Willard Robertson

A posse discovers a trio of men they suspect of murder and cow theft and are split between handing them over to the law or lynching them on the spot.

A World War I veteran’s dreams of becoming a master architect evaporate in the cold light of economic realities. Things get even worse when he’s falsely convicted of a crime and sent to work on a chain gang.

Nan Reynolds encourages her copywriter husband Bill to open his own advertising agency and helps him land his first client. Bill's former girlfriend Patricia Berkeley writes a very successful commercial for the client and heats up their old romance. Wife and girlfriend struggle over Bill.

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?

After railroad agents forcibly evict the James family from their family farm, Jesse and Frank turn to banditry for revenge.

Ronnie Jackson is a lowly baby photographer who secretly fantasizes about being a private detective. When a lovely baroness actually mistakes him for one and asks him to help locate her missing husband, Baron Montay, Ronnie finds himself agreeing. Several days later he is on death row whiling away the hours until his execution by recounting to a group of reporters the bizarre tale of how he ended up there.

The crew of an Air Force bomber arrives in Pearl Harbor in the aftermath of the Japanese attack and is sent on to Manila to help with the defense of the Philippines.

The story is set in the British province of New York during the French and Indian War, and concerns—in part—a Huron massacre (with passive French acquiescence) of between 500 to 1,500 Anglo-American troops, who had honorably surrendered at Fort William Henry, plus some women and servants; the kidnapping of two sisters, daughters of the British commander; and their rescue by the last Mohicans.

Based on the story of the famous Mormon leader, it follows Brigham Young and his challenge to transport his people across the Rocky mountains to settle in Salt Lake City. The plot focuses on two fictitious characters, Jonathan Kent and Zina Webb and the hardships they have to face along the way.

A corrupt D.A. with governatorial ambitions is annoyed by an investigative reporter's criticism of his criminal activities and decides to frame the reporter for manslaughter in order to silence him.

An upper-class female reporter is (despite herself) attracted to a hulking laborer digging a tunnel under the Hudson River.

A wisecracking reporter investigates the cannibalistic 'Moon Killer' murders tied to a medical academy, culminating in a chilling reenactment experiment.

Texas Ranger Dusty Rivers ("Isn't that a contradiction in terms?", another character asks him) travels to Canada in the 1880s in search of Jacques Corbeau, who is wanted for murder. He wanders into the midst of the Riel Rebellion, in which Métis (people of French and Native heritage) and Natives want a separate nation. Dusty falls for nurse April Logan, who is also loved by Mountie Jim Brett. April's brother is involved with Courbeau's daughter Louvette, which leads to trouble during the battles between the rebels and the Mounties. Through it all Dusty is determined to bring Corbeau back to Texas (and April, too, if he can manage it.)

Unexpected love blossoms when an assistant district attorney agrees to take a recidivist shoplifter home so she doesn't have to spend Christmas alone in jail.

Mazie, a poor orphan girl, is mistreated by cruel farmer Slag and his wife for whom she works. Mazie, who is growing into a woman, does not like they way Slag has been looking at her lately.

One of the members of a sorority is found murdered. Although the police are called in to investigate, some of the girls decide to do some sleuthing on their own to unmask the killer.

Ruth Raymond works on the telephone switchboard of a large NYC office building. One day, a private detective informs her that she is actually the daughter of railroad tycoon Luke Carson, and that she had been kidnapped as a baby 14 years ago by Luke's vindictive brother Elwood, and placed with strangers.

In a town called New Jerusalem, three bandits hold up a bank. After a gun battle with the townspeople, the three robbers retreat into the scorching Arizona desert. There, they happen upon an ill woman stranded with her child. As the mother dies, she begs the men to take care of her infant. The fugitives want to save the baby -- but to do so, they'll have to travel back to New Jerusalem, where they are wanted men. Remade as 3 Godfathers (1949).

Salomy Jane, a California mountain girl, is sought after by a number of men in the nearby small town of Redwood City. She is affected when two criminals are pursued by authorities: one for killing a hypocritical mayoral candidate, the other for robbing the stagecoach.

