Long before the silver screen showed the face of Mary Pickford to millions of Americans, Annie Oakley, born as Phoebe Anne Oakley Moses on August 13, 1860, had won the right to the title of "America's Sweetheart." Having grown up learning to shoot game to help support her family, Annie won first prize and met Frank Butler at a shooting match when she was fifteen years old. He convinced her to change her name to Annie Oakley and became her husband,...

Colorado Territory in 1864 wasn't merely the wild west, it was a land in limbo while the Civil War raged in the east and politics swirled around its potential admission to the union. The territorial governor, John Evans, had ambitions on the national stage should statehood occur, and he was joined in those ambitions by a local pastor and erstwhile Colonel in the Colorado militia, John Chivington. The decision was made to take a hardline stance against...

In 2032 archcriminal Simon Phoenix awakes from a 35 year deep freeze in CryoPrison to find a serene, non-violent Los Angeles ready for the taking. Officials seek an old-fashioned cop to fight an old fashioned criminal. They revive Sgt John Spartan.

Luke Skywalker rescues his friends, Han Solo and Princess Leia, from Jabba the Hutt, and wages his own battle against Darth Vader which ends in a climactic duel. The Ewoks help end the Empire.

Take one well-oiled effective killing machine, add a familiar hero on the ground, in the air, and on horseback, stir in a ghastly end that's surely impossible to escape, add action, add passion, made on a shoestring budget at breakneck speed, and you've got the recipe for Republic Pictures. Who, after all, cannot forget The Atomic Kid, starring Mickey Rooney, or The Untamed Heiress, with an un-Oscar-worthy performance by ingénue Judy Canova? Exploding...

By the time “Stagecoach” made John Wayne a silver-screen star in 1939, the thirty-one-year-old was already a veteran of more than sixty films, having twirled six-guns and foiled cattle rustlers in B Westerns for five studios. By the 1950s he was Hollywood's most popular actor, an Academy Award nominee destined to become an American icon. This biography reveals the story of his early life, illustrated with rare archival images.

Star wars, episode I, The phantom menace: Stranded on the planet Tatooine after rescuing Queen Amidala of Naboo, Jedi apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi and his Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn discover nine-year-old Anakin Skywalker, a young slave. Gifted with the power of the Force, Anakin wins his freedom and leaves home to be trained as a Jedi. Back on Naboo, Anakin and the Queen face a massive invasion while the two Jedi confront a lethal foe named Darth Maul. Star...