Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Roy Barcroft

I haven't been able to get on Blogger all day. Maybe there were millions of people blogging about the election and clogging the pipeline. Not that I had anything important to say, anyway.

One thing I got along with the Dixie Cup lids was a few B-western trading cards. One of them pictures Roy Barcroft, who played the lead villain (or "brains heavy" as they say in the biz; for the "dog heavies" read L. J. Washburn's dandy novel) in hundreds of Republic westerns. Barcroft played the bad guy so often that the kids in my hometown would start booing and throwing popcorn at the screen the first time he showed up in any feature.

One of my friends thought my father looked like Barcroft, but I never saw the resemblance. Most people who thought my father looked like any movie star at all compared him to Roy Rogers. I was never too sure of that one, either.

4 comments:

Cap'n Bob said...

That's the worst likeness of Roy Barcroft I've ever seen. BTW, my father resembled Ben Alexander of Dragnet fame.

Ivan G Shreve Jr said...

Roy Barcroft is the bad guy in my all-time favorite serial, The Purple Monster Strikes (1945).

Cap'n Bob said...

For another side of Roy Barcroft see Disney's Spin and Marty shows. He played the amiable Col. Logan, owner of the Triple-R.

Anonymous said...

When I was 9 years old (1947} I wrote a fan letter to Roy Barcroft at REPUBLIC PICTURES, included 25 cents, and asked for an autographed picture. I considered him to be more important than the cowboy "stars" since he was in 'every' picture! Of course I never got my picture (the people who answered mail at the studio must have thought I was a weird little boy - wanting a picture of the "bad guy"!)