Cochise Visitor Center and Museum of the Southeast, in Wilcox, Arizona. His grave is marked with a plaque that reads: “KoKo, Rex Allen’s stallion costar in 30 motion pictures. Traveled over half million miles with Rex in U.S. and Canada. Billed as ‘The Most Beautiful Horse in the World.’ At rest here, ‘Belly High’ in the green grass of Horse Heaven.”
Rex Allen, the last of the singing cowboys, and Koko, showing off that famous Glen Randall trained rear.
White Flash shows off his Glen Randall-trained rear, with crooner Tex Ritter aboard.
Spotlight on Sidekicks
It gets lonely on the celluloid range, and a cowboy has only so many songs for his horse. He needs a human companion to help move the plot along, too, and in Westerns the bill was often filled by a sidekick. Offering comic relief, a helping hand, and a ready ear, the sidekick became a horse-opera staple. Two standout sidekicks, Smiley Burnette and Slim Pickens, rode alongside three of the most famous singing cowboys, on their colorful mounts Ring-Eyed Nellie and Dear John.
Smiley Burnette and Ring-Eyed Nellie
Lester “Smiley” Burnette had the distinction of working as a comic sidekick of Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. A musical prodigy, the twenty-two-year-old Burnette started his career with Autry as an accordion player on Gene Autry’s WLS radio show in 1933. Smiley accompanied Autry to Hollywood and appeared in his first feature film, In Old Santa Fe. Honing his screen persona as “Frog Millhouse,” the gangly, pudgy, sweet-faced Smiley used his deep bass voice to add comic punctuation to musical numbers. He appeared in fifty-four prewar Westerns with Autry, wearing a checkered shirt and trademark black Stetson with a pinned up brim. He rode a white horse with a black ring drawn around his (or her) left eye—so Burnette would remember to mount from the left. First known as Black-Eyed Nellie, the horse later became know as Ring-Eyed Nellie and finally just Ring Eye. The horses were studio rentals, but according to Smiley’s son, Stephen Burnette, his dad did have a favorite, one who would allow Smiley to lounge on his back reading the newspaper between takes.
When Gene Autry went into the service, Republic Pictures recruited Smiley and Ring Eye for several Roy Rogers films, beginning with Hearts of the Golden West (1942). When Autry returned to Hollywood, Burnette and Ring Eye resumed their partnership with him in 1951’s Whirlwind for Columbia Pictures. They worked in six more Columbia films during the 1950s. The name of Frog Millhouse belonged to Republic, however, so Burnette became Smiley once more. Ring Eye didn’t have to change his (or her) name.
Smiley Burnette had his own sidekick, played by Joseph Strauch Jr., who appeared with Burnette in five Autry films, beginning with Under Fiesta Stars (1941). Dressed in the same clownish outfit as Burnette, Strauch got laughs portraying Frog Millhouse’s younger brother, Tadpole. He was mounted on a Little Ring Eye, a white pony with a black circle painted around his eye.
Autry and the original Champion with their sidekicks, Smiley Burnette and Ring Eye and their sidekicks, Joseph Strauch Jr. and Little Ring Eye, as they appeared in Under Fiesta Stars.
Slim Pickens and Dear John
Rex Allen’s sidekick was Slim Pickens, a former rodeo clown known for his goofy charm and rubber-faced reactions. Born in Kingsburg, California, in 1919, Louis Bert Lindley Jr. acquired his nickname as a fifteen-year-old rodeo contestant. He was told his chances for winning were going to be “slim pickin’s.” As Slim Pickens, however, Lindley went on to reap many riches, along with a blue roan Appaloosa named Dear John.
Slim first spotted Dear John in 1954, in a Montana pasture. Although the young gelding had bucked off everyone who had tried to ride him, Slim saw something special in the Appaloosa. He purchased Dear John for $150 and took him to California to work in Rex Allen movies. Their first picture went smoothly, but on the second one, Dear John tested his new master, coming unglued. “After that,” Slim said in a 1973 interview, “it took more’n six months of us punishin’ each other before we came to an understandin’. After that there wasn’t anything that horse wouldn’t do that was in reason.”
Slim worked with Glenn Randall to teach Dear John a variety of tricks, including bucking on cue. Look closely at most bucking horses in a movie or at a rodeo, and you can see a “bucking strap” circling their bellies well behind the saddle. This piece of leather is so annoying to a horse that it drives him into a mad fit of bucking. Dear John was unusual in that he did not need a strap and was trained to buck with a combined rein and leg cue. Using this shtick to great comic effect, Slim would go galloping and bucking after Rex Allen and KoKo, bellowing, “Whoa John!”
Dear John was also taught to sit on his haunches like a dog, a trick he would perform on his own, long after he was retired to pasture. A powerful jumper, Dear John could clear teams of horses, wagons, and huge stone walls that scared Slim to confront. But he knew that if Dear John went at an obstacle, he could clear it. If the horse refused, it was because he knew he couldn’t make it, and Slim trusted Dear John’s decision. The two developed more than an understanding; they had an uncanny rapport and seemed to communicate telepathically.
By the end of his stint in Rex Allen films, Dear John had become so famous in Hollywood that Slim began getting calls for the horse. The actor refused to let anyone else ride Dear John and insisted on being hired to handle him as well.
Slim retired Dear John to a pasture owned by veterinarian Joe Hird, in Bishop, California, in 1964. He visited the horse frequently but had difficulty catching him as John was afraid he would have to go back to work. One day, however, when Slim and Rex Allen went to see Dear John, Slim was able to hop on his old pal bareback and cued him to buck. Dear John sent him flying, but Slim landed happy. Instead of running away as was his custom, Dear John rested his head on Slim’s shoulder affectionately. Several years later, Slim awoke in the middle of the night knowing his horse had gone. According to his wife, Maggie, he sat bolt upright in bed and said, “John’s dead.” A few days later, he got the confirmation call from Joe Hird, who had been unable to break the news at first. Dear John had passed away the night Slim received his last message. He was thirty years old.
You can almost hear Slim Pickens whoop for joy as Dear John puts some sky between them and the wagon in this publicity shot.
A little rough around the edges, Slim Pickens and Dear John are visual foils for the dapper Rex Allen and his stunning Koko in 1953’s Iron Mountain Trail.
Brave buckaroo Slim Pickens hangs on as Dear John does what he does best.
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