Lone Ranger

This article is about the fictional Western character. For other uses, see Lone Ranger (disambiguation).

Lone Ranger
Clayton Moore as the Lone Ranger
Publication information
First appearance	WXYZ radio; Detroit, Michigan, USA; January 30, 1933
Created by	Fran Striker or George W. Trendle
In-story information
Alter ego	Ranger Reid (first name never given)
Team affiliations	Texas Rangers
Partnerships	Tonto
Abilities	Expert marksman Above-average athlete, horseman, and hand-to-hand combatant

The Lone Ranger is a fictional character, a masked ex-Texas Ranger who, with his Native American companion Tonto, fights injustice in the American Old West. The character has become an enduring icon of American culture.

He first appeared in 1933 in a radio show conceived either by WXYZ radio station owner George W. Trendle or by Fran Striker, the show's writer. The show proved to be a huge hit, and spawned an equally popular television show that ran from 1949 to 1957, as well as comic books and movies. The title character was played on radio by George Seaton, Earle Graser, and most memorably Brace Beemer. To television viewers, Clayton Moore was the Lone Ranger. Tonto was played by, among others, John Todd, Roland Parker, and in the television series, Jay Silverheels.

Departing on his white stallion, Silver, the Lone Ranger would shout, "Hi-yo, Silver! Away!" As they galloped off, someone would ask, "Who was that masked man anyway?" Tonto usually referred to the Lone Ranger as "Ke-mo sah-bee", meaning "trusty scout" or "trusted friend." These catchphrases, his trademark silver bullets, and the theme music from the William Tell overture are remembered by the millions who came of age during the decades of the show's initial popularity or have viewed the television series. Reruns of The Lone Ranger starring Clayton Moore were still being transmitted as of December, 2012, sixty-three years after their initial broadcast. On December 9, 2012, ME-TV featured the first eight episodes as part of their Sunday Showcase.

Premise

While details differ, the basic story of the origin of the Lone Ranger is the same in most versions of the franchise. Six Texas Rangers are ambushed by a band of outlaws led by Bartholomew "Butch" Cavendish. Later, a Native American named Tonto stumbles on the scene and recognizes the lone survivor, Ranger Reid (whose first name was never given on the show), as the man who had saved his life some time in the past. He nurses Reid back to health. The two men dig six graves for Reid's comrades, so that Cavendish will think there were no survivors. Among them is Reid's brother, Captain Daniel Reid, who is the Captain of the Texas Rangers. Tonto fashions a black Domino mask using material from Captain Daniel Reid's vest to conceal the Lone Ranger's identity. Even after the Cavendish gang is brought to justice, Reid continues to fight for law and order, against evil and crime under the guise of the Lone Ranger.

Characters

The Lone Ranger

In every incarnation of the character to date, the Lone Ranger conducts himself by a strict moral code put in place by Striker at the inception of the character. Actors Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels both took their positions as role models to children very seriously and tried their best to live by this creed. It reads as follows:

I believe...

• that to have a friend, a man must be one.

• that all men are created equal and that everyone has within himself the power to make this a better world.

• that God put the firewood there, but that every man must gather and light it himself.

• in being prepared physically, mentally, and morally to fight when necessary for that which is right.

• that a man should make the most of what equipment he has.

• that 'this government of the people, by the people, and for the people' shall live always.

• that men should live by the rule of what is best for the greatest number.

• that sooner or later...somewhere...somehow...we must settle with the world and make payment for what we have taken.

• that all things change but truth, and that truth alone, lives on forever.

• in my Creator, my country, my fellow man.

In addition, Fran Striker and George W. Trendle drew up the following guidelines that embody who and what the Lone Ranger is:

• The Lone Ranger is never seen without his mask or a disguise.

• With emphasis on logic, The Lone Ranger is never captured or held for any length of time by lawmen, avoiding his being unmasked.

• The Lone Ranger always uses perfect grammar and precise speech completely devoid of slang and colloquial phrases, at all times.

• When he has to use guns, The Lone Ranger never shoots to kill, but rather only to disarm his opponent as painlessly as possible.

• Logically, too, The Lone Ranger never wins against hopeless odds; i.e., he is never seen escaping from a barrage of bullets merely by riding into the horizon.