Two Virginians are heading for a new life in Texas when they witness a stagecoach being held up. They decide to rob the robbers and make off with the loot. To escape a posse, they split up and don't see each other again for a long time. When they do meet up again, they find themselves on different sides of the law. This leads to the increasing estrangement of the two men, who once thought of themselves as brothers.

At the height of the Great Depression, Tommy's mother has been out of work for months when Eddie's father loses his job. Eager not to burden their parents, the two high school sophomores decide to hop the freight trains and look for work.

An easy-going cowboy is mistaken by the townsfolk for a notorious gunman. The cowboy decides it would be best to leave town, until he meets the gunman's girlfriend.

During World War I, small-town girl Josephine Norris has an illegitimate son by an itinerant pilot. After a scheme to adopt him ends up giving him to another family, she devotes her life to loving him from afar.

In late 1941, with no hope of relief or re-supply, a small band of United States Marines tries to keep the Japanese Navy from capturing their island base.

Arriving at Medicine Bow, eastern schoolteacher Molly Woods meets two cowboys, irresponsible Steve and the "Virginian," who gets off on the wrong foot with her. To add to his troubles, the Virginian finds that his old pal Steve is mixed up with black-hatted Trampas and his rustlers...then finds himself at the head of a posse after said rustlers; and Molly hates the violent side of frontier life.

A hardened crook behind bars comes up against a reform-minded warden.

Mr. Morris, the owner of a large metropolitan department store, gives jobs to paroled ex-convicts in an effort to help them reform and go straight. Among his 'employed-prison-graduates' are Helen Roberts and Joe Dennis, working as sales clerks. Joe is in love with Helen and asks her to marry him, but she is forbidden to marry as she is still on parole, but she says yes and they are married. In spite of their poverty-level life, their marriage is a happy one until Joe discovers she has lied about her past, in order to marry him. Disillusioned, he leaves, goes back to his old gang and plans to rob the department store.

A kind-hearted young man is thrown out of his corrupt home town of West Rome, Oklahoma. He falls asleep and dreams that he is back in the days of olden Rome, where he gets mixed up with court intrigue and a murder plot against the Emperor.

Tacey and Harry King are a suburban couple with three sons and a serious need of a babysitter. Tacey puts an ad in the paper for a live-in babysitter, and the ad is answered by Lynn Belvedere. But when she arrives, she turns out to be a man. And not just any man, but a most eccentric, outrageously forthright genius with seemingly a million careers and experiences behind him.

A high-spirited and short-tempered Texan woman storms her way through life until her luck runs out, forcing her to learn the error of her ways.

An elderly business tycoon, believed to be dying, decides to give a million dollars each to eight strangers chosen at random from the phone directory.

An ex-gang member tries to resist his old cohorts' criminal influence after he suddenly becomes a Hollywood movie star.

A hardened criminal is transformed into a responsible member of society after he undergoes plastic surgery.

On her way by stagecoach to visit relatives out west, Flower Belle Lee is held up by a masked bandit who also takes the coach's shipment of gold. When he abducts Flower Belle and they arrive in town, Flower Belle is suspected of being in collusion with the bandit.

A railroad tycoon, disillusioned with his marriage, starts seeing a showgirl. Things go agreeably until the woman's manager decides to blackmail the millionaire.

The daughter of a prominent citizen marries an outlaw's son.

A cocky guy joins the Navy for the wrong reason but finds romance and twice is cited for heroism.

A notorious counterfeiter passes himself off as a Secret Service agent to Steve and gets him to unwittingly help him bilk the racetrack out of tens of thousands.

Aviator Jim Blaine and his brother Neil are rivals not only as daredevil flyers, but also for the love of parachutist Jill Collins.

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.

Fay Wray plays Jean Hastings, the wealthy and spoiled scion of a factory-owning family led by her irrepressible grandmother. Sparks fly when Jean meets Jim Devlin, the labor leader who’s spearheading a tense worker’s strike against the factory. After circumstances force Jean and Jim to spend a night together in his cabin, she begins questioning her family’s ruthless tactics. This hard-to-see Columbia film by British director Roy William Neill not only features Wray as a brunette but also includes an explosive depiction of labor strife. (Block Cinema)

World War I brings tribulations to an American woman married to a German.

