Yakima Canutt "created the profession of stuntman as it exists today," according to the Special Oscar presented to him by Charlton Heston at the Academy Awards in 1967. But before Canutt's days of stunt-doubling for top stars and second-unit directing filmdom's greatest action scenes, the rodeo world champion was a movie cowboy hero himself, as seen in these two Westerns from his silent-era prime.
The Outlaw Breaker (1926, B&W, Silent): When sheepherders invade cattle territory, bloodshed follows. Yak's cattleman dad and brother were victims of the eternal feud, and now Yak's ailing mother asks him to hang up his guns forever. That promise becomes hard to keep after a crooked sheep rancher frames Yak for murder.
The Iron Rider (1926, B&W, Silent): It's payday and cowpuncher Yak Halliday receives six months wages which he tries to boost it in an all-night card game. Yak doesn't know that his opponents are card sharks, and loses all his money. But when he discovers that he's been cheated, he plans to turn the tables on the crooked gamblers.