• Even though The Lone Ranger offers his aid to individuals or small groups, the ultimate objective of his story never fails to imply that their benefit is only a by-product of a greater achievement—the development of the west or our country. His adversaries are usually groups whose power is such that large areas are at stake.

• Adversaries are never other than American to avoid criticism from minority groups. There were exceptions to this rule. He sometimes battled foreign agents, though their nation of origin was generally not named. One exception was helping the Mexican Juarez against French troops of Emperor Maximilian, as occurred in radio episodes such as "Supplies for Juarez" (18 September 1939), "Hunted by Legionnaires" (20 September 1939) and "Lafitte's Reinforcements" (22 September 1939).

• Names of unsympathetic characters are carefully chosen, never consisting of two names if it can be avoided, to avoid even further vicarious association—more often than not, a single nickname is selected.

• The Lone Ranger never drinks or smokes, and saloon scenes are usually interpreted as cafes, with waiters and food instead of bartenders and liquor.

• Criminals are never shown in enviable positions of wealth or power, and they never appear as successful or glamorous.

Reid decides to use only silver bullets, to remind himself that life, too, is precious and, like his silver bullets, not to be wasted or thrown away.

The Lone Ranger's first name

Although the Lone Ranger's last name is given as Reid, his first name is not definitely specified. According to the story told in the radio series, the group of six ambushed Rangers was headed by Reid's brother, Captain Dan Reid. Some later radio reference books, beginning with Radio's Golden Age (Eastern Valley Press, 1966), claimed that the Lone Ranger's first name was John; however, both the radio and television programs avoided mentioning his first name. His first name also was not mentioned in contemporaneous Lone Ranger newspaper comics, comic books, and tie-in premiums. Fran Striker's obituary (1962) and a Gold Key Comics (1964) retelling of the origin both stated that "Dan" was the Lone Ranger's first name, not his brother's. Purported middle names for Dan and John Reid are of unknown origin and were apparently invented by later writers.

It appears that the first use of the name "John Reid" in media was in a scene in the 1981 big-screen film The Legend of the Lone Ranger in which the surviving Reid digs an extra grave for himself. This appeared to give the use of the first name John a degree of official standing, although the name "Luke Hartman" was used in the 2003 TV-movie/unsold series pilot. The name "John Reid" also appears in a recent Lone Ranger comic book series. But Lone Ranger fans consider the name "John" non-canonical. It has been said in jest that The Lone Ranger's first name actually is "The."

The name of Captain Reid's son, the Lone Ranger's nephew, a later character first introduced in the radio series, who became a sort of juvenile sidekick to the Masked Man, is also Dan Reid. When Trendle and Striker later created The Green Hornet, they made this Dan Reid the father of Britt Reid, alias the Green Hornet, thereby making the Lone Ranger the Green Hornet's great-uncle.

Tonto

Main article: Tonto

The character did not make his appearance until the eleventh episode of the radio show. Fran Striker told his son that Tonto was added so that the Lone Ranger would have someone to talk to. The radio program identified him as a member of the Potawatomi tribe, though some books say he was probably supposed to be an Apache.

The character spoke in broken pidgin English, although the actor, Jay Silverheels, never liked how Tonto was portrayed as being stupid through his language.

Because Tonto means "stupid" or "dumb" in Spanish, the character is renamed "Toro" (Spanish for "bull") or "Ponto" in Spanish-speaking countries. In fact, "Tonto" was named by William Jewell, who also came up with the term "kemosabe" based on the name of a summer camp in upstate Michigan. In the local native American language, "Tonto" meant "wild one."

Their horses

According to the episode "The Legend of Silver" (September 30, 1938), before acquiring Silver, the Lone Ranger rode a chestnut mare called Dusty. After Dusty is killed by a criminal the Lone Ranger and Tonto are tracking, the Lone Ranger saves Silver's life from an enraged buffalo and, in gratitude, Silver chooses to give up his wild life to carry him.

The origin of Tonto's horse, Scout, is less clear. For a long time, Tonto rides a white horse called White Feller. In "Four Day Ride" (August 5, 1938), Tonto is given a paint horse by his friend Chief Thundercloud, who then takes White Feller. Tonto rides this horse and refers to him simply as "Paint Horse" for several episodes. The horse is finally named Scout in "Border Dope Smuggling" (September 2, 1938). In another episode, however, the Lone Ranger, in a surge of conscience, releases Silver back to the wild. The episode ends with Silver returning, bringing along a companion who becomes Tonto's horse, Scout.

