A 5½ x 4¼ page from an autograph album signed in ink by Hoot Gibson (1892 - 1962), the American rodeo champion, film actor, film director, and producer. During the period between World War I and World War II, he was second only to cowboy film legend Tom Mix as a box office draw. While acting and stunt work began as a sideline to Gibson's focus on rodeo, he successfully transitioned from silent films to become a leading performer in Hollywood's growing cowboy film industry. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum. Gibson's movie career began in 1910 with early silent film "shorts", and he continued as a movie star once "talkies" were introduced, his first sound film being The Long, Long Trail (1929). He made over 200 pictures, primarily Westerns,  and worked with many directors, including John Ford, who directed many popular American Westerns and Civil War films, including The Horse Soldiers (1959), starring John Wayne, in which Gibson played a supporting role. As with many silent and early recordings, a number of Gibson's films are considered to be lost. Gibson squandered much of his income on high living and poor investments. By the 1950s, he faced financial ruin, in part due to costly medical bills from serious health problems. To get by and pay his bills, he earned money as a greeter at a Las Vegas casino. For a time, he worked in a carnival and took virtually any job his dwindling celebrity status could obtain. Hoot Gibson died of cancer in 1962 in Woodland Hills, California at age 70, and was interred in the Inglewood Park Cemetery in Inglewood, California.