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American silent-screen actress Fritzi Ridgeway played the girl with whom "Ruggles" (Edward Everett Horton) opens a restaurant in the Western-comedy Ruggles of Red Gap (1923). A former trick rider, Ridgeway was at home on the prairie and even starred in her own series of Western two-reelers in 1920. (Her leading man was Bob Burns who, like Ridgeway, usually played supporting roles.) There were more Westerns to come, but Ridgeway played mostly the second female lead, often a villain. Her career was decidedly on the wane after the changeover to sound and her role as one of the inmates in Ladies of the Big House (1931) was miniscule. Divorced from musical director Constantin Bakalainikoff, Fritzi Ridgeway later managed the Del Tarquez Hotel in Palm Springs, CA.