Lee Tracy once again plays a Winchellesque newspaper reporter in Universal's I'll Tell the World. More interested in his sex life than his career, news hawk Brown nonetheless agrees to cover the activities of a European archduke on behalf of his wire service.

When a couple become parents for the first time, they discover grandmothers can be almost as demanding as a newborn.

A Secret Service agent nabs a scalpel-happy doctor who runs drugs in caskets.

A circus wild animal trainer searches for the son who was taken away from him by a meddling relative years earlier.

The Arizona wilderness, 1880. Gen. Fletcher Blackwell sends a message telling Capt. Walsh, who is escorting a wagon-train through Apache territory, heading for the fort at Furnace Creek, that he should cancel the escort and rush to another town. Apache leader "Little Dog" is leading the attack on the wagon-train and massacring everyone at the poorly manned fort. As a result the treaty is broken with the Indians and the white settlers take over the territory with the help of the cavalry, as the Apaches are wiped out and only "Little Dog" remains at large. Gen. Fletcher Blackwell is court-martial-led for treason.

It's the early nineteenth century Washington. Young adult Margaret O'Neal, Peggy to most that know her, is the daughter of Major William O'Neal, who is the innkeeper of the establishment where most out-of-town politicians and military men stay when they're in Washington. Peggy is pretty and politically aware. She is courted by several of those politicians and military men who all want to marry her, except for the one with who she is truly in love.

John Abbott returns to the desert land he owns, and after being wounded by hired gunman Chick Chance, he is befriended by rancher Andrew Naab and his son, Marvin. Naab's daughter, Marian, falls in love with John but is about to marry Snap Thornton to keep a promise made by her father. She runs away on her wedding day but is captured and held hostage by outlaw Henry Holderness. John, the Naabs and fellow ranchers rush to her rescue.

An American gets caught up in wartime action in Turkey.

Jim is a compulsive gambler. He meets Marge at a boarding house and they get married. His gambling causes problems. When he runs into old flame Valerie Marge leaves him. After a few years he returns, but she is now in love with old flame Pres. Jim buys racing dog Dark Hazard and makes a fortune which he loses on roulette.

During the depths of the Great Depression a hitch-hiker Steve Talbot and juke-joint hostess Lola Mears stumble into Cat-Tail Florida where farmers and pickers struggle under the buyer who rules by monopoly, dirty contracts and violence. Steve helps organize against the buyer, leading to further escalation ending in a lynch mob.

A shy California farm girl falls head-over-heels in love with Barry Burnett, a fugitive from a chain gang building a road through the wilderness.

Buck Duane avenges his father's murder by gunning down the killer, but must flee from the law. He finds Ruth, whom he once loved, in the clutches of the outlaw Bland. In rescuing Ruth, he becomes entangled with Bland's amorous wife.

Nikki Martin, a beautiful French opera star, stows away on an ocean liner in hopes of escaping her jealous fiancee. Once aboard, she joins an American swing band and falls in love with its leader, who, after hearing her sing, eventually comes to reciprocate her feelings.

An ex-convict tries to connect with the daughter who doesn't even know he exists.

A Navy veteran with one leg fights to make himself a success.

Told in flashback, this drama follows the training and personal lives of three recruits in the Army Air Corps: a wealthy playboy, a college jock, and an auto mechanic. Love interest is supplied by a female photographer and a sultry blonde.

American Civil War, 1862. After the disaster of the Second Battle of Bull Run, Major Allen, chief of the Secret Service of the Union, asks actress Gail Loveless to become one of his operators and infiltrate enemy territory.

A senator's brother turns up murdered, and the senator tries to pin the blame on a man he knows is innocent.

Boy who thought his father a war hero finds he was really a deserter.

