European Film Star Postcards: Rex Allen

31 March 2024

Rex Allen

American film and television actor, singer and songwriter Rex Allen (1920-1999) was known as 'the Arizona Cowboy'. As a singing cowboy in Republic Westerns, he was one of the top-ten box office draws in the early 1950s. Later, he was the narrator of many Disney nature and Western productions.

Dutch card.

Dutch collector card, no. K 9. Photo: Republic Pictures.

The clean-cut, God-fearing American hero of the Wild West

Rex Elvie Allen was born in 1920 to Horace E. Allen and Luella Faye Clark on a ranch in Mud Springs Canyon, forty miles from Willcox in Cochise County in southeastern Arizona. As a boy, he played guitar and sang at local functions with his fiddle-playing father until high school graduation, when he toured the Southwest as a rodeo rider.

He got his start in show business on the East Coast as a vaudeville singer, then found work in Chicago as a performer on the WLS-AM program, National Barn Dance. He left the show in 1949 and moved to Hollywood. In 1948 he signed with Mercury Records where he recorded many successful country music singles until 1952, when he switched to the Decca label where he continued to make records into the 1970s. He also recorded one album for Buena Vista (Disney, pictured) in the 1960s, although sources vary on the date of issue.

When singing cowboys such as Roy Rogers and Gene Autry were very much in vogue in American film, Republic Pictures in Hollywood gave him a screen test and put him under contract in 1949. Beginning with The Arizona Cowboy (R. G. Springsteen, 1950), Allen starred as himself in 19 Hollywood Westerns. One of the top-ten box office draws of the day, whose character was soon depicted in comic books. On-screen, Allen personified the clean-cut, God-fearing American hero of the wild West who wore a white Stetson hat, loved his faithful horse Koko, and had a loyal buddy who shared his adventures.

Allen's comic-relief sidekick in his first few pictures was Buddy Ebsen and then character actor Slim Pickens. Late in coming to the industry, Rex Allen's film career was relatively short as the popularity of Westerns faded by the mid-1950s. But he starred in several B-Westerns during the 1950s, often filming on the Iverson Movie Ranch in Chatsworth, Calif., known for its huge sandstone boulders. Allen has the distinction of making Phantom Stallion (Harry Keller, 1954), the last singing Western.

As other cowboy stars made the transition to television, Allen tried too, cast as Dr. Bill Baxter for a half-hour weekly series called Frontier Doctor, which filmed much of its outdoor action on the Republic Pictures backlot and at the Iverson Movie Ranch. In 1961 he was one of five rotating hosts for NBC-TV's Five Star Jubilee. Allen had a rich, pleasant voice, ideally suited for narration, and was able to find considerable work as a narrator in a variety of films, especially for Walt Disney Pictures wildlife films and television shows. The work earned him the nickname, 'The Voice of the West'. He narrated the original version of The Incredible Journey (Fletcher Markle, 1963). Allen also provided the narration for the Hanna-Barbera animated film Charlotte's Web (Charles Nichols, Iwao Takamoto, 1973).

Belgian postcard by Nieuwe Merksemsche Chocolaterie S.P.R.L., Merksem (Anvers). Photo: Republic Pictures.

Dutch postcard by DRC, no. F 156. Photo: Republic Pictures.

Don't Go Near The Indians

Rex Allen wrote and recorded many songs, some of which were featured in his films. One of Allen's most successful singles was 'Don't Go Near The Indians', which reached the Top 5 of Billboard magazine's Hot Country Singles chart in November 1962. It features The Merry Melody Singers.

The song is a tale of a young man who disobeys his father's advice stated in the title. When the father finds out that he has developed a relationship with a beautiful Indian maiden (named Nova Lee), he decides to reveal to his son what he had kept secret for so long: The man's biological son was killed by an Indian (as stated in the lyrics) during a clash between the white man and a tribe, and in retaliation, he kidnapped the boy as a young baby and raised him as his son. The other secret: His son cannot marry Nova Lee because she's the boy's biological sister.

In his later years, he performed frequently with actor Pedro Gonzalez-Gonzalez. He wrote and sang the theme song for the early 1980s sitcom Best of the West. Rex Allen died in 1999, two weeks before his 79th birthday, in Tucson, Arizona, after he sustained fatal injuries when his caregiver accidentally ran over him in the driveway. Cremated, his ashes were scattered at Railroad Park in Willcox where most of his memorabilia are on display.

Allen was married three times; all three marriages ended in divorce. First, in 1940, he married Doris Windsor, with whom he had one child, Rexine Allen. His second marriage was to Bonnie Linder (1946–1973), with whom he had 4 children. His third and final marriage was to Virginia Hudson in 1992. The couple divorced in 1999. His five children included Rex Allen Jr., who became a singer like his father.

For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Allen was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6821 Hollywood Boulevard. The Rex Allen Arizona Cowboy Museum and Willcox Cowboy Hall of Fame in Willcox, Arizona features Allen's collection of memorabilia, including photos, movie posters, cowboy outfits, records and musical instruments. Across the street from the museum is a bronze statue of Allen.