Whenever the Lone Ranger mounts Silver, he shouts, "Hi-yo, Silver! Away!" Besides sounding dramatic, this shout originally served to tell the radio audience that a riding sequence was about to start. Bill Cosby complained in his book Cosbyology that, when the TV version came around, the Lone Ranger still used the line for reasons he could not figure out. In an echo of the Lone Ranger's line, Tonto frequently says, "Git-um up, Scout!" (The phrase became so well embedded in the Lone Ranger mythos that International Harvester used it as an advertising line to promote their Scout utility vehicle in the 1970s.)

Original radio series

The first of 2,956 radio episodes of The Lone Ranger premiered on January 30, 1933 on WXYZ, a radio station serving Detroit, Michigan. Sources disagree on whether station and show owner George W. Trendle or main writer Fran Striker should receive credit for the concept. Elements of the Lone Ranger story had been used in an earlier series Fran Striker wrote for a station in Buffalo, New York.

In any case, the show was an immediate success. Though it was aimed at children, adults made up at least half the audience. It became so popular, it was picked up by the Mutual Broadcasting System radio network, and finally by NBC's "Blue Network", which in time became ABC. The last new episode was broadcast September 3, 1954. Transcribed repeats of the 1952–53 episodes continued to be aired on ABC until June 24, 1955. Then selected repeats appeared on NBC's late-afternoon weekday schedule (5:30–5:55 pm Eastern time) from September 1955 to May 25, 1956.

Each episode was introduced by the announcer as follows:

In the early days of the western United States, a masked man and an Indian rode the plains, searching for truth and justice. Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, when from out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the great horse Silver! The Lone Ranger rides again!

By the time it was on ABC at 7:30 pm Eastern Time, the introduction, voiced by Fred Foy, had become "From out of the west with the speed of light and a hearty hi-yo Silver" following "Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear," later changed to:

A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust and a hearty Hi-Yo Silver! The Lone Ranger! ... With his faithful Indian companion Tonto, the daring and resourceful masked rider of the plains led the fight for law and order in the early western United States! Nowhere in the pages of History can one find a greater champion of justice! Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear! From out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the great horse Silver! The Lone Ranger rides again!

followed by Brace Beemer's voice: "Come on, Silver! Let's go, big fellow! Hi-yo Silver! Away!"

The Lone Ranger was played by several actors:

• John L. Barrett, on test broadcasts on WEBR in January 1933
• George Seaton (under the name George Stenius) (January 31–May 9, 1933)
• series director James Jewell, for one episode
• an actor known only by the pseudonym "Jack Deeds", for one episode
• Earle Graser (May 16, 1933–April 7, 1941). On April 8, Graser died in a car accident; and, for five episodes, the Lone Ranger was unable to speak beyond a whisper, with Tonto carrying the action.
• Brace Beemer (April 18, 1941 to the end), who had been the show's deep-voiced announcer for several years
• Fred Foy (March 29, 1954), also an announcer on the show, took over the role for one broadcast when Beemer had laryngitis.

Tonto was played throughout the run by actor John Todd (although there were a few isolated occasions when he was replaced by Roland Parker, better known as Kato for much of the run of sister series The Green Hornet). Other supporting players were selected from Detroit area actors and studio staff. These included Jay Michael (who also played the lead on Challenge of the Yukon aka Sgt. Preston of the Yukon), Bill Saunders (as various villains, including Butch Cavendish), Paul Hughes (as the Ranger's friend Thunder Martin and as various army colonels and badmen), future movie star John Hodiak, Janka Fasciszewska (under the name Jane Fae), Rube Weiss and Liz Weiss (a married couple, both actors in several radio and television programs in Detroit), and others. The part of nephew Dan Reid was played by various child actors, including Bob Martin, James Lipton and Dick Beals.

Music

The theme music was the "March of the Swiss Soldiers" finale of Gioachino Rossini's William Tell Overture, now inseparably associated with the series. The theme was conducted by Daniel Pérez Castañeda.