A foreword warns against the peril of yellow journalism, and the story illustrates it by following events in the upstate New York town of Cornwall after prominant financier George Ferguson is killed. Two types of New York City journalists descend on Cornwall, one interested in facts, the other in getting sensational "news". Mrs. Ferguson is known to have been friendly with a local banker. The Fergusons quarrel the evening he is killed (by "burglars", his wife tells the police later), and she is arrested, spurred on by the "bad" journalists, who also manage to badger the banker's wife into the hospital. Meanwhile, young Bruce Foster runs the Cornwall Courier, and shows the big city reporters how to dig out real news while they attempt to subvert justice for their own ends.

"Teddy" Connor, a woman recently orphaned, leaves her uncle's Midwestern farm for Chicago, where she meets "lumber king" John Meade. John takes her in for a hot meal and sends her roses the next day. John is engaged to penniless society beauty Caroline Haig, who is in love with Rodney Bentley and is marrying John for his money. A jovial millionaire without a conscience, John orders his long-time employee, Tim Mathews, to report to Chicago from the lumber mills and announces he is leaving the lumber business for wheat. Although Tim insists they reforest their lumber lands, John ignores his plea. For laughs, John invites Teddy and Tim to his engagement party at Caroline's wealthy friend's estate. Teddy, realizing John is engaged to a woman who does not love him, drowns her tears in liquor and embarrasses Caroline.

The Jones family is in an uproar when Dad's campaign for mayor appears sabotaged by an anonymous newspaper article.

Pop Clark is about to lose his baseball team, unless they can win the pennant so he can pay off debts. He hires ace player Larry Kelly to ensure the victory. As well as rival teams, mobsters are trying to prevent the wins, and as the pennant race nears the end, Pop's star players begin to be killed, on and off the field. Can Larry romance Pop's daughter, win enough games, and still have time to stop a murderer before he strikes more than three times?

When a meek purchasing agent is told by a quack doctor that he only has three months to live, he gets involved with a bank robbery and kidnapped by the gang.

Football star Ted Radcliffe goes west to manage an inherited cattle ranch. Empire builder and cattle thief Don Paco is hounded by El Coyote (who is really Don Bob) who now has a partner in Ted. Unfortunately Ted is also falling love with Don Paco's daughter Adela.

An undercover cop infiltrates a powerful New York based crime syndicate.

A businesslike syndicate runs all the gambling joints in town; least profitable is honest Mike Lee's. Under pressure to allow cheating, Mike "walks out," leaving tough-minded daughter Lady Lee to earn a living the only way she knows. She soon becomes a success gambling among the rich, but, falling out with the syndicate, she considers the marriage proposal of blueblood Garry Madison. Can such a match work despite snobbery and old associations?

An American oil company representative risks sacrificing his marriage for his career in the rural lands of China.

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

A man is determined to find the real culprit behind the crime for which his father was wrongly executed.

A romance between two young lovers is complicated by their prohibitive parents. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2013.

Police Inspector Steve Trent is called to the Radford Arms, a high-rise apartment building that has been taken over by a bank and its apartments now-unoccupied.

While a ship captain is at sea dealing with a mutiny among his crew, his wife is at home having an affair with his best friend.

A carny builds a gambling empire at the expense of his family's wellbeing.

Everyweek Newsmagazine editor Richard Kurt pursues famous free-spirited portrait artist Marion Forsythe on her return to the states from Europe, seeking to convince her to write her biography as a feature for his magazine. One of Marion's old beaus, now running for U.S. Senator from their home state, also comes calling.

Two rival newspaper editors try to scoop each other through their different methods of integrity on reporting the news.

President McKinley asks Lt. Richard L. Perry to go underground to identify some obviously very well briefed Mid-Western bank robbers based in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

After her brother's death, Roma Courtney becomes the heiress to his fortune. When a fake psychic claims to have a message from her dead brother, he coaxes her into participating in a séance. While her fiancé first believes the séance is nothing more than a scam, he eventually realizes that the vengeful spirit of an executed murderer has possessed Roma's body.

A New York radio talent scout turns up at a barn dance.

The Rangers have planted wanted posters of their man Tom Logan around hoping he can join the outlaw gang they are after. Robbing the stage ahead of the gang gets him in and he learns Keefe is the boss. When it's time for the big bank robbery Keefe puts Tom in charge but secretly tells a henchman to kill him during the holdup.

