7.2/10139 votes#1 - Ironside
Season 1 Episode 1 - Aired 3/28/1967
While on vacation, Chief of Detectives Robert Ironside of the San Francisco police force is shot by an unknown assailant and paralyzed from the waist down. Fearing he will be forced to retire he convinces the powers that be to to make him a Special Consultant to the Commisioner of Police, who is an old friend. With his team, consisting of police detective Ed Brown, police woman Eve Whitfield, and reformed Juvenile offender Mark Sanger. he tries to find the gunman who put him in a wheelchair.
Director: James Goldstone
Writer: N/A
7.6/10121 votes#2 - Message from Beyond
Season 1 Episode 2 - Aired 9/14/1967
A substantial sum of money is stolen from a race-track, whilst Ironside and his team are present, and the Chief is determined to crack the case. The only clue is a car, crashed by the inside man, but if it has a secret to tell it is not going to give it up easily.
Director: Michael Caffey
Writer: Don Mankiewicz
7.6/10108 votes#3 - The Leaf in the Forest
Season 1 Episode 3 - Aired 9/21/1967
Lonely old women are being strangled, and Chief Ironside believes that there is more to it than just a serial killer at work. Setting Eve up as a potential victim requires a little ingenuity, but it might just prove to be worth the effort.
Director: Leo Penn
Writer: N/A
7.4/10104 votes#4 - Dead Man's Tale
Season 1 Episode 4 - Aired 9/28/1967
A notorious gangster is preparing to turn State's evidence when he is murdered, but Ironside pretends that the man is still alive, and ready to talk, in order to catch the killer and nail a major criminal.
Director: Don Weis
Writer: N/A
7.6/1092 votes#5 - Eat, Drink and Be Buried
Season 1 Episode 5 - Aired 10/5/1967
When TV personality Francesca Kirby starts to receive death threats, her old friend Robert T. Ironside is soon on the case. When the threats become attempts on her life, he begins to delve deeper. Will he like what he finds?
Director: William A. Graham
Writer: N/A
8.2/1097 votes#6 - The Taker
Season 1 Episode 6 - Aired 10/12/1967
A policeman known to Ironside for some years is shot dead whilst on an investigation. The evidence points to him being crooked, but the Chief is determined to prove otherwise.
Director: Don Weis
Writer: Winston Miller
8.0/10102 votes#7 - An Inside Job
Season 1 Episode 7 - Aired 10/19/1967
Two killers break out of their cell in the precinct and hold Ironside and Eve Whitfield hostage, forcing the Chief to come up with a fool-proof plan for their escape. As always Ironside has a trick or two of his own up his sleeve.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: N/A
7.2/1088 votes#8 - Tagged for Murder
Season 1 Episode 8 - Aired 10/26/1967
An apparently accidental death occurs, but Ed risks his shield on the certainty that it was murder. When Ironside gets on the case a murky tale of murdered ex-servicemen and an old robbery is soon uncovered.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: N/A
8.1/1090 votes#9 - Let My Brother Go
Season 1 Episode 9 - Aired 11/2/1967
Ironside is having problems keeping a group of local kids on the straight and narrow, and enlists the help of football star Bat Masterson, an old friend of Mark's. Bat's brother Joe, however, is a rather less savoury character, and Bat has to choose which side he is on.
Director: Don Weis
Writer: N/A
7.4/1076 votes#10 - Light at the End of the Journey
Season 1 Episode 10 - Aired 11/9/1967
A recently blinded woman is witness to a murder, and not knowing that she couldn't see him the murderer attempts to silence her. Ironside is on hand to protect her, and also to help her to come to terms with her new way of life.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: Robert Van Scoyk
8.2/1090 votes#11 - The Monster of Comus Towers
Season 1 Episode 11 - Aired 11/16/1967
An ingenious art theft takes place at Comus Towers Art Museum, and a guard is murdered in the process. Chief Ironside takes the case, but another death is to follow; this time the proprietor of the museum, who is an old friend of the Chief's.
Director: Don Weis
Writer: N/A
7.6/1082 votes#12 - The Man Who Believed
Season 1 Episode 12 - Aired 11/23/1967
A woman who wrote a cheering letter to Ironside when he was recovering from being shot, dies in an apparent suicide. Convinced that it was murder Ironside investigates, and uncovers the sad truth. (NB - As part of the incidental music, this episode heavily features the original song From The Day You're Born, which was reused later in the season, in episode Something For Nothing, where it was sung by guest star James Farentino).
Director: Anton Leader
Writer: N/A
8.1/1094 votes#13 - A Very Cool Hot Car
Season 1 Episode 13 - Aired 11/30/1967
Cars are being stolen in worryingly high numbers, and with the numbers recovered falling dramatically, the signs point to a crooked cop somewhere in the department. Mark is convinced that the cop in question is innocent, but nobody else seems very sure.
Director: N/A
Writer: Luther Davis
7.4/1090 votes#14 - The Past Is Prologue
Season 1 Episode 14 - Aired 12/7/1967
A friend of the Chief's turns out to have been living under an assumed identity for the last nineteen years, and is wanted in New York for murder. The mayor is determined to have him extradited back to NY for execution, but Ironside is equally determined to save him, especially when it becomes clear that he is innocent.