Many other classical selections were used as incidental music, including Bizet's Symphony in C, Mendelssohn's Fingal's Cave Overture, Emil von Řezníček's Donna Diana Overture, Liszt's Les préludes, Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture and music by Schubert. Classical music was originally used because it was in the public domain, thus allowing production costs to be kept down while providing a wide range of music as needed without the cost of a composer.

In the late 1930s, Trendle acquired the rights to use incidental music from Republic Pictures motion picture serials as part of a deal for Republic to produce a serial based (loosely) on the Lone Ranger. This music was then modified by NBC radio arranger Ben Bonnell and recorded in Mexico to avoid American union rules. This music was used in both the radio and later television shows.

Premiums

The Lone Ranger program offered many radio premiums, including the Lone Ranger Six-Shooter Ring and the Lone Ranger Deputy Badge. Some used a silver bullet motif. One ring had a miniature of one of his six-guns atop it, with a flint and striking wheel, as used in cigarette lighters, so that "fanning" the miniature pistol would produce a shower of sparks. During World War II, the premiums adapted to the times. In 1942, the program offered the Kix Blackout Kit.

Some premiums were rather anachronistic for a 19th-century hero. In 1947, the program offered the Kix Atomic Bomb Ring, also known to collectors as the Lone Ranger Atom Bomb Ring. This ring was a miniature spinthariscope that actually had a small amount of radioisotope in it to produce the scintillations caused by nuclear reactions. With its tailfin piece removed, though, the "bomb" body looked like a silver bullet.

The sponsor was General Mills, with its breakfast-cereal products: Cheerios, Wheaties, and Kix. In 1947, Cheerios produced a line of Frontier Town cereal boxes with the Lone Ranger likeness on the front of the box. Different versions of the boxes would have Frontier Town buildings on their backs to cut out. One could also send in ten cents and a box-top to get each of the four map sections of the town. These, as well as nine different boxes, were needed to complete the cardboard Frontier Town.

The Green Hornet

Main article: The Green Hornet

The radio series inspired a spin-off called The Green Hornet, which depicts the son of the Lone Ranger's nephew Dan, Britt Reid, originally played by Al Hodge, who in contemporary times fights crime with a similar secret identity and a sidekick, Kato. In the Green Hornet comic book series published by NOW Comics, the Lone Ranger makes a cameo through a portrait in the Reid home. Contrary to most visual media depictions, and acknowledged by developer/original scripter Ron Fortier to be the result of legal complications, his mask covers all of his face, as it did in the two serials from Republic Pictures (see below). However, the properties have been acquired by separate owners and the familial link has been ignored in the Western character's various incarnations. The Lone Ranger – Green Hornet connection is part of Philip Jose Farmer's Wold Newton Universe, which connects disparate fictional characters.

Film serials

Main articles: The Lone Ranger (serial) and The Lone Ranger Rides Again

The Lone Ranger serials from Republic Pictures are enigmas to many serial and Lone Ranger fans because they are very rare and hard to find. Only late in 2009 was a complete version of the first serial, in English and with only minor omissions, made available on DVD through the Serial Squadron. Previously, the existing film material for the first serial, The Lone Ranger, was incomplete and either subtitled in Spanish or dubbed in French.

The hero's identity is unknown even to the audience in the original 1938 serial, with six men suspected of being behind the mask. As the chapters unreel, they are killed off one by one, but each actually appears in the costume in various scenes. (The clichéd plot device of the hero's or villain's identity being concealed and multiple candidates being killed off one by one was used in many serials, including Columbia's Flying G-Men and Republic's The Masked Marvel, Manhunt of Mystery Island, and Adventures of Captain Marvel.) As the character played by Lee Powell is ultimately revealed to be the Masked Man, that actor is often given sole credit for the part. Two other suspects were played by Bruce Bennett and George Montgomery, then still billed under their respective birth names of Herman Brix and George Letz.

Prior to the serial's release in 1938, the radio Lone Ranger's origin had been unknown, and hints had been dropped that he might be a historical figure in disguise. An alternate origin for Tonto, with him being rescued in a mine accident, had also been provided on radio. The 1938 serial presented the first version of the canyon ambush, Tonto nursing the Lone Ranger back to health, and the Lone Ranger swearing vengeance for the first time; all these elements were adopted with minor modifications as the origin of the radio and television versions of the character. Much of the familiar transitional music used in the radio series after 1938 also originated in the first Republic serial.