City girl marries country doctor, meets prejudice and exclusion when she tries to befriend the townspeople.

A safecracker goes straight after doing a stretch for a bum rap. He agrees to do one last job for his "pals". He then flees from killers with a San Francisco fisherman's fiancee.

A doctor working with the Bureau of Pure Foods and Drugs, uses radio broadcasts to expose fraudulent patent medicines.

Rigby, Larribee, and Grant each have one third of Bill Joyce's map locating his gold mine. The three plus Joyce's sister Helen head for the mine. An accident with a runaway horse carrying supplies leaves them stranded in the desert with very little water.

This George O'Brien western is based on a novel by Max Brand, previously filmed as the 1920 Tom Mix vehicle The Untamed. Cast as devil-may-car Whistlin' Dan Barry, our hero rides into a passel of trouble in a wide-open town. Warned to leave the premises or else, Whistlin' Dan refuses to do so, sticking around long enough to whomp villain Jim Silent (Mitchell Lewis) and romance heroine Kate Cumberland (Louise Huntington).

Alison Drake, the tough-minded executive of an automobile factory, succeeds in the man's world of business until she meets an independent design engineer.

Accused of killing her employer, financier Bjorn Faulkner, Kit is championed by wisecracking sailor-on-leave Steve Van Ruyle, who has a vested interest in the outcome of the trial.

In this high-flying mystery set aboard a cross-country flight to New York, some of the passengers are kidnappers who are trying to locate a hidden cache of loot. Unfortunately, something goes wrong during the trip and the pilots must land the plane in the Arizona desert during a terrible storm. There all of the passengers and crew find cramped accommodations in a lonely farmhouse where murder, mystery and mayhem occur.

A gray-haired convict, within the shadows of the gallows, tells his story to the prison chaplain beginning twenty years earlier when he was sent to prison for a crime he did not commit.

Sailor Joe Hart, who is spending his shore leave at a gambling joint, sells his gun to young Laurie Roberts after losing terribly. After Hart again loses his last dime, he leaves the joint and steals a car in order to return to his ship. Later that night, a tough gambler named "The Weasel" convinces Laurie, who also lost badly, that Baldy, the joint's owner, is crooked, and they both return to the joint to break open the safe. During the holdup, The Weasel kills Baldy with Joe's gun and, after being picked up for speeding, Joe is arrested for murder.

In a little Mexican village by the American border. However powerful big shot Captain Innocencio (a misnomer indeed!)is, he proves unable to charm Lolita, the shapely daughter of his neighbor, a big-time rancher. Lolita expects better than this awkward unprepossessing showoff! Besides the fortune-teller she consults tells her her true love will get into her life after a terrible storm. This very night a violent storm does break out and an American pilot, whose plane is caught in it, is forced to make an emergency landing next to where she lives. The gringo - by the name of Phil Marvin - is both dashing and good-looking. Good news for Lolita but bad news for Innocencio who is not ready to bow that easily...

A young sailor saves a woman from drowning. The woman turns out to be a rich heiress; unfortunately for the sailor, she was only pretending to be drowning so that another young man she had her eye on would save her.

Olga runs an isolated gas station and restaurant in the stifling hot American desert with her discontented younger sister Myra. When two escaped criminals stop for a bite to eat, Olga is reminded of the past she left behind.

A romantic triangle during WW I provides the basis of this drama. The trouble begins when a young wife gets involved with a coffee baron while her husband is off fighting WW I. Her shell-shocked husband finally returns. He is terribly jealous. To help him, the wife takes him to a Western dude ranch. Her lover also goes, and the two men soon become friends. The coffee magnate helps to cure him, but then breaks his heart by telling him that he and the wife are planning to run away.