Director: Don Weis
Writer: Paul Mason
7.1/1075 votes#15 - Girl in the Night
Season 1 Episode 15 - Aired 12/21/1967
Ed falls for a girl he meets after hearing her playing the piano in a bar in Las Vegas. While they are out together Ed is knocked unconscious and the girl disappears. Ed, Ironside and the team try to figure out the mysterious circumstances behind her disappearance.
Director: Ralph Senensky
Writer: Dean Riesner, True Eames Boardman
7.8/1079 votes#16 - The Fourteenth Runner
Season 1 Episode 16 - Aired 12/28/1967
A visiting Soviet athlete vanishes during a practice run, and Ironside is placed on the case. It soon turns out that the 'trustworthy Soviet hero' is anything but, and that the athlete is working for American Intelligence. Has he simply disappeared, however, or has he been found out?
Director: Don Weis
Writer: Ivan Goff, Ben Roberts
8.2/1077 votes#17 - Force of Arms
Season 1 Episode 17 - Aired 1/4/1968
A local businessman sets up an organized vigilante force to try to clean up San Francisco. When a key member is murdered, it becomes clear that the "Second Force" has got severely out of hand.
Director: Anton Leader
Writer: Ivan Goff, Warren Duff
7.7/1075 votes#18 - Memory of an Ice Cream Stick
Season 1 Episode 18 - Aired 1/11/1968
An old friend of Mark's is a suspect in a murder investigation, but Mark refuses to accept that the man may be bad. Ironside tries to convince him otherwise, but in the process risks breaking his own friendship with Mark.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: Sy Salkowitz
7.8/1079 votes#19 - To Kill a Cop
Season 1 Episode 19 - Aired 1/25/1968
When Ed and two colleagues arrest a violent man they don't take his threats seriously, but when the other two officers are murdered, Ed is convinced that he knows who the killer is. Suspended from duty he sets himself up as the next victim, determined to prove that his suspicions are correct.
Director: Anton Leader
Writer: N/A
7.6/1075 votes#20 - The Lonely Hostage
Season 1 Episode 20 - Aired 2/1/1968
A cop goes bad and shoots a fellow officer, then offers to give himself up to Chief Ironside. Instead, he takes the Chief and Mark hostage, and plans to kill them as soon as his escape is certain. Ironside has to convince the man's wife that her husband is no longer the man she married.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: N/A
7.8/1080 votes#21 - The Challenge
Season 1 Episode 21 - Aired 2/8/1968
A psychiatrist friend of Ironside's is murdered, and the only clues are his collection of artworks. Is one of the artists the murderer? And if so, which one?
Director: Anton Leader
Writer: John McGreevey
6.6/1069 votes#22 - All in a Day's Work
Season 1 Episode 22 - Aired 2/15/1968
During a night on the town, Eve Whitfield kills an armed robber who tries to shoot her. When he turns out to be a boy just turned seventeen, she doubts her abilities as a police officer, particularly when half of the town seems convinced that he was a model teenager. It soon turns out that this is far from the truth.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: Evan Hunter
8.1/1090 votes#23 - Something for Nothing
Season 1 Episode 23 - Aired 2/22/1968
A compulsive (and unlucky) gambler is in debt to a local mobster for $32,000. Ironside wants to put the mobster away, but only can if the gambler is prepared to turn state's evidence. The Chief has to persuade him to turn against the man who is offering him a way out of debt. (NB - The second episode to feature original song From The Day You're Born.)
Director: Robert Butler
Writer: Anthony Terpiloff
7.9/1083 votes#24 - Barbara Who
Season 1 Episode 24 - Aired 2/29/1968
A friend of Ironside's turns out to be an amnesiac victim without a past. The need to discover who she really is comes to the forefront when somebody tries to kill her, and it becomes clear that the Chief's hopes for a long term relationship might not be possible with this particular girl.
Director: James Sheldon
Writer: N/A
6.8/1065 votes#25 - Perfect Crime
Season 1 Episode 25 - Aired 3/7/1968
Lecturing on a law course at a local college, the Chief finds that one of the students is planning to prove that the perfect crime can be committed. The person responsible appears to be particularly cold and calculating, and the Chief finds that he is facing true genius.
Director: Charles S. Dubin
Writer: N/A
The Best Episodes of Ironside Season 1
Every episode of Ironside Season 1 ranked from best to worst. Discover the Best Episodes of Ironside Season 1!
When an assassin's bullet confines him to a wheelchair for life ending his career as Chief of Detectives, Robert T. Ironside becomes a consultant to...
Genres:CrimeDramaMystery
Network:NBC
Season 1 Ratings Summary
"Ironside" is the best rated episode of "Ironside" season 1. It scored 7.2/10 based on 139 votes. Directed by James Goldstone and written by N/A, it aired on 3/28/1967. This episode is rated 0.4 points higher than the second-best, "Message from Beyond".