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What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravinient. Okay. Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter available right down the street at a.m. p.m. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. p.m. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from AM PM what more could you want? Stop by AM PM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience too much good stuff. Hey, this is Sarah. Look, I'm standing out front of a.m. p.m. Right now and well, you're sweet and all, but I found something more fulfilling. Even kind of cheesy. But I like it. Sure, you met some of my dietary needs, but they've just got it all. So farewell oatmeal. So long, you strange soggy. Break up with bland breakfasts and taste AM PMs bacon, egg and cheese biscuit made with K tree eggs, smoked bacon and melty cheese on a buttery biscuit. AM P M. Too much good stuff. Welcome to the Old Time Radio Westerns. I'm your host, Andrew Rines and I'm excited to bring you another episode. This is one of over 80 episodes released monthly for for your enjoyment. You can find more western shows at our website by going to otrwesterns.com now let's get into this episode. Ladies and gentlemen, here is William Conrad. Thank you, George. For nearly 10 years I had the pleasure of portraying a man named Matt Dillon. He's the principal character in radio's first adult western drama, Gunsmoke. Tonight you're going to hear the biography of this exceptional radio series. And helping me tell this fascinating story will be writer John Meston, producer, director Norman McDonald, my colleague Chester Polly Bear, my other colleague Doc, who is one of the sweetest, most wonderful men who ever lived. Howard McNair, our leading lady Georgia Ellis, composer, conductor Rex Corey. And from the many others that brought you this realistic portrayal of the American west, of course, you'll hear some of our best stories too. And now, Gunsmoke. What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cray venient. Okay. Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter available right down the street at a.m. p.m. Or a savory breakfast. I can Grab in just a second at AM pm. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from AM pm. What more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravinience. Am, pm Too much good stuff. Around God city and in the territory on west. There's just one way to handle the killers and the spoilers, and that's with a U. S. Marshal and the smell of gun smoke. Gunsmoke, starring William Conrad. The transcribed story of the violence that moved west with young America and the story of a man who moved with it. I'm that man. Matt Dillon, United States Marshal. The first man they look for and the last they want to meet. It's a chancy job, and it makes a man watchful and a little lonely. It was a long ride from Dodge up to Ponker Creek in the Dakota territory. And I killed a good horse getting there. But I caught Lee Trumbull. He was asleep in the clump of willow, and I took him without a fight. We rode his horse double into Sioux Falls, but we came the rest of the way back to Dodge in style, by stagecoach. At least I thought we were traveling in style. Lee didn't seem to care much for it. In fact, he wouldn't even talk until the stage pulled into Dodge and drove up Front street or the plaza. You're making a bad mistake, Marshall. Is that so? I didn't kill anybody. There are two witnesses say you did, Lee. They're lying. Then why did you run? My brother Dolph, he said you was after me. That's why I run. You'll get a trial. You can talk about it then. I ain't gonna stand trial, Marshal. Dolph will get me out of jail before that. Is that so? I never figured. Dolph is a man to do much of anything. You've been against us Trumbos ever since we come to Dodge, ain't you, Marshall? Yeah, I have. Neither one of you is any good. See what I mean? There's your brother Dolph now, waiting to welcome you back. How'd he know I was coming? I wired Chesterton Sioux Falls a week ago. The Daniel deputy of yours isn't there. Chester's not my deputy. Well, he sure acts like it. Yeah, he does, doesn't he? Now, here we are. You got my brother in there, Marshall. Come on out, Lee. You're going to be sorry for this. Now, that's what Lee's been Telling me. Come on, Lee, get on out of there. I'm coming, Marshall. I'm coming. Shoot him, doll. Don't look at me, Marshall. I didn't even draw. No, no, you didn't. Did your, Dolph. You didn't have to kick him like that. You hurt him, he'll get his win back. I got him covered, Mr. Dillon. Hello, Chester. Don't you try nothing like that again, Lee. It's all right, Chester. The fights out of him. You want me to take Dolph's gun? That's funny. I keep forgetting. You do wear a gun, don't you, Dolph? Nothing wrong with wearing a gun, Marshall. There is, the way you wear one. What do you mean? Well, you might run into somebody who doesn't know you're afraid to use it. He might shoot you before he found that out. You pick a