Tim MacGregor, unscrupulous lumber operator, obtains by bribery a contract to cut a vast quantity of timber from land owned by Kay Handley, rich débutante. When Dick O'Hara, forestry inspector, demands a postponement, MacGrgeor refuses and sends his henchman, Jean Collet, to obtain the services of the famous "bull-of-the-woods" Andy Jensen and his partner "Lucky." Kay arrives and gives her permission to cut the timber, defying Dick. Dick, with his two assistants, Withers and "Tex," begins a survey of the timber stand. When Dick and Tex finally reveal MacGrgeor as a crook, Collet is sent to kill "Tex" and obtain the reports. A fight ensues and "Lucky" is killed by one of Collet's flying knives. Kay then admits that Dick is right and helps him trap Collet. Dick and Andy force a confession from Collet and MacGregor is exposed.

After being disinherited by their wealthy father for their wild and irresponsible ways, two brothers embark on vastly different paths. One turns to crime and the other follows the straight and narrow falling in love along the way. When their paths cross again both find their lives in danger and only one will emerge safely.

Director William A. Wellman adds another to his long line of salutes-to-aviation films in this bio of an aviation pioneer, John Montgomery (Glenn Ford.) In 1883 he built a practical glider despite the opposition of his friends, who thought he was crazy, and of his family, who were afraid that his dreams of flying would hurt his father's political ambitions. He pursues his education at Santa Clara University where the Jesuits lend a helping and understanding hand. An earthquake destroys what appears to be a working model for an airplane, but a gold-sorting machine Montgomery invented, and then neglected, promises to provide for his financial needs to keep working on his aircraft until he gets involved in costly lawsuits defending his invention.

A gossip columnist's rise to fame. Based closely on the real life of Walter Winchell.

Truck driver Norman Foster has aspirations to become a prize fighter, but romantic interest June Clyde finds the idea deplorable. Henry Armetta and ZaSu Pitts supply the laughs.

A secretary (Gloria Stuart) solves a murder for her boyfriend (Michael Whalen) in the district attorney's office.

In this romance, a slightly crooked and highly ambitious mayoral candidate convinces a woman to help him blackmail the incumbent by using a little baby as evidence in a paternity suit. The girl goes along with it until she learns that the mayor is innocent.

A young man inherits a valuable piece of Texas land that an oil man plots to steal away.

Reporter Nicholas Ranson is jubilant when, on 17 Dec 1903, in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville and Wilbur Wright take their first airplane flight. Back home in Underwood, Maryland, however, his uncle Hiram F. Jenkins, owner and editor of the local newspaper, refuses to print the story. Nicholas quits and continues to work on his own airplane, with the devoted help of his little daughter Peggy. Peggy is actually the first in her family to fly when her friends, Patrick Falconer and Scott Barnes, induce her to get inside a large kite they have made, and run with it in a field until she is airborne. The kite is caught in a tree, however, and Peggy gets a black eye. Later, Nicholas dies when his experimental airplane crashes, leaving his wife and children alone. By Peggy's adulthood, planes are capable of flying at an altitude of 11,000 feet, and speeds of nearly 100 m.p.h. Peggy continues her father's obsession with flight by helping Scott and Pat to build a plane.

Richard Arlen is the convicted murderer and Adrienne Ames his sister who believes in his innocence. We see the murder and the framing set-up at the beginning of the film, so there’s no mystery for the audience to solve. Just the pleasure of watching an intricate cat-and-mouse game, with the murderer one step ahead of his pursuers until the final, tense confrontation.

Cub reporter Dusty investigates the murder of the District Attorney and stumbles into a plot involving a kidnapping and a crooked election.

A group of people are stuck on a schooner in the middle of the Pacific with no wind.

Before Ruth Vincent, daughter of a state governor, and state attorney general Robert Sheldon can announce their marriage, the governor is accused of taking bribes. To avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest, they decide to keep their marriage secret. The political intrigue complicates, and no one is quite what they seem. Soon, Sheldon and Ruth must decide between saving the governor's career and an innocent person's life.

Buck Colins heads a group of local ranchers who are trying to prevent the railroad from completing its line through their property. Till now they have been able to charge tolls on herds passing through. Hoppy goes undercover to expose them.

The Cisco Kid rides again! This time, he robs a bank to save pretty widow Sally Benton and her ranch. After developing a good relationship with Sally’s children, he risks life and limb in order to save her little one.

