Roy Rogers

HAPPY TRAILS TO ROY ROGERS, KING OF THE COWBOYS

We’ve had a crush on Roy Rogers since childhood and thought we’d pay tribute to the cowboy star, who would have been 100 years old on November 5. Before his career peaked in western movies, Roy cleverly had it written into his contract that he owned the rights to his likeness, voice, and name for merchandising. He did it all before the Kardashians. Roy Rogers games, action figures, lunch boxes, books, comics, clothing etc. flooded the market and kids lapped it up. Rogers was second only to Walt Disney in the amount of items featuring his name, so he was an early marketing genius. We always thought he was the best dressed cowboy and envied all those gorgeous elaborately fringed shirts…

THIS AUCTION IS LIKE A ROY ROGERS AND DALE EVANS ESTATE SALE


Roy Rogers has always been our cowboy hero and we just HAD to see what Christie’s is auctioning off from the Roy Rogers Museum. We pulled photos of our favorite items. Roy and Dale’s parade quality wardrobes were mostly made by Nudie the Rodeo Tailor and Roy’s outfits are expected to bring in $5000 to $7000 while Dale’s might be more affordable in the thousand dollar range. Too bad she was so tiny. We love the framed children’s cowboy and cowgirl ensembles ($1500 to $2000) and the Rogers family dishes (a full set of Wallace China in the Westward Ho pattern $3000 to $5000) Incidentally, Roy’s fringed gabardine cowboy suits are in remarkable condition and his son explained that his dad grew up poor and always took meticulous care of his fancy clothes.