Lash and Fuzzy then moved to Screen Guild, later Realart, with producer Ron Ormand where their movies were billed as 'A Western Adventure Production', starting with DEAD MAN'S GOLD, MARK OF THE LASH, FRONTIER REVENGE (all 1948), OUTLAW COUNTRY, SON OF BILLY THE KID, SON OF A BADMAN (all 1949), KING OF THE BULLWHIP, THE DALTON'S WOMEN (both 1950), THE THUNDERING TRAIL, THE VANISHING OUTPOST, THE BLACK LASH and THE FRONTIER PHANTOM (all 1951).  In those films, the Cheyenne Davis moniker was dropped and Lash played a character with his own name.  He said he never liked the name, Al, and actually changed his name to Lash.  "Even my mother calls me 'Lash' ", he said.  And Fuzzy exchanged his brown horse for a pinto.  Most of his movies featured a fight-ending blow in which Lash would seem to jump into the air and strike downward with a knockout punch.  It wouldn't have been effective in a real fight, Lash confessed.  "But it looked good!"  At a festival where he and frequent adversary Terry Frost were watching one of their films, Frost asked, "Did we really do that fight?"  Lash assured him that they had: "They were too cheap to hire doubles!" Lash said he always made sure his hat came off in fights, so audiences could see that it was really him and not a stuntman.

Producer Ron Ormond did some other sagebrush flicks during the closing years of the western programmer --- click here and here for examples.

Above, John 'Bob' 'Lefty' Cason and Lash are battlling it out (upper right) in this title lobby card from DEAD MAN'S GOLD (Ron Ormand/Screen Guild, 1948). (Courtesy of Les Adams) Above are Cason and Lash LaRue in mortal combat in a lobby card from MARK OF THE LASH (Ron Ormand/Screen Guild, 1948).

Economies were obvious in many of these pictures where scenes were re-used, sometimes making youthful audiences think they'd seen a new movie before when they saw the often-repeated footage, for instance, of Lash sneaking up on the outlaws' hideout and using the whip to jerk guard Bud Osborne backwards over a wagon wheel.

THE BLACK LASH re-used many scenes from the earlier FRONTIER REVENGE, at one point necessitating an obvious double for Jim Bannon, a bad guy from the first movie whose character had to say a few words for a transition scene in the new one.  Peggy Stewart plays the same role in both, but is a secret agent with the good guys the first time and one of the villains in the second.

Perhaps the most obvious re-use of footage came in Lash's last series western, THE FRONTIER PHANTOM, which was basically him telling the story of OUTLAW COUNTRY to some lawmen so they would let him complete his mission of hunting down some bad guys.  In those movies, Lash played both his own character and his wayward twin brother, Frontier Phantom, a gimmick also used in the Lash LaRue comic books.  OUTLAW COUNTRY was among Lash's favorites of his movies.

THE DALTON'S WOMEN had Lash and Fuzzy billed far down in the cast, and was marketed almost as a girlie show with scantily-clad females having saloon fights and such.  But it was basically a Lash LaRue western. KING OF THE BULLWHIP had Lash battling it out with a masked bullwhip-expert bandit called El Azote, climaxing in a bullwhip fight used over the credits and at the climax.  Lash said they filmed it in an afternoon, something unheard of with present-day filming schedules.

Following the end of his movie series, Lash made personal appearances across the country, played various roles in TV series such as 26 MEN, JUDGE ROY BEAN and THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF WYATT EARP.  In the WYATT EARP TV westerns, LaRue portrayed Johnny Behan, a sheriff sympathetic to the outlaw faction in Tombstone. However, LaRue and star Hugh O'Brian did not get along, and Lash eventually relinquished the role to Steve Brodie.  Around 1951, he did his LASH OF THE WEST TV series, which incorporated bits and pieces from his earlier films.  In the 1980s, he appeared in a couple of independently-produced films, THE DARK POWER and ALIEN OUTLAW, as well as brief appearance in the TV remake of STAGECOACH with Johnny Cash (one of his fans) and Waylon Jennings.  Lash recalled how Johnny introduced him to one of Johnny's family members as 'the original man in black'.

The Motion Picture Herald and Boxoffice polls were conducted from about the mid 1930s through the mid 1950s.  With a few exceptions, the annual poll results would list the Top Ten (or Top Five) cowboy film stars.  In most cases, the winners were what you would expect --- Autry, Rogers, Holt, Starrett, Hoppy, etc.  Note that only a couple of PRC's western heroes ever attained a ranking in those polls --- Eddie Dean was ranked in 1946 and 1947 and Tex Ritter made the list in 1944 and 1945 while in the Texas Ranger series.  Lash LaRue never achieved a Top Ten ranking in those polls.

(Courtesy of Walter & Elaine Flanagan) Got an e-mail from Elaine and Walter Flanagan about Lash, and we appreciate them also providing the above photo.  Walter Flanagan writes: "As a kid, I went to the movies every Saturday morning and saw the usual two westerns. I met Lash LaRue in Memphis, TN in 1992 at a B-movie festival and got his autograph on this picture of him and Fuzzy St. John. He was attired in all black as usual and was sitting at a table surrounded by video tapes of western movies being sold by another man. I took it that he had hired Lash to bring people to his table. No one was around at the time, so I was able to spend a few minutes talking to Lash. I had heard of his problems with addiction and being arrested in Miami for vagrancy. I told him of seeing his westerns on Saturday mornings at the movies and how much I enjoyed them. As I looked at the autographed picture of him and Fuzzy, I asked him if Fuzzy was still with us. He lowered his head, shook it back and forth, and said, 'No', and with a pause, 'Fuzzy's gone!' I told him I was sad to hear that, and that it was a pleasure to see him in person, and I wished him all the best." Walter Flanagan March, 2002

(Courtesy of Minard Coons) Above, a business card showing one of Lash's many jobs and ventures during his later years.  Right, an advertising/promo card from Lash, and the autograph reads 'Black Diamond and Me, 1953'.  Note the spelling variations of Lash's last name on the advertising card and the autographed photo from Walter Flanagan above --- is it LaRue or La Rue with a space?  Just about all the movie adwork shows La Rue spelled with a space.

(Courtesy of Minard Coons)

(Courtesy of Bill Sasser) LaRue was married a bunch of times, with some counts as high as ten or twelve marriages.  In the above picture, Lash was re-united with ex-wife Reno Browne (Reno Blair) at the 1987 Charlotte Film Fest.  Browne was a great rider and made a batch of films at Monogram in the 1940s with Johnny Mack Brown, Whip Wilson, others.  She is ill from the cancer that would ultimately claim her life.