Deadwood Dick, a masked and mysterious hero, is in reality Dick Stanley, editor of the Dakota Pioneer Press and a leading member of Statehood For Dakota. He is on the trail of a masked villain known as the Skull, who leads a violent, renegade band infamous for its violence against the Deadwood residents' wishes for a statehood status.

An adventurer goes after Nazi spies who have a new death ray called the Paratron.

The period is the 1820's and the first wagon train leaves Independence heading west to Santa Fe. In order to maintain his power, the ruthless Official at Santa Fe must not let them arrive and he sends out his men to stop them. The wagon train then has to endure repeated attacks but is aided by a mysterious rider that shoots singing arrows and rides a painted stallion.

A crime fighter known as The Spider battles a villain called The Octopus, who is out to sabotage America and install his own government.

Secret Service Major Steel (Joseph W. Girard), is one of the few men in America aware of the fact that Captain Albright (Dave O'Brien) is also Captain Midnight, daring masked aviator dedicated to fighting gangsters and enemies of America. When murderous bombing attacks are made on West Coast munitions plants, Steel sends for Albright and asks him to track down the mysterious Ivan Shark (James Craven), the foreign agent mastermind behind the attacks. Shark has learned about an ingenious range finder, invented by John Edwards (Bryant Washburn, and makes plans to obtain a model of the invention. Edwards instructs his daughter, Joyce (Dorothy Short), to bring the model to Albright for safekeeping in his mountain laboratory. Shark takes Edwards prisoner by Albright assures Joyce that her father will be saved and an end put to Shark's reign of terror. Dressing as Captain Midnight and enlisting the aid of his friends, Chuck (Sam Edwards) and Ichabod Mudd (Guy Wilkerson), Captain Midnight delivers on his promises fourteen chapters later.

Beyond Hell's Gate Pass is territory controlled by a man who calls himself King Carter; he uses a variety of schemes to prevent the railroad from being built, for fear it will finish his control of (what he considers) his land.

Former combat cameraman Mike Kovac is now a freelance photographer in New York City, specializing in difficult and dangerous assignments where he can get the kinds of pictures that other photographers can't, or won't take. He sometimes gets help, often reluctantly, from his contact in the police department, Lt. Donovan, and advice from his immigrant father Anton.

Professor Davidson and his niece Diana Palmer search Africa for the Lost City of Zoloz, reputed to be the source of a large hidden treasure. Also searching is a local crook, Singapore Smith, and Dr. Max Bremmer, who plans to destroy the peace in which the native tribes have been living. However, Godfrey Prescott, otherwise known as the Phantom, is feared and respected by the natives and is able to circumvent the traps and schemes of the villains.

A murderous gang of counterfeiters has kidnapped the government's best engraver and is forcing him to print virtually undetectable phony money. The Secret Service sends its toughest agent, Jack Holt, and a female partner after the gang.