Frank Yaconelli

This is a special series of lost classic programs from the Golden Age of TV. The series has been restored by SabuCat Productions from the best archival film elements available in high definition, some of the programs have not been seen since they were originally broadcast. Volume One features 2 one-hour dramatic programs that feature John Cassavetes. Climax! ran for four years - This was an anthology series that presented a different story and different set of characters on each episode. It ran from 1954 to 1958 and featured Casino Royale of James Bond fame that lead to a feature film of the same titles. On August 9th, 1956 - they showed No Right to Kill directed by Buzz Kulik and starring John Cassavetes, Robert H. Harris, Joe Mantell and Terry Moore.

A wealthy woman discovers a vineyard worker with a beautiful operatic singing voice. She helps make him a star but then breaks his heart. He flees in misery to Mexico where he meets a sweet farm girl.

This Pete Smith Specialty short shows, humorously, the disastrous results when people save their money in unsafe places.

In 1865, a troop of Confederate soldiers led by Major Matt Stewart attack the wagon of gold escorted by Union cavalry and the soldiers are killed. The only wounded survivor tells that the war ended one month ago, and the group decides to take the gold and meet their liaison that knew that the war ended but did not inform the troop. The harsh Rolph Bainter kills the greedy man and the soldiers flee in his wagon driven by Major Stewart. When they meet a posse chasing them, Stewart gives wrong information to misguide the group; however, they have an accident with the wagon and lose the horses. They decide to stop a stagecoach and force the driver to transport them, but the posse returns and they are trapped in the station with the passenger. They realize that the men are not deputies and have no intention to bring them to justice but take the stolen gold.

An ambitious young man wins an heiress's heart but has to cope with his former girlfriend's pregnancy.

An industrialist and a pianist meet on a trip and fall in love. Through a quirk of fate, they are reported dead in a crash though they weren't on the plane. This gives them the opportunity to live together free from their previous lives. Unfortunately, this artificial arrangement leads to greater and greater stress. Eventually the situation collapses when they come to pursue their original, individual interests without choosing a common path.

Buffalo Bill Cody battles a gang of outlaws secretly headed by an unscrupulous lawyer.

Slammin’ Sammy Menacker is killed in the ring, and Gorgeous George (in his only film appearance) is arrested for murder. Out to clear his name is his manager Lorraine and cop Ron Peterson, who was already on the scene to investigate the Mob’s influence on pro wrestling.

Dave and Chito are working for Melburn who is looking for wild horses. Olmstead has his men looking for then also. When Dave finds them first, Olmstead buys them from Melburn and then kills him. A clue leads Dave to Olmstead's where he breaks in and finds the murder weapon. When he takes his evidence to the Marshal he learns Olmstead has been murdered and he is the one under arrest.

Chasing women and staying one step ahead of the law, the Cisco Kid meets Raquel and then Dolores. He sees that Raole is the boy friend of Raquel but engaged to Dolores. Learning that all her money will got to her uncle Don Jose when she marries Raole, Cisco suspects a plot and sets out to unravel it.

In Old California, a young Frenchman transporting a chest full of silver travels by stagecoach to San Marino, to complete a complex business deal. The stagecoach is ambushed by a band of men whose leader, a mysterious bandido known as Cisco (Gilbert Roland), claims the silver is money that was extorted over a period of years from the poor people of California. The bandits take the money and escape, but Cisco stays behind with the Frenchman -- who, it turns out, is actually a lovely mademoiselle, Jeanne DuBois (Ramsay Ames). She follows him to the bandit's lair, where Cisco tells her he intends to return the stolen money to the poor people. The two rivals are irresistibly drawn to each other, however, and as a token of love Cisco offers to return the money to Jeanne instead. Now she must decide whether to complete her business deal, or to comply with Cisco's wishes and redistribute the wealth.

The Cisco Kid (Gilbert Roland) hears of a land-swindling scheme devised by the police Commandante (Martin Garralaga) and the tax collector (Harry Woods) in a small western town. Cisco's efforts against the plot cause the thieves to fall out, and Cisco is able to return the land to the rightful owners.

