Roy Rogers (1912-1998)

Today in 1998 marks the death of singing cowboy and all-around nice guy Roy Rogers, born Leonard Slye in Oklahoma. Here's the opening of his 1950's TV show:

Rex Bell (1903-1962)

Rex Bell (October 16, 1903 – July 4, 1962), born George Francis Beldam, was Lieutenant Governor of Nevada and a western movie star. Rex was born in Chicago and married actress Clara Bow in 1931. They had two sons, Tony Beldon (born 1934, changed name to Rex Anthony Bell, Jr.) and George Beldon, Jr. (born 1938). In 1931, Rex and Clara founded the Walking Box Ranch. In 1944 Bell ran for the United States House of Representatives on the Republican ticket against Democrat Berkeley Bunker. His wife, Clara Bow, attempted suicide to avoid the public spotlight, thus dampening the zeal for Bell's campaign and contributing to the lieutenant governor's loss to Bunker. Bell was the leader of the Nevada state GOP and in 1948 was an alternate to the Republican National Convention. He was also active in the Nevada Chamber of Commerce and Boy Scouts. The ties Bell forged during those years helped him win the lieutenant governor's office in 1954. That year Charles H. Russell, the incumbent GOP governor, also won. In 1958 Democrat Grant Sawyer unseated Russell, but Bell won re-election as lieutenant governor. His final film appearance was a brief cameo as a cowboy in John Huston's film The Misfits (1961), which was shot on location in Nevada. The Rex Bell Elementary School in Las Vegas was named in honor of Bell. His grave is located in Glendale, California's Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery.

(From Wikipedia)

Tim McCoy (1891-1978)

One of the great stars of early American Westerns. McCoy was the son of an Irish soldier who later became police chief of Saginaw, Michigan, where McCoy was born. He attended St. Ignatius College in Chicago and after seeing a Wild West show there, left school and found work on a Wyoming ranch. He became an expert horseman and roper and developed a keen knowledge of the ways and languages of the Indian tribes in the area. He competed in numerous rodeos, then enlisted in the U.S. Army when America entered the First World War. He was commissioned and rose to the rank of colonel, eventually being posted as Adjutant General of Wyoming, a position he held until 1921. Resigning from the Army, he returned to ranching and concurrently served as territorial Indian agent. In 1922, he was asked by the head of Famous Players-Lasky, Jesse L. Lasky, to provide Indian extras for the Western extravaganza, The Covered Wagon (1923). He brought hundreds of Indians to Hollywood and served as technical advisor on the film. After touring the country and Europe with the Indians as publicity, McCoy returned to Hollywood and used his connections to obtain further work in the movies, both as a technical advisor and as an actor. MGM speedily signed him to a contract to star in a series of Westerns and McCoy rapidly rose to stardom, making scores of Westerns and occasional non-Westerns .. In 1935, he left Hollywood, first to tour with the Ringling Brothers Circus and then with his own Wild West show. He returned to films in 1940, in a series teaming him with Buck Jones and Raymond Hatton, but World War II and Jones's death in 1942 ended the project. McCoy returned to the Army for the war and served with the Army Air Corps in Europe, winning several decorations. He retired from the army and from films after the war, but emerged in the late 1940s for a few more films and some television work. He married Danish writer Inga Arvad and spent his later years as a retired gentleman rancher, occasionally touring with his own Wild West show. He died in 1978 at the age of 86.
(From IMDB)

Here's a trailer for his 1932 movie Two-Fisted Law, featuring a young John Wayne: