[4] As a boy he played guitar and sang at local functions with his fiddle-playing father, until high-school graduation when he toured the Southwest as a rodeo rider.

Allen began his singing career on radio station KOY in Phoenix, Arizona, after which he became better known as a performer on the National Barn Dance on WLS in Chicago.

[5] When singing cowboys such as Roy Rogers and Gene Autry were very much in vogue in American film, in 1949 Republic Pictures in Hollywood gave him a screen test and put him under contract.

[4] One of the top-ten box office draws of the day, whose character was soon depicted in comic books,[6] on screen Allen personified the clean cut, God-fearing American hero of the Wild West, who wore a white Stetson hat, loved his faithful horse Koko, and had a loyal buddy who shared his adventures.

Late in coming to the industry, his film career was relatively short as the popularity of series westerns faded by the mid 1950s.

[4] As other cowboy stars made the transition to television, Allen tried too, cast as Dr. Bill Baxter for the half-hour weekly syndicated series Frontier Doctor.

[9] Allen was a cousin of the Gunsmoke cast member Glenn Strange, who played bartender Sam Noonan.