Ken Maynard

The first sound film shot at Lone Pine   was Universal Picture' The Wagon Master (1929). This Ken Maynard Production, coincidentally was the first sound B-Western to feature a singing cowboy. Ken Maynard sang 2 songs The Cowboy's Lament/The Lone Star Trail. John A Lomax from Austin Texas coincidentally documented "The Cowboys Lament" in his 1910 book of Cowboy Songs and other Frontier Ballads. This song began at Sam Sherman's Barroom not the same song cowboy's changed into "The Streets of Laredo". Francis Henry Maynard with the same last name of Ken Maynard , sharing no family relations with Francis Henry Maynard who was a old time cowboy& poet, claims cowboy's from his outfit liked it. He claims he heard an Irish version of a girl gone bad which he penned as The Dying Cowboy in the winter of 1876. And like The Cowboy's Lament of John A Lomax started out in dodge city also, Francis Henry Maynard's started at Tom Sherman's Bar-Roo

 My theory is Ken Maynard was able to successfully use the Tri-Ergon method. The agreement of all involved parties which included the removal of sound on disc method to synchronize sound. He became the first singing cowboy in Hollywood sept. 8, 1929. The sound version of The Wagon Master is still missing  The silent version of this film was in a vault until recently in Amsterdam.

 The film classification code for the Sept. 8, 1929 release of The Wagon Master

            The Famous Tower Theater with their debut of the Vitaphone sound on disc system. The Tower Theater ad offered up a list of Hollywood actors that the movie goers could come sit with. Oh look there "I spied a young cowboy" Ken Maynard.