Knox Manning

It is 1865 and Union prisoners use a military balloon to escape a Southern prison camp near the end of the Civil War. The balloon drifts for days and finally lands on a mysterious volcanic island with very unusual inhabitants. Also landing, in a better aircraft, is Rulu, a visitor from Mercury. She seeks a radio-active material that will enable her to manufacture an explosive that will destroy the world or, at least, the portion known as Earth in this 15 Chapter Serial from the 1950s.

Postulates the first manned trip to the moon, happening in the (then) near future, and being funded by a consortium of private backers. Assorted difficulties occur and must be overcome in-flight. Attempted to be realistic, with Robert A. Heinlein providing advice.

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

Newlyweds Joe and Anne Palooka are delayed in their honeymoon plans by the helpful Humphrey Pennyworth and by considerably-less-helpful manager, Knobby Walsh.

A chorus girl's career is ruined and her brother is driven to suicide when she starts smoking marijuana.

Most of the footage is devoted to the annual Passion Play at Lawton, Oklahoma, enacted by volunteers from several nearby communities. This portion of The Lawton Story was directed by Harold Daniels and narrated by radio announcer Knox Manning. To bring the film up to feature length, a fictional plotline concerning the preparations for the pageant was hastily assembled, featuring such familiar Hollywood character players as Forrest Taylor, Willa Pearl Curtis and Maude Eburne.

Congo Bill is hired to locate an heiress lost somewhere in Africa.

The baseball player goes from wayward youth to Boston Red Sox pitcher to New York Yankees home-run hero.

Two tour guides take visitors on a promotional tour of Warner Bros.' studios.

A little feature on horse racing.

Two ex-soldiers return from overseas--one of them having smuggled into the country a French orphan girl he has become attached to. They wind up running into their old sergeant--who hates them--and getting involved with a race-car builder who's trying to find backers for a new midget racer he's building.

A brief history of Stan Kenton's musical career from taxi-dance gigs to his successful big band orchestra.

This Warner Bros. The Sports Parade series short chronicles the attempt by a group of men to navigate the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon to Lake Mead. Led by Norman D. Nevills, nine men undertake a nineteen days trip in three specially built rowboats through the more than 200 rapids, some which run at 30 mph. Along the way, they see the remnants of previous expeditions. They also visit abandoned Pueblo Indian cave dwellings.

Smart as a Fox is a 1946 short documentary film supervised by Gordon Hollingshead. In this short film, a fox cub experiences life in the forest. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Live Action Short, One-Reel.

Shy milkman Burleigh Sullivan accidentally knocks out drunken Speed McFarlane, a champion boxer who was flirting with Burleigh's sister. The newspapers get hold of the story and photographers even catch Burleigh knock out Speed again. Speed's crooked manager decides to turn Burleigh into a fighter. Burleigh doesn't realize that all of his opponents have been asked to take a dive. Thinking he really is a great fighter, Burleigh develops a swelled head which puts a crimp in his relationship with pretty nightclub singer Polly Pringle. He may finally get his comeuppance when he challenges Speed for the title.

Two young beautiful starlets use the Griffith Observatory telescope to find stars in Hollywood.

This short film focuses on Ontario's fire rangers, who keep watch over Canada's forests.

This short tells the story of archery through the ages, mostly using Warner Brothers archive footage. Noted archer Howard Hill demonstrates his skills with various trick shots.

This short film, produced at the end of WWII, warns that although Adolf Hitler is dead, his ideas live on.

A short film that looks at various animal acts training and working in Hollywood.

Joe McDoakes thinks he's allergic.

Story of a Dog is a 1945 short documentary film under the supervision of Gordon Hollingshead. In the film, a dog trains for the battlefield and becomes a crucial part of the United States military. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Live Action Short, One-Reel.

Frank Capra-directed propaganda film produced during World War II depicting the United States' new enemy: Japan.

Visits to three animal parks in Miami, Florida: the Rare Bird Farm, with it's many chickens, cranes, and other birds; the Monkey Jungle, where the visitors are caged and the simian inhabitants roam freely; and finally the Parrot Jungle.

In this short film, prominent jazz musicians of the 1940s gather for a rare filming of a jam session. This highly stylized chronicle features tenor sax legend Lester Young.

Hypochondriac Danny Weems gets drafted and accidentally smuggles his girlfriend aboard his Pacific-bound troopship.

Japanese master spy Daka operates a covert espionage-sabotage organization located in Gotham City's now-deserted Little Tokyo, which turns American scientists into pliable zombies. The great crime-fighters Batman and Robin, with the help of their allies, are in pursuit.

Documentary-style drama on training of aerial rear gunners in World War II. Private PeeWee Williams, a Kansas farm boy, transforms his home-grown shooting skills into those necessary to an aerial gunner in the tail turret of an American bomber.

Tom, a young Army Air Forces pilot, begins instruction with his captain on flying the A-20 attack aircraft. The captain demonstrates to Tom the pre-flight routine and checklists, then pilots the plane with Tom as his passenger. The captain demonstrates the flight parameters of the plane, the synchronization of the engines, stall recovery, and emergency procedures. Finally, the instructor shows Tom how to fly the plane on one engine and how to land in such a circumstance.

The third film of Frank Capra's 'Why We Fight" propaganda film series, dealing with the Nazi conquest of Western Europe in 1940.

This short film in support of the war effort focuses on the training and missions of Army Air Corps Captain Hewitt T. Wheless just after the U.S. entry into World War II.

A superhero known as The Black Commando battles Nazi agents who use explosive gases and artificial lightning to sabotage the war effort.

Sergeant MacLane of the Mounties investigates the disruptive activities of a bunch of troublemakers.

An expedition into the Rockies is chronicled.