coward, Marshall. Now, Chester. Yes, sir. I'm going over to the office. When Lee here stops groaning, hurt him over and lock him up, will you? Okay. And if Dolph gives you any trouble, shoot him, Marshall. Get going, Dolph. Go on, move. You'll be sorry for this. I'll make you sorry for it. Oh, say, there's a fellow waiting for you over at the office, Mr. Dillon. He's a stranger to me, but he wanted to see you. All right, Chester. Oh, by the way, welcome back. Thanks. It's been most a month you've been gone. We sure did miss you here. There were times when I missed being here, Chester. Don't let Lee get away from me now, huh? I'd hate to make that ride all over again. No, sir, I won't. Oh, I sure won't. Oh, stop breathing like that, Ian. Get on your feet. You ain't hurt. Whoa. Hello, Matt. Hack. Hack. Brian. How are you? Good to see you. You're surprised to see me alive, huh, Matt? Why, Hack, it's been at least 10 years, isn't it? Man ain't born a good kill Me. Leastways, I ain't run into him yet. Or maybe you're just lucky. Luckier than you, anyways. A lot luckier sometimes. The way I recall it now, you're thinking about Santa Fe. Yeah. He wasn't very lucky that day, Matt. Remember how it was? You backed into a corner with nothing but a beer bottle in your hand and three of John Chisholm's drunk cowboys about to empty your guns into you. Yeah. Yeah. Then you walked in and killed every one of them. Yeah, it was real surprise, wasn't it, Matt? John Chisholm's been after you ever since, hasn't he? Hacked. Oh, that was just the first of Chisholm's men I've killed, Matt. Been riding with Billy the Kid till about half a year ago. Oh, why'd you quit? Never could make out if Billy was working for or against Chisholm. Besides, didn't pay enough. But you're the one, Matt. When I got to Dodge last night, heard you was U.S. marshal here, I just didn't believe it. Well, being a marshal isn't that hard a job. Oh, you can handle it, all right. I know that. What I mean is, it kind of sudden. Find a man you used to know. Being a U.S. marshal. Well, I gotta earn my keep somehow. Oh, sure, sure. What are you doing to Dodge anyway? I don't know, Matt. I don't know yet. I've been over to Wagon Bed Spring, stretching my legs. You sleeping in a bed? Doing a little gambling and the like. Now, some fell here sent for me. I ain't seen him yet. But if it's a job he's got, I sure need the money. Well, good luck with it, Hack. We'll get together later and have a drink. Straight ahead, Lee. I see that door there. The. What's this? Just a prisoner. What do you do? I didn't do nothing. Shut up and keep walking me. What you locking him up for, man? Murder. That's bad. That's real bad. Murder's always bad. I don't mean that. I mean locking a man up. I couldn't stand that, Matt. I never been in jail. I never ain't gonna be. Well, then you better stay sober around here, Hack. And you're taking it back. About that drink. No, no, you'll be safe as long as you're with me. Oh, I don't know, man. I've been around you when it wasn't so safe. I'll see you later. Yeah, sure. Hack. Hey, come on in, mister. I'm leaving. So long, Matt. So long, Hank. Marshall. Dylan. Hello. How are you? Marshall, I got something I got to tell you. It's my duty, the way I see it. Well, what's the trouble? Hello, Ollie. What you doing here? Well, I come to tell the marshal something, Chester, but I sure don't like him informing on people. You understand me, Marshall? What's it about? Early Dolph Trumbo, that's what. You got his brother Lee in jail here? We sure have. I just locked him up myself. Well, Dolph's coming to get him out. He's over at the Alphaganza right now, talking it up. Talking what up? Well, there's the men at the bar there, Marshall. And Dolph's buying them drinks and telling them his brother's plum innocent and they gotta raid the jail here and get him out. You mean he's forming a mob? That's what he's doing. And I don't like it. There's gonna be trouble. Sure. Oh, Lee, thanks very much for telling me this, but don't worry about the trouble. I'll put a stop to that right now. Come on, Chester. Yes, you. Wouldn't, you know, Ball Crumble do something stupid like this, Mr. Dylan trying to form a mob to take his brother out of jail. How well it works sometimes, Sister. It's not in Dodge. It don't. Oh, not so far, anyway. Here's the all apprehension. Now, don't get in the way, huh? No, You're right. Something else. There's nothing to be afraid of. You man. You'll be led by one of the best gunmen in the whole country, I promise you that. And we'll have justice in Dodge once and for all. Justice. What do you want, Marshall? What are you doing here? Olie told you. I seen him sneak out. I just been talking, Marshal. No harm in talking, is there? Lee's innocent anyway. He shouldn't be in jail. And I'm going to get him out, too. These men here are all with me, and we're going with them. Quiet, Bartender. This place is closed for the rest of the day. No more liquor. And you men get out of here. And don't let me find any of you together again, not for a long time. Now get moving. Oh, here, