Virginia City is plagued by organized crime, Sam Bryant and his gang.  One of his men, Farmer Perkins, kills a storekeeper, and at his trial, the wife of the store owner is afraid to testify.  When Perkins is sentenced to hang, Bryant kidnaps Ben and wants to exchange Ben for Perkins, which leaves Adam with the most difficult decision of his life.  A stellar cast.

Death at Dawn

Lorne Greene

Pernell Roberts

Dan Blocker

Michael Landon

Season 2

Dark Star

Lotta Crabtree is hired by mining tycoon Alpheus Troy to lure one of the Cartwrights into town and hold him for ransom in exchange for Ponderosa timber rights.

A Rose for Lotta

Greedy opportunist Mark Burdette and his accomplice Early Thorne stir up trouble between the Paiute tribe and the citizens of Virginia City.  Ben discovers Burdette and Thorne are selling antelope beef to the miners and finds the price too high.  He offers the miners beef at a more reasonable price.  Burdette and Thorne retaliate by framing the Paiute's for attacks, by dressing as them and killing ranchers.  Based on a factual accounting.  Lorne Greene's first voice-over narration, and no landing constructed yet for the Ponderosa stairway.

Death on Sun Mountain

John Pennington and his crew want to mine the Ponderosa land by hydraulic means. Ben is totally against this method and evicts them in short order. Hoss is given the task of telling Pennington's men to leave, but soon has a moral dilemma on his hands when he meets Pennington's beautiful sister, Emily. He soon discovers a heartbreaking secret...she's terminally ill; but their relationship soon leads to plenty of trouble for the Cartwrights.

The Newcomers

Trader Mike Wilson attempts to escape punishment by the Paiute Indians after mistreating two of their women, by placing the blame on Adam.  A fierce war between the Paiutes and the California militia follows, and the Paiutes seize Adam as hostage.  Very impressive battle scenes in the this first mini-epic of the series.  This episode did all it could to stage the real thing; 50 Indians were used and 50 cavalry actors and extras were used, and the production involved three days of shooting on location.  This episode encompassed both the biggest cast and most costly stunts.  This episode is based on the factual accounting that occured in May and June of 1860.

The Paiute War

Samuel Clemens arrives in Virginia City to write for the Territorial Enterprise at the same time a crooked politician tries to lay claim on the Ponderosa.

Enter Mark Twain

Little Joe is infatuated wih saloon owner Julia Bulette, whom he imagines is like his late mother.  First episode to reveal backround details concerning Marie Cartwright, and inspired by the true story of a Virginia City madam.  Also, the first episode to showcase Michael Landon.

The Julia Bulette Story

Adam defends the mining claim of Annie O' Toole in a court presided over by Judge Ben Cartwright.  Annie comes to the Washoe Diggings with a claim to a mine filed by her beau, Swede Lundberg.  Swede has two claims and sold one to an acquaintance of theirs named Gregory Spain, creating confusion, that only Judge Ben Cartwright can make a ruling on.

The Saga of Annie O'Toole

Adam and Hoss assist a German engineer in developing the concept of "square set timbering" in the mines.  Based on fact, and the first episode not to include all four Cartwrights.  Hoss refers to the character, Emily, with whom he was in love with in, "The Newcomers".

The Phillip Diedesheimer Story

In a flashback, the legendary prospector arrives on the Ponderosa and participates in the founding of Virginia City.  Coincidentally, guest star Jack Carson played a teller at the Comstock Bank and Trust in the 1942 film, "Gentleman Jim".  This early classic was the second episode filmed.

Mr. Henry Comstock

Virginia City is visited by actress Adah Issacs Menken, who happens to be an old acquaintance of Ben's.  Joe is badly beaten by Adah's jealous suitor, John C. Regan, who is bested in a fight with an enraged Hoss.

The Magnificent Adah

Luther Bishop and Ben Cartwright have had an ongoing land dispute for a number of years, over a small tract called the Truckee Strip.  One of Bishop's employee's has a grudge against the Cartwrights and wants to stir up the feud again, while also harboring designs on Bishop's pretty daughter, Amy.

Joe meets and falls in love with Amy, in spite of the family differences and the two want to marry.  Just when it looks like the feud will end with the union of the two young people, Bishop's man attacks Amy and Joe must come to the rescue.

The Truckee Strip

Adam and Joe reluctantly join a group of vengeful townsmen, who are out to lynch the three men who supposedly killed Vannie Johnson.  The posse is run by Paiute Scroggs and Flint Johnson, the dead woman's husband.  When Adam and Joe clash with them, they both separate and try to reach the three men before the posse does.  This episode's storyline is a variation of the 1943 film "The Ox-Bow Incident".

The Hanging Posse

In a variation of "High Noon", Ben and Hoss must face a gang of outlaws practically all alone when most of Virginia City's citizens go into hiding.  The most action-filled episode since "The Paiute War".

Vendetta

This episode begins with Adam defending the honor of Sue Ellen Terry in a duel.  No one gets shot because the other man misses Adam and Adam generously shoots in the air to end the duel.  Sue Ellen lives with her sister, who seems nice but turns out to be fairly evil, consumed with jealousy because she's getting older and her sister is a young beauty.  When Adam drops Sue Ellen off after a date one night, half way through this episode, someone shoots her dead, and Adam becomes a suspect and is thrown in jail.  When the sheriff suggests that Adam escape, he does it, but when he walks out, someone tries to shoot him.  He chases after them but doesn't find them, and soon after hears Sue Ellen's sister scream.  He runs up the stairs to find her dead, and of course, is then suspected of that murder as well.  Of course, his family helps him during the last half hour, and it all turns out that someone we should not have suspected did all the murders, but that he actually wasn't trying to hit

The Sisters

Hoss and Joe come across a pregnant Indian woman while hunting bighorn sheep and must deliver her baby.  Despite touches of humor, including a scene in which Joe refers to a meal as "cattle fodder", the story does not have an altogether happy ending.

