The gang kids are upset that World War II is causing them deprivations and inconveniences. Organizing a fact-finding committee, Gang members Mickey, Froggy, Buckwheat, and Janet try to determine what to do about the present national crisis. With the help of a convenient copy of Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac, the kids stage a play in which they cathartically come to grips with the sacrifices indigenous to the war effort, and provide patriotic solutions to the situation.
The story centers around Lucille Ball who plays herself against the backdrop of a military academy full of frisky boys. Ball is the reluctant guest of a diminutive cadet, Bud Hooper (Tommy Dix), who wrote her a "mash note" and invitation to be his date at a school prom.
Another World War II MGM Our Gang mini-musical, Calling All Kids finds the gang invading a local radio station to perform a revue honoring the U.S. military. Amidst such highlights as a "recruiting office" sketch featuring the duo of Mickey and Froggy, and a closing ensemble piece with lyrics that rhyme "Taxes" with "Axis," the film features an extended celebrity-impression routine, with Buckwheat imitating Eddie "Rochester" Anderson and other kids posing as Judy Garland, Eleanor Powell, Fred Astaire, Carmen Miranda, and Virginia O'Brien.
Much to the dismay of Mugs McGinnis (Leo Gorcey), everyone in his East Side Kids gang (as well as the rival The Cherry Street Gang) gets to smack his rear end eighteen times in celebration of his eighteenth birthday. His mother Molly (Martha Wentwroth) then becomes distraught when she gets a letter from his "uncle" Pete Monahan (Noah Beery), a rancher friend of his late father, stating that he will soon visit them in New York. Molly explains to her only child that ever since his father lied to Pete that he had seven children, Pete has been sending birthday checks for each child. Pete is unaware that the McGinnises are so poor that they could never afford to return the checks.
A maid, in cahoots with Madame Zenobia (Gladys George), a fake psychic, fools Jo Ainsly (Virginia Field) into believing Zenobia to be a gifted fortune teller.
In 1863, a sheriff named Steve Upton (Randolph Scott) tries to keep the law in Red Valley, a small town in Utah. While he's away, the bank is robbed. The holdup was secretly masterminded by corrupt banker Stanley Clayton and the livery stable's boss, "Uncle Willie" McLeod, with the help of ruthless gunman Jack Lester, who shoots three innocent men.
After an attempt at installing a door with mishaps galore, the boys are recruited by the police chief (Bud Jamison) as police officers. The head of the citizen's league, Mr. Dill (John Tyrrell), warns the police commissioner that he must capture the ape man that is terrorizing the city, or he will have his job.
A Russian inventor by the name Ivan Kouzetsoff travels to England to introduce the British shipping industry to his newly invented and improved propeller blade. When he is in England Kouzetsoff meets the socialite woman Anne Tisdall, and falls head over heels for her. Meeting Anne and hearing her views turn his own previous views and conceptions about the capitalist system and its degenerates up side down. After a lovers' quarrel, Ivan heads back to Russian only to be recalled to England a year later to smooth out imperfections in his design. Despite his efforts, his modifications prove to be unsound and he seems destined to return to the Soviet Union in disgrace.
The Stooges are the Wrong brothers (a parody of the Wright brothers), a trio of aviators in the "Republic of Cannabeer, P.U." who receive an army draft notice. The notice says the brothers have been granted a 30-day deferment of duty on account of their claims that the plane they are inventing, the “Buzzard”, will revolutionize flying. Curly proudly announces that their plane has put them among other "great inventors" like Robert Fulton, Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell and Don Ameche.