A young intern is drafted and placed in the Army Medical Corps as a buck private and is none too happy about it. Injured, he is placed in the hospital where a Major comes by and explains how army doctors make important advances in medical science. The private is inspired and promises to make a good soldier. He is even more inspired when a nurse becomes his superior officer.

A celebrated New York cabbie is pressed into service for a perilous journey through World War II China.

A man tries to redeem himself after ducking out on his comrades before the fatal attack.

This entry in Warner's "Broadway Brevity" series of shorts is based on Damon Runyon's short story, "The Old Doll's House". Racketeer Lance McGowan, on the night he has decided to go straight, finds himself caught between the gunfire of two rival gangsters and, wounded by a bullet, he finds refuge in the home of a wealthy recluse. One of the gangsters is found riddled with bullets from the gun Lance dropped while making his escape, and he is arrested and tried for murder. The reclusive widow comes to the trail and testifies that Lance was her guest that night when the clock struck twelve, the time of the killing. Lance, while innocent, is also lucky, as the widow had her all her clocks set to always strike twelve, as the time her husband had died.

Kings of the Turf is a 1941 American short documentary film about horse racing, directed by Del Frazier. This entry in The Sports Parade series shows us how Mortimer, a Standardbred horse, is trained for harness racing. It was nominated for an Academy Award at the 14th Academy Awards for Best Short Subject.

A short in the WB Hollywood Novelty series (production number 7301) about the training of polo ponies. Buddy Rogers buys one of the ponies in training, and later uses him in a match where Jack Holt and Joe E. Brown are among the players. Edward G. Robinson and Jack Oakie are among the spectators who see Joe. E. Brown knock in the winning score.

Chubby William Tracy starred as Dodo Doubleday, a feckless Army draftee blessed (or cursed) with a photographic memory. Inexplicably promoted to sergeant, Doubleday becomes the bane of topkick Sgt. Ames' (Joe Sawyer) existence.

A former University of Michigan football star (Tom Harmon) rejects an opportunity to play professional football. Instead, he marries his college sweetheart (Anita Louise) and begins a career as a college football coach.

A colorful music and dance tribute to the peasants and workers of Brazil.

The heirs of Anton Benson are searching Bensonhurst for hidden gold; they are joined by a reporter, a gangster...and a masked fiend known as The Iron Claw.

Janie is a telephone operator who is caught up in the lines of love of three men: car salesman Tom, Chicago millionaire Dick and auto mechanic Harry. But Janie just can't seem to make up her mind between them. While fantasizing about her futures with each of the men, Janie spends her time desperately trying to juggle between them until she can make a decision.

As a parting shot, fired reporter Ann Mitchell prints a fake letter from unemployed "John Doe," who threatens suicide in protest of social ills. The paper is forced to rehire Ann and hires John Willoughby to impersonate "Doe." Ann and her bosses cynically milk the story for all it's worth, until the made-up "John Doe" philosophy starts a whole political movement.

After a young woman is coerced into prostitution and her brother framed for murder by an organized crime syndicate, retribution in the form of an ape visits the mobsters.

Ella Bishop is an inhibited girl whose frustrations grow as she approaches womanhood. As a women, her ambitions to teach cause her to lose her only opportunity for true love. Ella's life becomes one of missed chances and wrong choices. As she reaches old age, she reflects back and realizes she allowed the years to go by without achieving what she believes to be her true fulfillment. However, her years have not been without glory, and her moment of triumph arrives when her numerous now-famous students from over the years, return to honor their beloved Miss Bishop.

Columbia's 12th serial of 57 total (following 1940's "Deadwood Dick" and ahead of 1941's "White Eagle") is another of director's James Horne's "classics" where he evidently figured that the same reactions that served him well in Laurel and Hardy films would work well in action serials where he has all hands, heroes and villains alike, doing some kind of over-the top "take", no matter the situation. This loose adaptation of an Edgar Wallace story finds Michael Bellamy (Kenne Duncan in his Kenneth Duncan period) inheriting Garr Castle, but his brother, Abel Bellamy (James Craven, as usual making Oil-Can Harry look smooth), has him imprisoned unjustly and moves into the castle himself. When Michael's wife, Elaine Bellamy (Dorothy Fay), fails to return after visiting Abel, her sister Valerie Howett (Iris Meredith), accompanied by their father,

Columbia's 11th serial and the first western serial that James W. Horne solo-directed.

This short film showcases the skills of Howard Hill, known as the "World's Greatest Archer".

Warner Bros. short about stuntmen and stuntwomen and how they do their work, featuring real-life stunt artists Harvey Parry, Mary Wiggins, and Allen Pomeroy.

The night before his grandson, Tommy Grayson, a mechanic at the Midland Aircraft Corporation, is to marry Gail, a former showgirl, Major Matt Grayson, a war veteran and watchman at the plant, catches two men breaking into the machine shop. The men run, but the major shoots one of them.....

Mandrake and his team attempt to prevent "The Wasp" from stealing and using a new Radium invention.

This is the story of the historic 1938 flight of Douglas 'Wrong Way' Corrigan. Mr. Corrigan starred in this film, which chronicled his infamous flight. On July 17, 1938, Mr. Corrigan loaded 320 gallons of gasoline (40 hours worth) into the tiny, single engine plane. While expressing his intent to fly west to Long Beach, CA, Mr. Corrigan flew out of Floyd Bennett Field heading east over the Atlantic. Instrumentation in the plane included two compasses (both malfunctioned) and a turn-and-bank indicator. The cabin door was held shut with baling wire. Nearly 29 hours later, he landed in Baldonnel near Dublin. He forever claimed to be surprised at arriving in Ireland rather than California. He returned to the US as a hero, with a ticker tape parade in New York and received numerous medals and awards.