The second serial, The Lone Ranger Rides Again, was released in 1939 and starred Robert Livingston. It gave the Lone Ranger a second companion, a Mexican named Juan, played by Duncan Renaldo (who later starred as The Cisco Kid on television). Livingston wanted his face to be seen onscreen and consequently appears as rancher "Bill Andrews" in most dialogue scenes. Its standard Western plot concerned a battle over land between outlaws and ranchers. The only known copy of this serial was discovered in South America and was Spanish-subtitled. It had been cut together as a long feature and so is missing most opening titles and original cliffhanger ending resolutions.

George W. Trendle disliked the fact that the Lone Ranger appeared without his mask throughout the serial and consequently decided to terminate Republic's license to use the character. He then offered the character to Universal Pictures instead. A third Lone Ranger serial was announced in promotional advertising by Universal, but never produced.

Trendle had the prints of both serials destroyed to prevent their further exhibition after the license expired. Some have suggested that Trendle retained prints of the Lone Ranger serials, but made no effort to store them properly, and they deteriorated. However, Clayton Moore notes in his autobiography, I WAS That Masked Man, that he witnessed the master material for the serials being burned on the Republic Pictures back lot. In any case, only Spanish-subtitled foreign dupe prints of the two Lone Ranger serials survive. The Serial Squadron, an organization which restores classic movie serials, painstakingly reconstructed a subtitle-free English digital video version of the serial in 2007, re-creating the original opening titles and restoring the original cliffhangers.

Given all the differences between the two serials, it is perhaps surprising that Tonto was played in both by Victor Daniels, one of two actors known as Chief Thundercloud.

Television series

Main article: The Lone Ranger (TV series)

The Lone Ranger was a TV show that aired for eight seasons, from 1949 to 1957, and starred Clayton Moore as the Lone Ranger and Jay Silverheels as Tonto. Only five of the eight seasons had new episodes. It was the ABC television network's first big hit of the early 1950s. Moore's tenure as the Ranger is probably the best-known treatment of the franchise. For the show's third season, Moore sat out due to a contract dispute and was replaced by John Hart. Moore returned for the final two seasons. The fifth and final season was the only one shot in color. A total of 221 episodes were made.

Moore lawsuits

After the series ended, Moore continued to make public appearances as the Lone Ranger. In 1979, Jack Wrather, then owner of the rights to the character, won a lawsuit against Moore. The actor began wearing oversize wraparound Foster Grant sunglasses instead as a substitute for the mask. Moore later won a countersuit, allowing him to resume his costume.

Films

The Lone Ranger (1956)

Main article: The Lone Ranger (1956 film)

The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold

Main article: The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold

The Legend of the Lone Ranger

Main article: The Legend of the Lone Ranger

The 1981 film The Legend of the Lone Ranger caused much upset among fans when the movie studio filed a lawsuit and obtained a court injunction to prevent Clayton Moore from appearing as the Lone Ranger anywhere else, and then gave a cameo to his successful TV replacement, John Hart. The film itself was a failure. It did not help that lead actor Klinton Spilsbury's lines had to be overdubbed by James Keach.

Moore, who never appeared publicly without his mask, was enjoined in the lawsuit from wearing it and, in protest, he began wearing oversized sunglasses that were the approximate size and shape of the mask. In a sequence in the movie, John Reid, a newly graduated attorney, is traveling west in a stagecoach to meet his brother. Another passenger announces his intent to make his fortune from his invention of sunglasses. The stage is robbed and the inventor killed. As the man lies on the ground with the broken dark glasses, John Reid says, "So much for free enterprise."

The Lone Ranger (2003)

Main article: The Lone Ranger (2003 film)

In 2003 the WB network aired a two hour Lone Ranger TV movie, starring Chad Michael Murray as The Lone Ranger. The TV movie served as the pilot for a possible series. However, the movie was greeted unenthusiastically; the name of the secret identity of The Lone Ranger was changed from "John Reid" to "Luke Hartman," and while there was still an empty grave alongside those of the five dead Rangers, its supposed occupant was unidentified, and the hero maintained his unmasked identity as well, becoming a cowboy version of Zorro as in the second film serial. Ultimately, the project was shelved.

