The Vanishing Frontier

The 1937 film version of Bret Harte's story, starring Preston Foster.

A woman journeys to Spanish California to marry a Spanish officer, but on the way she meets and falls in love with an American adventurer who is part of a movement to overthrow the Spanish in California.

"Wicked" Lily Bishop joins a wagon train to California, led by Michael Fabian and Johnny Trumbo, but news of the Gold Rush scatters the train. When Johnny and Michael finally arrive, Lily is rich from her saloon and storekeeper (former slaver) Pharaoh Coffin is bleeding the miners dry. But worse troubles are ahead: California is inching toward statehood, and certain people want to make it their private empire.

The swishing fop Don Diego de la Vega becomes the swashbuckling masked hero Zorro when tyranny threatens his people in nineteenth-century California.

In California in 1848, Brunton through his stooge Sheriff is evicting the Mexicans from their ranches. Major John Freeman and his troops arrive to investigate. Keeping his troops hidden and appearing out of uniform, he takes up the fight against Brunton. He helps a rancher who has been evicted before his taxes were due only to find him murdered and this leads to the showdown between Brunton's men and the soldiers.

When they learn that their brother Matt Denton is awaiting trial in California, charged with train robbery, deputies Tom Denton and Fred Denton leave their home in Fort Grant, Texas and head west. They arrive in Tulare just in time to rescue Matt from being hanged, but a guard is killed during their escape. Ed Larkin who framed Matt, falsely accuses them of a long list of crimes. They return to Fort Grant so that Tom can see his sweetheart Laura Brook. They encounter outlaw Bill Devlin who persuades them to hold up a train which Laura unwittingly told them would carry a large payroll. Soon the whole territory is enraged at their deeds. They return to Fort Grant to hold up the two banks that are filled with huge sums of cattle money.

It is California in 1852 that only recently being surrendered by Mexico to the United States and admitted into the union. Most of the land-owners of California were the descendants of the Dons who had colonized it a hundred years before and whose title deeds bore the signature and seal of a long-dead Spanish king. But, by a loop-hole in the law, the title-deeds of the Dons could not be recognized, and this opened the door of organized gangs of land-grabbers, such as the one led by Joe Kincaid, to operate with a prime excuse for legitimate plunder and robbery. In most cases the law was unable to cope with the situation. Then Rosita Castro, the daughter of Don Pasqual Castro, masked and disguised as a man, organized a band of vigilantes to fight against the tyranny of the outlaws, aided by an undercover federal agent, Jim Kearney.

Cheerful outlaw Charlie Boles leaves former partners Lance and Jersey and heads for California, where the Gold Rush is beginning. Soon, a lone gunman in black is robbing Wells Fargo gold shipments. One fateful day, the stage he robs carries old friends Lance and Jersey...and notorious dancer Lola Montez, coming to perform in Sacramento. Black Bart and Lance become rivals for both Lola's favors and Wells Fargo's gold.

Harker Flet and compatriots Timothy X. Nolan and Katy, along with three other men, steal $40,000 in money and jewelry from a California train in the gold-mining country of the 1880's. The six split up and while they are hiding out awaiting the rendezvous to divide the loot, Hark is cornered, framed and sent to prison. He is released after two-and-a-half years and sets out to find Katy and Nolan and get his share of the loot.

Having spent the last 10 years fighting injustice and cruelty, Alejandro de la Vega is now facing his greatest challenge: his loving wife Elena has thrown him out of the house! Elena has filed for divorce and found comfort in the arms of Count Armand, a dashing French aristocrat. But Alejandro knows something she doesn't: Armand is the evil mastermind behind a terrorist plot to destroy the United States. And so, with his marriage and the county's future at stake, it's up to Zorro to save two unions before it's too late.

After a bloody exchange with some bounty hunters, Anna, a veteran of the War in Afghanistan, and Gloria, her ill-prepared God-fearing friend, team up with a pair of coyotes to escape into Mexico.