Gabby Hayes #59

Wagonwheels' ornery donkey won't stop its relentless braying, driving everyone around the old prospector to the edge of sanity—but Wagonwheels stubbornly refuses to silence the noisy critter. This one-pager delivers frontier humor built on the simplest and most annoying of comedic setups: a sound that just won't quit.

When Gabby Hayes rides into Rawhide with his newfound gold-claim winnings, he's shocked to discover he's being accused of robbing the very bank where he planned to deposit the cash—and the sheriff swears he saw the bearded robber on a white horse that morning. Determined to clear his name, Gabby escapes custody and pieces together the truth: someone has been impersonating him using a disguise, and a freshly painted horse holds the key to unmasking the real culprit.

When the circus rolls into Rawhide, Gabby Hayes and his clever horse Corker can't resist showing off their tricks—especially when a snobbish performer named Slick Harte tries to show them up with his own trained horse, Satan. But when Gabby discovers Harte attempting to rob the circus cashier's wagon, he and Corker must track down the fleeing thief and recover the stolen money before he escapes. It's a wild chase that proves Corker's smarts are worth more than any fancy circus act.

When Gabby Hayes accepts a mysterious pie from an admirer, he gets caught in a love triangle that sends him fleeing straight into the clutches of a Night Rider—whom he accidentally traps in an oven. From there, the mix-ups pile up when the gang's candlestick-making leader, Waxy Wayne, sets a trap at his shop, leaving Gabby to stumble onto the whole operation and turn the tables on the criminals. It's a rollicking tale of accidental heroics where a hungry old prospector's misadventures with food and women lead him to dismantle an outlaw gang.

When Sheriff Mike Garret's age finally catches up with him and the town asks for his resignation, the aging lawman's wounded pride drives him to prove he's still got the sand of his younger days—even if it means taking on a gang of bank robbers single-handedly. With help from an unexpected quarter, Mike learns that his legacy as a lawman runs deeper than any one job, and that there's honor in passing the torch to the next generation.

When a skeptical friend catches Sagebrush fishing and questions his tall tales about the one that got away, the old prospector's quick wit and frontier logic deliver a punchline that lands perfectly in this 1957 humor story from Gabby Hayes #59. "Aweigh With Him!" is pure Western tall-tale comedy—the kind of frontier yarn-spinning that keeps frontier folk entertained and exasperated in equal measure.