually downplayed in this Roy Rogers flick, and the story doesn't rely on them for the title of the picture. Roy appears with his real name intact, if you overlook the fact that he was born Leonard Slye, and briefly appeared as Dick Weston with the Pioneers. Roy's recruited to come back to his home town from back east where he's a research entomologist, with a goal of of replacing Gabby Whittaker (Gabby Hayes) as the local, long serving but ineffective sheriff. The plot's a familiar one, the main villain (Bradley Page) and his henchmen are poisoning the cattle of nearby ranchers in order to get their land cheap, but it won't take long for Roy and his scientific bag of tricks to uncover the bad guys. Maris Wrixon portrays a ranch owner who refuses to fall victim to the area's violent night riders, her foreman Bob Nolan making brief appearances at her side, and wouldn't stand out as the leader of the Sons of the Pioneers if you didn't already know what he looked like. All in all it's a compact story coming in under an hour, with light spots featuring a usually comical Pat Brady, and Gabby Hayes as a juggler extraordinaire.