During WWII, the publisher of the isolationist New York Gazette is murdered just as he was about to change the paper's policy and support the US war effort. His friend, a small town patriotic editor, is brought in to find the culprits.

Tom Kenyon and his sidekick Pierre La Farge are hired by rancher Mike O'Day who, with his daughters Toni and Sugar, provides wild horses for the government remount station.

Prince the wonder horse and his gallant rider gallop off to protect hapless ranchers from the ruthless Nazi bad guys who are trying to steal their land so they can exploit the valuable tungsten deposits in this WW II western. Mayhem ensues, but soon the villains are vanquished and America's tungsten deposits are safe once more.

Working undercover, Allen and sidekick Mendoza are out to stop the mail train robberies. Rivers and his gang are the culprits and by joining up with them, they hope to get the evidence they need.

Two ex-cons plan to kill the range rider marshal who sent them to prison and, when their plan fails, join forces with their former boss, a crooked saloon owner who has the same idea.

Outlaws are running wild in a border town. A marshal is sent in to clean it up.

Cholita, after a long absence in Mexico City, is returning home to take up her duties as head of the rancho and, as everyone expects, to marry her childhood sweetheart José. Expectations are somewhat dashed as she shows up with Fernando to whom she is engaged. This makes José and Cholita's uncle more than a little bit put out as Fernando is not only not a Mexican, he is also a city slicker afraid of the country.

Before changing his name to Richard Powers, cowboy hero Tom Keene spent the waning days of his stardom at Monogram, churning out westerns like Riding the Sunset Trail. When ingenue Betty Dawson (Betty Miles) and her kid sister Sugar (Sugar Dawn) are cheated out of their cattle ranch, Tom Sterling (Keene) and his sidekick Mendoza (Frank Yaconelli) vow to get the ranch back for the girls. This requires Sterling to cross six-guns with Pecos Dean (Gene Alcase), a former friend who'd turned bad.

In this western, the good-guy battles his bad-guy double and his band of outlaws to protect a purty gal's ranch.

A musician's ex-wife wants him back after he finds love and success.

On faraway Mosaque, an American pilot finds that he is in a desperate struggle with a military officer intent on sabotaging a local fort.

Around 1820 the son of a California nobleman comes home from Spain to find his native land under a villainous dictatorship. On the one hand he plays the useless fop, while on the other he is the masked avenger Zorro.

The story—in which an American heiress on holiday in South America falls in love with an Argentine horse breeder against the wishes of their families—takes a backseat to the spectacular location shooting and parade of extravagant musical numbers, which include the larger-than-life Carmen Miranda singing the hit “South American Way” and a showstopping dance routine by the always amazing Nicholas Brothers.

Newspaper reporter Michael Ward plunges into a nightmare of guilt, fearing that his "evidence" has sentenced the wrong man to death.

Randall and his sidekick Manny (Frank Yaconelli) played horse traders battling a greedy and unscrupulous rival (Tom London). When some of his stock disappears, Jack follows the trail to a ranch belonging to Harriet Morgan (Marin Sais) and her young niece, Ann (Phyllis Ruth). A white stallion is accused of luring the Morgan mares astray but the horses are in reality being rustled by the ever-present London and his henchman (Charles King).

A Central American plantation manager and his boss battle over a traveling showgirl.

Four explorers are summoned to Peru by the brilliant physicist Dr Thorkel. They discover a rich source of radium and a half-mad Thorkel who shrinks them down to one-fifth their normal size when they threaten to stop his unorthodox experimentation.

A ranch owner gives the Cheyenne Kid $1000 and sends him off to buy cattle. At the same time he fires a ranch hand and that hand rides ahead and alerts Jeff Baker about the $1000. Bakers' henchman are too late to get the Kid but they kill the rancher paid by the Kid. The Sheriff then arrests the Kid claiming he murdered the rancher to get the money back and that Baker said he then lost it at his gambling table.

