The BEST episodes written by Thomas Thompson
#1 - The Martin Gatsby Story
Wagon Train - Season 6 - Episode 4
Wealthy merchant Martin Gatsby, a man with little room for compassion for others, wants the wagon train to keep rolling and demands that Hale leave Caleb Lefton and his family behind, because the inexperienced Lefton is causing delays.
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#2 - The Hunter Malloy Story
Wagon Train - Season 2 - Episode 16
Hunter Malloy and partner get jobs as drivers on the wagon train to rob their boss. Striking gold instead while stopping to repair their wagons, the fever is high as some stop to strike it rich and uncover more than just a few nuggets.
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#3 - The Fourflusher
The Rifleman - Season 2 - Episode 32
A sharecropper enters his colt in a horse race, hoping to win enough money to buy his farm from the owner, who has bet on Mark McCain's entry.
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#4 - The Sacramento Story
Wagon Train - Season 1 - Episode 39
At the end of a long journey, lives were lost. Some made it with their dreams intact. Flint tries to help one of the passengers with theirs and almost bites off too much. Politics are involved as well as unsolicited trips to the Far East.
#5 - The Clayton Tucker Story
Wagon Train - Season 3 - Episode 18
Taking a dangerous route through the desert to join up with the wagon train, a small band of settlers take a turn for the worse when they lose the one man leading them, their scout, and now differ on where they need to go now.
#7 - The Quest
Bonanza - Season 4 - Episode 2
Determined to prove he can succeed at something without the help of his Pa, Hoss, and Adam, Joe sets out on his quest and wins a timber contract for Ponderosa timber, and later discovers that having a family to rely on can definitely be an asset.
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#8 - San Francisco
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 28
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.
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#10 - Incident at Alkali Sink
Rawhide - Season 5 - Episode 29
Burt Harvey is accused of cowardice at Gettysburg by his new father-in-law.
#11 - The Monty Britton Story
Wagon Train - Season 1 - Episode 38
Low on water, Flint scouts for more. When three water holes are dry or poisoned, Fort Paiute seems their only hope but he has to make it back to the wagon train on foot and the only other man who knows the way is believed to be a deserter.
#12 - The Artie Matthewson Story
Wagon Train - Season 5 - Episode 7
Duke finds Flint's dying foster mother who asks Flint to check on her real son Artie who she hasn't seen in five years and has a reputation for getting into trouble with the law. Flint finds him on the right side of the law - or is he.
#13 - The Fear Merchants
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 20
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.
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#14 - The Outcast
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 17
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.
#15 - Tommy
Bonanza - Season 8 - Episode 14
The Cartwrights protect a woman and her deaf-mute little son from the boy's outlaw stepfather.
#16 - The Hobie Redman Story
Wagon Train - Season 5 - Episode 16
When three wagons are late in the desert, Chris sends Duke to find them and bring them to the wagon train as the train cannot wait for them. It may be a suicide mission due to water holes drying up and the missing people's personal issues.
#17 - The Fenton Canaby Story
Wagon Train - Season 7 - Episode 15
Canaby, who is unjustly reputed to have led a wagon train to disaster in the desert, becomes unexpectedly part of Hale's train as Hale has some of the same problems Canaby had and the train carries a widow wanting revenge against Canaby.
#18 - The Gift
Bonanza - Season 2 - Episode 27
While crossing the desert to Yuma, Arizona with a white stallion intended as a birthday present for Ben, Joe runs into a pack of merciless comancheros. His companion, a former comanchero, Emiliano, who raised the horse, must get he and Joe through safely.
#19 - The Payment
The Virginian - Season 3 - Episode 14
Ryker invites the man who raised him to come to Medicine Bow after being released from 10 years in prison. When Ryker finds Abe has invited his family to join him, he knows there are problems as Shiloh makes a record sized cattle shipment.
#20 - The Philip Diedesheimer Story
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 8
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."
#21 - The Newcomers
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 3
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.
#22 - Star Crossed
Bonanza - Season 9 - Episode 23
Candy falls in love with a beautiful young woman, unaware that the man claiming to be her cousin is a bounty hunter who is not only harassing her but has framed her for murder and robbery.
#23 - The Saga of Annie O'Toole
Bonanza - Season 1 - Episode 7
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.
#24 - The Cole Crawford Story
Wagon Train - Season 5 - Episode 28
The young Crawford couple is trying to leave their past behind but having difficulty doing it. The wagon train is crossing a massive ranch and the owner's son refuses to let Mrs. Crawford leave nor will the train members help them.
#25 - The Pursued (1)
Bonanza - Season 8 - Episode 4
A Mormon with two wives is badgered by the town's people and then things get much worse.
#26 - Old Tony
The Rifleman - Season 5 - Episode 26
Mark and his girlfriend Laurie discover that an old hermit is very lonely.
#27 - The Unwanted
Bonanza - Season 10 - Episode 27
Feeling unloved, a Marshal's daughter runs off with a Ponderosa hand her father thinks may be related to the man that shot him.
#28 - A Christmas Story
Bonanza - Season 8 - Episode 15
Warbling Andy Walker returns to Virginia City a big success, along with his shifty Uncle Thaddeus.
#29 - The Other Son
Bonanza - Season 7 - Episode 4
A mule skinner and his two sons are hired by Ben to transport nitroglycerin to California.
#30 - Mighty is the Word
Bonanza - Season 7 - Episode 9
Virginia City's newest preacher is an ex-gunfighter who wants only to build a new church, but the brother of one of his victims has other ideas. The blueprints for the church are said to be a gift from Adam.
#31 - The Lonely Runner
Bonanza - Season 7 - Episode 5
The Cartwrights' friend, Jim Acton, is in danger of losing his prized mare. He has sold a herd of wild horses to horse trader Sam Whipple, and Whipple takes him to court claiming the mare was part of that herd. Acton walks out on the court proceedings, and the judge awards the mare to Whipple. When Acton tries to make a deal with Whipple to buy her back, Whipple shoots at him. Jim kills Whipple in self defense and becomes a wanted man. The Cartwrights are sure he is innocent, but an overzealous deputy under Sheriff Coffee, has other intentions. Acton has only one wish: to run free like a wild horse.