The Last Hunt

Ben sends Hoss and Joe to Monterey to purchase an expensive seed bull.  The first of Blocker and Landon's many comic misadventures, although the casual use of violence, as in the rapier fight, is oddly uncharacteristic for the series.  Hoss reveals his real name to be Eric for the first time.

El Toro Grande

Because she is related to criminals, a young woman is ostracized by everyone but the the Cartwrights.  She unwisely seeks solace with an ex-con friend of Joe's, Clay Renton, and it's up to Ben to straighten everything out.  First episode to have a chapter title after the cast credits.

The Outcast

As the Civil War approaches, Adam and Joe clash over which side to support.  The situation is complicated by the arrival of Frederick Kyle, a Southern sympathizer.  He was an old friend of Joe's mother and viewers also discover that Joe's middle name is Francis.

A House Divided

In the first all-out comic episode of the series, Hoss and Joe travel to Kiowa Flats, Texas, where they are mistaken for the notorious Slade Brothers, also played by Blocker and Landon.

The Gunmen

The Cartwrights encounter racial bigotry in Virginia City and end up protecting a Chinese boy from mob violence.  Victor Sen Yung, in his largest role to date, speaks normally in the presence of his fellow countrymen, but reverts to broken English when with the Cartwrights.

The Fear Merchants

In "The Spanish Grant", a young bargirl, Rosita Morales is pretending to be a Spanish noblewoman named Isabella Marie Inez de la Cuesta and at the end of the story, it's revealed she is really Rosita Morales, but on the other hand, is she really Rosita Morales?  This little twist at the end is simply entertaining everytime it's viewed, with the viewer able to determine the young woman's real identity at the end of act four.

The Spanish Grant

A shiftless sheepherder, Jeb Drummond, encroaches his herd of sheep on the Ponderosa and refuses to budge.  He resists all of Ben's attempts to throw him off his land and finally resorts to taking Adam prisoner in exchange for ownership of the ranch.

Blood on the Land

When a tough U.S. Marshal from California arrests a Ponderosa hand, Dave Walker, for murder, Adam and Hoss go along to make sure their employee reaches Los Angeles alive.  In one scene, Adam is dressed in black for the first time.  In another, Hoss, upon seeing Southern California for the first time, remarks, "It sure ain't never gonna amount to much".  Later, Adam makes an amusing reference to the chow Joe says he was forced to eat in "The Last Hunt".

Desert Justice

Nevada Territory is awaiting statehood, and Ben considers running for governor until he learns he is wanted for murder in New Orleans.  Inspector Charles Leduque arrives and says Ben is wanted for commiting the murder 20 years earlier, and after Joe kills his bodyguard in self-defense, Inspector Leduque makes it appear the other way around.  Ben has no choice but go with Leduque, to clear his name in a very suspense-filled episode.  Once again, there are several references to Joe's mother, and viewers are shown Marie's grave near the shore of Lake Tahoe.

The Stranger

After Adam is bushwhacked by three army deserters, Ben tracks them down, and tackles the brutal Captain Bolton who is pursuing them.

Escape to Ponderosa

A restaurant owner whom Ben and Adam have confronted over stolen Ponderosa beef ends up dead one night.  His daughter, Sally Byrnes runs the cafe and in her resentment, wrongfully accuses Ben and Adam of murdering her father and they are sentenced to hang.  A rancher by the name of Hawkins is also jealous of the Cartwrights and has hired his men to stop the town from helping Ben and Adam, ensuring they hang.  Hoss and Joe are willing to stop them, but Ben insists they stay within the limits of the law.

The Avenger

Adam takes Ben's friends, Lord Marion Dunsworth and Lady Beatrice, on a hunting expedition, and they are captured by a gang of crude thieves and murderers.  During one early scene, after listening to Ben reminisce, Hoss says, "Always like to hear Pa get wound up.  He don't do it often."

The Last Trophy

In this comic episode, the first to take place far from the ranch, Ben, Hoss, and Joe deliver a herd to San Francisco.  Although he warns his sons to be careful in the big city ("This is not the Ponderosa!"), Ben is the one who is shanghaied and must be rescued.

San Francisco

Len Keith, a miner, wants to purchase some land adjacent to the Ponderosa from rancher Andy McKaren.  Andy's son, Tod, is anxious to sell.  Keith has offered him a partnership,and more importantly, he is in love with Keith's daughter.  When Ben warns Andy that a mine on the property would foul up Ponderosa water, Andy agrees not to sell the land.  Len Keith, determined to get that land, plants tick infested cattle in a Ponderosa herd to turn Andy against the Cartwrights.

Bitter Water

Hoss takes Billy Allen, the young son of a convicted felon under his wing, then is forced to kill his father and Billy will not forgive him.  The most emotional Hoss story since "The Newcomers" and one of Blocker's best.

Feet of Clay

Joe falls in love with Tirza, an undeniably strange gypsy girl who says she is cursed and never does seem to "snap out of it".  The first episode of the series with a supernatural flavor, directed appropriately enough, by Lewis Allen, who made the classic ghost film "The Uninvited".

The High-Sierra adventures of Ben Cartwright and his sons as they run and defend their ranch while helping the surrounding community.

Death at Dawn

Seasons14

Season 1 Episodes32

Cast4

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Episode Summary