After the train station clerk is assaulted and left bound and gagged, then the departing train and its passengers robbed, a posse goes in hot pursuit of the fleeing bandits.
Gambler "On-the Level" Leigh (William S. Hart) is forced to leave his high rolling lifestyle to move his ailing sister Alice (Mildred Harris) to the healing climate the mountains. Financial strain compels him to resume his favored vocation. Unfortunately for Level, the dance hall girl Coralie (Alma Rubens) doesn't take rejection well and convinces the dealer to clean him out with a "cold deck". A desperate robbery ensues, leading to Level wanted for murder!
After reading a newspaper article regarding old Tightwad's rise in the world, Bill and Jim hit upon a plan to get some of Tightwad's easy money by holding young Tightwad for ransom. They accordingly hire a rig, take the boy and conceal him in a cave. The boy, instead of weeping and wailing for home and mother, proclaims himself "Red Chief" and makes it uncomfortable for his captors. (Moving Picture World)
Arizona range rider Lon Gilchrist helps stagecoach passengers fight off attacking Apaches. After rescuing a baby and binding her bleeding forehead with his handkerchief, Lon receives a reward that allows him to buy a ranch. Many years later, the rescued child, Lizzie Mayberry, is a waitress in a cheap restaurant, where she meets Lon, who, now wealthy, courts and marries her. Because he is so busy, Lon has his friend Del Beasley look after her. After a misunderstanding, Lizzie has Del take her to the railway station. Thinking that they left together, Lon pursues them.
A sheep farmer brings his new wife to his father's ranch and the old man takes an instant dislike to her.
When a gang of outlaws put Andy Clyde's ranch house under siege, daughter Alice Day recruits college heart throb Ralph Graves to save daddy.
Johnny Arthur has been ordered to spend a year out west to toughen him up, so he and butler George Davis head out. The cowboys at the ranch don't like him, so Johnny and they play practical jokes on each other. However, when Virginia Vance is kidnapped, it turns out to be real desperadoes.
In Oklahoma, kindhearted outlaw Brick Willock rescues little Lahoma Gledware and her father Henry from certain death at the hands of his outlaw band. In the course of the rescue, he kills Kansas Kimball, the brother of the outlaws' leader Red Kimball, who vows vengeance against Brick. Brick renounces his life of crime, and after Gledware relinquishes custody of his daughter to marry an Indian princess, the old cowboy gives refuge to the little girl, raising her with the help of neighbor Bill Atkins.
An outlaw calling himself Passin' Through halts his "evil" ways long enough to help out some children in difficulty.
Most of the scenes are laid in a parrot-and-monkey country in South America, a land where "it is always after dinner." The Llano Kid, a Texas bad man, flees there from justice. The consul persuades him to play the long-lost son of a Castilian family, and tattoos a coat of arms on the back of the Kid's hand to make the deception complete. The Kid is taken into the household, trusted and loved by the gladdened mother. For the first time he has a home. The romance develops. And when the time comes to rob and flee he has too much manhood to break the loving mother's heart. The surprise comes when it is revealed that the man the Kid killed in Texas was the real son.
Jessie, a young woman at the Bar Z Ranch, who is engaged to Jack Howard. On the day of the cowboys' "hoedown," Jack presents her with an engagement ring and they plan to marry after the roundup. A misunderstanding arises when Jack dances with one of Jessie's friends, causing her to doubt his fidelity. Meanwhile, other ranch hands, inspired by the leap year, also seek to marry, leading to a chaotic series of races and a busy Justice of the Peace.
When Letty Mason relocates to West Texas, she finds herself unsettled by the ever-present wind and sand. Arriving at her new home at the ranch of her cousin, Beverly, she receives a surprisingly cold welcome from his wife, Cora. Soon tensions in the family and unwanted attention from a trio of suitors leave Letty increasingly disturbed.
Don Diego Vega pretends to be an indolent fop as a cover for his true identity, the masked avenger Zorro. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2012.
Jack Pepper accidentally fires his gun while forcing a newspaper editor to retract his statement regarding Miss Tulip Hellier, and the sheriff goes after Jack. While hiding out, Jack finds a liquor cache on the Hellier ranch and knows it was placed there as a ruse to distract the sheriff while an outlaw gang runs dope across the border.
Phillip Haver, who, along with his friend Toby Jones, finds David Ainslee dying in the desert. After rustlers stole his cattle, Ainslee went off in search of a lost mine and fell victim to a killer. Before he kicks the bucket, Ainslee hands Haver a poke of gold dust to pay off the mortgage on the ranch.
A cowboy seeks revenge against the man who shot him in a bar-room brawl. While searching for him, he comes across a wild stallion that he is determined to capture and break, and unknowingly falls in love with the daughter of the man who shot him.
Tex Benton (cowboy star Tom Mix) wants to marry Janet McWhorter (Kathleen O'Connor), but her father (Charles K. French) will give his blessings only if Tex works on his sheep ranch. Tex, a cattleman through and through, refuses and gets his aggressions out by stirring things up at the local saloon.
Jeanne La Roche lives alone with her brother in the great northwestern country. Jacques is a ne'er-do-well and has fallen under the suspicion of the mounted police, two of whom are dispatched to arrest him for robbery. The stolen goods are found in his home. Jeanne is too young to be left in their lonely cabin, so she is taken to the post, where the wife of the proprietor welcomes her and gives her a home. Several years later, Donald McLean wins her for his wife. Meantime Jacques escapes from prison, eludes his pursuers and takes refuge in McLean's home.
On a trip East, Silent Kerry falls for pretty Mary Stockdale. Later, by coincidence, she just happens to show up in his neck of the West. Her father is at the mercy of the usual gang of rustlers, and there's a jealous dance hall girl, Carmencita, who complicates matters for Kerry.
Dick Rainboldt (Carey) signs up to work at a gold mine without realizing that he's being hired as a strikebreaker. He takes the job primarily because of a pretty girl who lives in the town. The superintendent and manager of the mine convince Rainboldt to blow up the mine and make it appear like the strikers did it. But Rainboldt turns the tables on the plotters and reveals their scheme. The mine owner rewards him with a big assignment and the girl promises to marry him.