 Ranch owner "Lucky" Langham(Robert Homans), who once had millions, has nothing but his ranch to leave to his spendthrift,big-city daughter Cody(Carol Hughes)and, knowing the girl s character, he has made his foreman Gene Autry(Gene Autry)administrator of his will.Langham dies in an accident and the spoiled, self-centered Cody arrives from the east and speeds through town in her high-powered car.Town constable Cy Wheeler(George Guhl) tosses her in jail, which is where Gene finds her sharing a cell with Mugsy Malone(Milburn Morante) and Spud Grogan(Ben Corbett), two likeable tramps.Cody wants to sell the ranch and leave, but Gene refuses to let her sell and forces her to remain until she marries a husband satisfactory to him.She sends for Larry Cummings(Craig Reynolds), a shady and crooked Chicago cattle broker,whom she plans to marry.Gene spots Cummings for what he is and refuses to approve him as a husband until he demostrates his ability to run the ranch and make it pay.To make Cummings look good and make the ranch more profitable, Cody turns it into a dude ranch, which serves the purpose of padding the footage with the Stafford Sisters and J.L.Frank s Golden West Cowboys band and some eastern-dude escapades featuring chubby Cupid Ainsworth and allowing Frog Millhouse(Smiley Burnette) to dispense of a couple of very forgettable songs.Meanwhile, Cummings has discovered the ranch, with or without dudes, is worth a quarter-million dollars, so he decides to eliminate Autry and wires for Chicago gangster Red Kuzak(LeRoy Mason)and his racketeers.(The ones that come with him can be called Thugs but the hired local help are all Henchmen.)The thugs and henchmen fake a cattle-rusting raid to lure Gene into a trap but, with Frog s left-handed help,Gene escapes and finds Cummings  telegram on one of the dead racketeers.Gene confronts Cummings, and Cody orders her now-ex-fiancee off the place.But before departing Cummings demands ten-thousand dollars from Cody to call off the men he has hired to rub out Gene. Cody knows Gene won t give her the money for that purpose so she has herself "snatched" by Mugsy and Spud,her former cellmates, so she can use the ransom money to pay off Cummings. But Cummings learns of the scheme and he moves in and takes over and raises the ante to $25,000 just to get Cody returned safely, and he ll throw in Mugsy and Spud for free.Gene now has his work cut out for him.