After living all his chilhood in the street, a young boy notices rapidly that crime doesn't pay and that´s why he decides to become a policeman. One day, one of his best friends go in prison for a murder he didn't commit. Immediately the policeman tries his best to release him and prove his innocence.

Jack Randall plays Dunham, a wandering cavalier who comes to the aid of frontier heiress Mary (June Wilkins). The girl's legacy is half-ownership of a prosperous saloon, the other half controlled by hissable villain Slater (Ted Adams). With the help of no less than two comic sidekicks (Frank Yaconelli and Nelson McDowell), Dunham cuts the villain down to size.

Newlyweds Dennis and Carmelita have several obstacles to deal with in their new marriage: Carmelita's fiery Latin temper, a meddling aunt and a conniving ex-fiancee who's determined to break up their marriage.

An American tourist in South America finds love and unexpected trouble.

Carmelita Fuentes is a fiery-Latin singer/dancer in Mexico City who has designs on Dennis Lindsay, an American publicity agent, for unclear reasons, while Lindsay's shiftless uncle Matthew Lindsay aids and abets her every step of the way to the marriage altar.

Two young brothers are separated when their wagon train is attacked and their parents killed. One brother Cherokee is raised by Indians and the other, the Kansas Kid, by the outlaw gang leader Buff. Twenty years later they unknowingly meet again when the Kid goes after wagons being guided by Cherokee.

One of the last bills signed by President Lincoln authorizes pushing the Union Pacific Railroad across the wilderness to California. But financial opportunist Asa Barrows hopes to profit from obstructing it. Chief troubleshooter Jeff Butler has his hands full fighting Barrows' agent, gambler Sid Campeau; Campeau's partner Dick Allen is Jeff's war buddy and rival suitor for engineer's daughter Molly Monahan. Who will survive the effort to push the railroad through at any cost?

Jimmy, an idealistic and hard-working young man, has just arrived in New York City with dreams of making his fortune. Along the way he faces numerous obstacles, opportunities and temptations, but through it all, he considers the actions of his hero, Abraham Lincoln, for guidance. Will Jimmy see his dreams come true, or will he be another of the countless hopefuls chewed up and spit out by New York's mean streets?

When a confused eyewitness identifies New York City cabbie Brick Tennant as a killer, he is sentenced to death for a murder that he wasn't involved in. Though no one is willing to listen to the innocent prisoner's pleas for freedom, Brick's faithful fiancée, Mary, knows that her lover is innocent because she was with him when the crime was committed. As the scheduled execution draws ever nearer, Mary begins to investigate the murder herself.

Manuel and Carga are after the hidden map of a gold mine which is somewhere in the hacienda willed to Manuel's brother, Don Careta. Following the third midnight raid on his home, Don Careta is fearful for the safety of his daughter Wanda, and sends for Jack Martin to help him.

Starving playwright Judith Wells meets playboy writer of musicals, George Macrae, over a plate of stolen spaghetti. He persuades producer Sam Gordon to buy her ridiculous play "North Winds" just to improve his romantic chances, and even persuades her to sing in the sort of show she pretends to despise. But just when their romance is going well, Gordon's former flame Lulu reveals the ace up her sleeve...

Retired lawman Kentucky Wade and his three buddies, Mike Morales, "Dude" Hanford and "Trigger" Benton come to Brimstone and help their friends Larry Munro and his sister, Lucy , in their fight to retain control of Larry's rich ore mine. "Doc" Hardy , as an old friend of Wade's, joins them in their efforts to keep Matt Keeler , the scheming owner of "The Brimstone News", from his efforts to wrest control of Munro's property and mine. Keller employs a legion of henchmen, and sidelines at running runs guns to Red Hatchet and his tribe so they can also get in on the fray against the Munro's and Kentucky and friends.

A politically charged story about a man who dabbles in crime, with disastrous results, to gain the capital he needs to purchase a school where immigrants are prepared for American citizenship. The school's European teacher dreams of a fascist America. Based on a story by Nathanael West and Samuel Ornitz, who was one of the Hollywood Ten blacklisted during the McCarthy Era.