Millioniare Curran, thinking his son too intellectual, sends him west to learn logging at one of his lumber camps. Unknown to his father, Grant Curan is a professional wrestler and easily able to handle the thugs that attack him at the lumber camp. This enables him to stay on the job and he soon undercovers how his father is being cheated by the local boss.

Jim Sherwood , toughest logging boss in the timber country, takes on his toughest assignment when he agrees to cut an enormous volume of timber for Andrew MacKinley, who has to deliver the timber within sixty days.

A kindly, elderly couple who run a New York City boarding house form the steady center around which the lives and loves of their various residents unfold. Borrowed money, a lovelorn chorus girl, and a tragic misunderstanding set in motion the chain of events in East of Fifth Avenue’s tender pageant of life.

A tale of an international counterfeiting-ring operating in Mexico starts with Patrick Nevil viewed as a suspicious character by newspaper woman Agnes Stuart, who is working on a story to expose racketeering night-club owner Doc Lilley.

Jenny is carrying the child of a young man who dies in the San Francisco earthquake (1906). After giving birth, she decides to place her child in the custody of a wealthy married couple. Years later, thanks to the protection of a corrupt politician, she becomes the main "madame" of San Francisco, in addition to participating in various illegal activities.

Skippy, the mischievous son of a wealthy doctor, meets Sooky in poverty-ridden Shantytown, and together they try to save Sooky's pet from a cruel dogcatcher.

A husband-and-wife vaudeville team disguise their young son as a girl so he can enter a contest run by a movie studio that's looking for "a new Shirley Temple".

Young lovers Jack and Sally are from families that compete to send horses to the 1938 Kentucky Derby, but during the Civil War, her family sided with the South while his sided with the North--and her Uncle Peter will have nothing to do with Jack's family.

A newlywed discovers that she and her husband's snobby family speak different languages.

Tugboat, the Narcissus, is owned and captained by Annie Brennan, and among her crew are her alcoholic but good-natured husband, Terry, and her conscientious son, Alec. Annie continually loses business because of Terry's drunken mistakes. Alec wants to quit school to work on the tug full time, but Annie will not sacrifice her son's education. A grown Alec has followed in his mother's footsteps and becomes a mariner, but a more upscale one as the captain of a luxury liner. Alec returns home with his fiancée, Pat - the boss' daughter - with a grand plan to save Annie from the life that drunkard Terry has provided her. But ultimately, it's Annie and Terry that need to be Alec's savior, and by their move show him the meaning of true commitment.

Captain Angus Swope (Noab Beery), known as The Black Yankee, skipper of the Golden Bough, treats his crew shamefully and he treats women no better, as evidenced by his handling of a woman he has abducted, together with her baby daughter, Mary (Sally Blaine), from seaman Newman (Willard Robertson). When the woman dies as a result of his cruelty, he brings up Mary as his own daughter.

Cisco and Gordito arrive to find there is an outlaw operating in the area who is assumed to be the Cisco Kid. When a reward is offered for his capture and a large shipment of money goes out, Cisco is on hand. Seeing the gang rob the stage he goes after them only to be wounded. The gang leader leaves Cisco's handkerchief at the scene and now he is wanted for the murder he tried to break up.

A relationship gradually develops between a savvy New York City street girl and a good-hearted cab driver, but other matters keep getting in their way, including financial problems and a murder.

Skippy, son of Dr. Herbert and Mrs. Skinner, adamantly stands by his poor friend, Sooky Wayne, who lives in Shantytown with his sickly mother. The Boone Boys, a boys' club that costs thirty dollars to join and has uniforms that Sooky admires, refuses to admit him because he is poor. Sooky and Skippy form their own club called the Beagle Boys.

Sally (Jean Parker) is engaged to be married, loves dancing and kids. But her life is ruined when an accident cripples her and her betrothed magnanimously offers to not back out of the marriage. After rejecting his offer she starts a doll shop and tries to save for an operation. From her doll shop window she watches children and talks to Jimmie (James Dunn) the ice cream man. She wants to know Jimmie better, but is terrified of rejection.

A prosecutor's career and his adopted daughter's happiness hang in the balance when he is blackmailed by a gangster.