The Lone Ranger (2013)

Main article: Lone Ranger (2013 film)

In March 2002, Columbia Pictures announced their intention to make a Lone Ranger film with Classic Media, who owned the film rights at the time. Husband and wife producers Douglas Wick and Lucy Fisher joined the project. The tone was to be similar to The Mask of Zorro, and Columbia suggested that Tonto be re-written as a female love interest. The projected budget was set at $70 million. In May 2003, David and Janet Peoples were hired to write the script. By January 2005, the Peoples script was rewritten by Laeta Kalogridis, with Jonathan Mostow to direct.

The Lone Ranger languished in development hell. In January 2007, The Weinstein Company was interested in purchasing the film rights from Classic Media. However, the deal fell through, and Entertainment Rights eventually optioned the property. By May 2007, producer Jerry Bruckheimer (alongside Entertainment Rights) set The Lone Ranger up at Walt Disney Pictures. Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, who had worked with Bruckheimer and Disney on the Pirates of the Caribbean film series, were being considered to write the script. In late March 2008, Elliott and Rossio were in final negotiations. Disney then announced in September 2008 that Johnny Depp would be portraying Tonto.

The Elliot/Rossio script had a supernatural tone, and has since been rewritten by Justin Haythe. In May 2009, Mike Newell, who was then directing Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time for Bruckheimer and Disney, entered negotiations to direct The Lone Ranger. However, Bruckheimer explained the following June that he wanted to wait on hiring a director until Newell completed Prince of Persia, and until Depp finished filming Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. "The priority is most definitely Pirates 4," Bruckheimer commented. "They are going to cast the title role once they get a director and Disney greenlights. We don't have a director yet." In September 2010, Gore Verbinski was hired to direct. Filming was slated to begin after Depp finished work in Dark Shadows. Actor Armie Hammer will play the role of The Lone Ranger. It was announced in July 2011 that British actress Ruth Wilson has been cast as Rebecca, the female lead in the movie.

On August 12, 2011, Disney announced that production on The Lone Ranger would be delayed due to budget concerns. However, on August 15, 2011, it was revealed that The Lone Ranger had been shelved for the foreseeable future due to said budgetary concerns, as well as the under-performance of another Western-genre film, Cowboys & Aliens.

On October 13, 2011, Disney confirmed that the project is back on track with a projected release date of May 31, 2013, subsequently further delayed to July 3, 2013.

Other media

The series also inspired numerous comic books, books, and gramophone records.

The Return of the Lone Ranger

An attempt by CBS to revive the series in 1961, Return of the Lone Ranger, did not get past the pilot stage. The Lone Ranger was played by Tex Hill in this production.

Animation

The Format Films animated cartoon, 1966 to 1968

Main article: The Lone Ranger (animated TV series)

An animated series of the The Lone Ranger ran from 1966 to 1968 on CBS. It was produced by Herbert Klynn and Jules Engel of Format Films, Hollywood, and designed and animated at the Halas and Batchelor Cartoon Film studios in London, England. The show lasted thirty episodes; however, these were invariably split into three separate shorts, with the middle segment being a solo adventure for Tonto, so that there were actually 90 installments in all. The last episode aired on March 9, 1968.

These Lone Ranger adventures were similar in tone and nature to CBS's science fiction Western, The Wild Wild West, in that plots were bizarre and had elements of science-fiction and steampunk technology thrown in. Even the Lone Ranger's greatest enemy in the animated series was a dwarf, similar to James T. West's greatest enemy, Dr. Miguelito Loveless. He was called Tiny Tom, and voiced by Dick Beals. This animated cartoon was credited as being a Jack Wrather production, and it provided the first exposure many 1960s children had to the characters.

The Lone Ranger's voice was provided by Michael Rye {r.n. Rye Billsbury}, who had portrayed Jack Armstrong: The All-American Boy on radio. Shepard Menken played Tonto. The narrator in the opening title was Marvin Miller. Other "guest voices" were provided by Paul Winchell, Agnes Moorehead and Hans Conried.