Investigators set out to capture a gang of thieves transporting stolen cash through the U.S. mail.

When a group of World War 1 buddies head west to farmstead, they run into trouble.

Baritone singer Barry Glendon, completing a successful season in opera, departs for his ranch in the west over the objections of his manager Tony. Arriving there with his double-talking friend Shorty, Barry learns that a parcel of his vast ranch has been fraudulently sold to Carol Marland and her ailing (and tiresome) young brother Johnny. Pretending he is only the foreman, and having his cowhands go along with it,Barry allows Carol and her whining, growing-ever-more-tiresome brother to believe that they are the actual owners in order to give him a free hand in running down the swindlers who victimized Carol who, with a brother like hers, was a victim to begin with.Barry learns that brothers Clem and Jonas Allen are the villains and,through a ruse in which they are led to believe there is a hidden treasure on the land they sold Carol, they try to buy it back bidding against Barry, who forces the price up.

Greek sponge divers in Tarpon Springs, Florida duel over diving methods and fight over the same girl, and only one will survive.

In the 1840's Mexico has ceded California to the United States, making life nearly impossible for the Mexican population due to the influx of land and gold-crazy Americans. Farmer Joaquin Murrieta revenges the death of his wife against the four Americans who killed her and is branded an outlaw. The reward for his capture is increased as he subsequently kills the men who brutally murder his brother. Joining with bandit Three Fingered Jack, Murrieta raises an army of disaffected Mexicans and goes on a rampage against the Americans, finally forcing his erstwhile friend, Bill Warren, to lead a posse against him.

A sharpshooter in a traveling sideshow is falsely accused of murdering a local miner.

A cowboy captures two rustlers and collects a $5000 reward. Using the money to take a vacation, he winds up getting accused of a murder he didn't commit.

Edith overhears Bart's plan to rob the bank so she informs Ken. But she is also overheard and when Ken goes to investigate, Bart's Henchman Prod frames him for the robbery. Thrown in jail, Ken's pal Pedro arrives with a plan to get him out.

A cowboy comes to the aid of a lady rancher threatened by Mexican bandits who believe there is a treasure buried on her land.

"Mitch" Mitchell is an aviator who has been hired to take a child in a guardianship suit out of California into Mexico. He is accompanied by Maxine Rush, the secretary of the head of a private-detective agency who has been hired to care for the kid until the suit is over. (Overview written by Les Adams )

Ken and his sister are separated while young when the Indians attack their wagon train. Ken, now grown, is sent after the outlaw known as the Golden hair Girl only to find that she's his long lost sister.

A diver saves his best friend's life but loses his own arm in doing so. Later, unable to find work because of his missing arm, he is forced to go to work for a criminal searching for lost treasures. Meanwhile his friend, who has since become a policeman, finds himself assigned to break up the crook's operation and bring in his gang--including the man who saved his life.

Leon's ex-wife moves into the apartment next to him.

A renegade reporter and a young heiress meet on a bus heading for New York, and end up stuck with each other when the bus leaves them behind at one of the stops.

Ken Maynard stars as a roving cowboy who tells the tale of taming the stallion that inspired the titular poem.

A student nun falls in love with a Mexican singer starring in a cafe next door to her convent.

'Firebrand' Jordan is a ranger sent into the high Sierras to assist the local Sheriff Ed Burns in capturing a mysterious band of counterfeiters.

Bud Rand, a cowboy who is charged with the care of Little Billy Rand, accepts an offer to appear with Copeland's Wild West Show to ride a horse called "Mankiller." Dude, Copeland's righthand man, resents Bud's attentions to Mary, one of the performers, and when they fight it out, Bud is the victor. In revenge Dude loosens the cinch on the horse.....

On shore leave, a young sailor meets and falls in love with a pretty young blonde. He goes home with her to meet her parents, but they don't approve of him at all. Their daughter takes offense at this, and in the ensuing argument she storms out of the house determined to live on her own.

A U.S. soldier goes after bandits in California, although it is still owned by Mexico.