The Tarzan/Lone Ranger Adventure Hour, early 1980s

The Lone Ranger was featured, along with Zorro and Tarzan, in Adventure Hour cartoon shorts in the early 1980s, produced by Filmation. These episodes featured William Conrad as the voice of the Masked Man, though he was listed in the credits as "J. Darnoc" (Conrad spelled backwards). This series took a more realistic tone with a heavily historical context to include an educational element to the stories, even though there were several episodes that did feature elements of science fiction (much like the earlier cartoons from the 1960s). Conrad had starred in the original radio version of Gunsmoke as Marshal Matt Dillon and was the announcer/narrator for the cartoon escapades of Rocky & Bullwinkle. There were 14 episodes, split into two adventures at a time, for a total of 28 stories. Though Conrad was the main voice featured, other noted voice actors in the Filmation series include an uncredited Lou Scheimer, Frank Welker, and Michael Bell.

The Lone Ranger: The Lost Episodes, 2001

In 2001, GoodTimes Home Video released a videotape called The Lone Ranger: The Lost Episodes. Along with clips from the first serial, trailers for the two post-TV series features, commercials with Moore and sometimes Silverheels in character, and two complete television episodes, there was a cartoon short, said to date from the late 1930s. With on-screen dialog balloons instead of recorded voices, it seems to be a throwback from the silent era.

Toys

Besides the premiums offered in connection with the radio series, there have been many Lone Ranger commercial toys released over the years. One of the most successful was a line of 10-inch action figures and accessories released by Gabriel Toys in 1973.

Video game

Further information: The Lone Ranger (video game)

A video game version of The Lone Ranger was released by Konami for the Nintendo Entertainment System in North America in Template:Vgy. It is an action adventure game featuring three different perspectives: side-scrolling, overhead, and first-person exploration. The game loosely follows the plot of the 1981 film The Legend of the Lone Ranger, with the ultimate goal being the rescue of the U.S. President, who has been kidnapped by the Lone Ranger's nemesis, Butch Cavendish.

Novels

The first Lone Ranger novel appeared in 1936, and eventually 18 volumes were published, as listed below. The first book was written by Gaylord Dubois, but the others were written by the character's primary developer, Fran Striker. Striker also re-edited and rewrote parts of later editions of the first novel. First published between 1936 and 1956 in hardback by Grosset and Dunlap, these stories were reprinted in 1978 by Pinnacle Books.

• The Lone Ranger (1936)
• The Lone Ranger and the Mystery Ranch (1938)
• The Lone Ranger and the Gold Robbery (1939)
• The Lone Ranger and the Outlaw Stronghold (1939)
• The Lone Ranger and Tonto (1940)
• The Lone Ranger at the Haunted Gulch (1941)
• The Lone Ranger Traps the Smugglers (1941)
• The Lone Ranger Rides Again (1943)
• The Lone Ranger Rides North (1943)
• The Lone Ranger and the Silver Bullet (1948)
• The Lone Ranger on Powderhorn Trail (1949)
• The Lone Ranger in Wild Horse Canyon (1950)
• The Lone Ranger West of Maverick Pass (1951)
• The Lone Ranger on Gunsight Mesa (1952)
• The Lone Ranger and the Bitter Spring Feud (1953)
• The Lone Ranger and the Code of the West (1954)
• The Lone Ranger and Trouble on the Santa Fe (1955)
• The Lone Ranger on Red Butte Trail (1956)

Comic strip

King Features Syndicate distributed a newspaper strip of the Lone Ranger from September 1938 to December 1971. Fran Striker himself initially scripted the feature, but time constraints soon required him to quit, replaced by Bob Green, later followed by Paul S. Newman and others. The original artist was Ed Kressy, but he was replaced in 1939 by Charles Flanders who drew the strip until its conclusion. In 1981, the New York Times Syndicate launched a second Lone Ranger strip, written by Cary Bates with art by Russ Heath. It ran until 1984. Two of the storylines were collected in a comic book by Pure Imagination Publishing in 1993.

Comic books

File:Lone ranger.jpg

Dynamite Entertainment's The Lone Ranger #4 cover. Art by John Cassaday.

In 1948, Western Publishing, with its publishing partner Dell Comics, launched a comic book series which lasted 145 issues. This originally consisted of reprints from the newspaper strips (as had all previous comic book appearances of the character in various titles from David McKay Publications and from Dell). However, new stories by writer Paul S. Newman and artist Tom Gill began with issue #38 (August 1951). Some original content was presented as early as #7 (January 1949), but these were non-Lone Ranger fillers. Newman and Gill produced the series until its the final issue, #145 (July 1962).

Tonto got his own spin-off title in 1951, which lasted 31 issues. Such was the Ranger's popularity at the time that even his horse Silver had a comic book, The Lone Ranger's Famous Horse Hi-Yo Silver, starting in 1952 and running 34 issues; writer Gaylord DuBois wrote and developed Silver as a hero in his own right. In addition, Dell also published three big Lone Ranger annuals, as well as an adaptation of the 1956 theatrical film.

The Dell series came to an end in 1962. Later that same year, Western Publishing ended its publishing partnership with Dell Comics and started up its own comic book imprint, Gold Key Comics. The new imprint launched its own Lone Ranger title in 1964. Initially reprinting material from the Dell run, original content did not begin until issue #22 in 1975, and the magazine itself folded with #28 in 1977. Additionally, Hemmets Journal AB published a three-part Swedish Lone Ranger story the same year.

In 1994, Topps Comics produced a four issue miniseries, The Lone Ranger and Tonto, written by Joe R. Lansdale and drawn by Timothy Truman. One of the major changes in this series was the characterization of Tonto, who was now shown to be a very witty, outspoken and sarcastic character even willing to punch the Lone Ranger during a heated argument and commenting on his past pop-culture depictions with the words, "Of course, quimo sabe. Maybe when we talked I should use that 'me Tonto' stuff, way they write about me in the dime novels. You'd like that, wouldn't you?".

The first issue of a new Lone Ranger series from Dynamite Entertainment by Brett Matthews and Sergio Cariello shipped September 6, 2006. It has started as a six issue miniseries, but due to its success, it has become an ongoing series by the same team. On September 15, 2006, Dynamite Entertainment announced that The Lone Ranger #1 had sold out of its first printing. A second printing of the first issue was announced, a first for the company. While overall considered a critical success, the new series has received some backlash from classic Lone Ranger fans for its graphic depictions of violence. The series has received an Eisner Awards nomination for best new series in 2007. True West magazine awarded the publication the "Best Western Comic Book of the Year" in their 2009 Best of The West Source Book! And in 2010 Dynamite released "The Lone Ranger avenges The Death of Zorro".

Dynamite Entertainment:

• The Lone Ranger Vol. 1 (160 pages, Collects The Lone Ranger #1–6)
• The Lone Ranger Vol. 2 Lines Not Crossed (128 pages, Collects The Lone Ranger #7–11)
• The Lone Ranger Vol. 3 Scorched Earth (144 pages, Collects The Lone Ranger #12–16)
• The Lone Ranger Vol. 4 Resolve (Collects The Lone Ranger #17–24)
• The Lone Ranger & Tonto (128 pages)

See also

• Old Shatterhand
• The Cisco Kid
• Zorro
• Tex Willer
• Lawn Rangers
• Morgan Kane
• Roy Rogers
• Bonanza
• Rawhide
• Gunsmoke

Further reading

• Bisco, Jim, "Buffalo's Lone Ranger: The Prolific Fran Striker Wrote the Book on Early Radio," Western New York Heritage, Volume 7, Number 4, Winter 2005.
• Grams, Martin, The Green Hornet: A History of Radio, Motion Pictures, Comics and Television, OTR Publishing, 2010.
• Harmon, Jim, The Great Radio Heroes, Doubleday, 1967.p[

• Jones, Reginald, The Mystery of the Masked Man's Music: A Search for the Music Used on the Lone Ranger Radio Program, 1933-1954, Scarecrow Press, 1987 (ISBN 0-8108-3974-1).
• Osgood, Dick. Wyxie Wonderland: An Unauthorized 50-Year Diary of WXYZ Detroit. Ohio: Bowling Green University Press, 1981.
• Holland, Dave "From Out Of The Past: A Pictorial History Of The Lone Ranger" (Holland House, 1988)

External links

• Official website
• The Lone Ranger at IMDb
  • Lone Ranger is available for free viewing and download at the Internet Archive
• Lone Ranger at the National Radio Hall of Fame
• The Lone Ranger Radio Series 1938 - 1956 (downloadable mp3 files)
• National Public Radio's Lone Ranger feature
• Death of the Lone Ranger at Snopes.com
• I Love Comix Archive: The Lone Ranger
• Old Time Radio Podcast Rebroadcasting the show in the order it was placed.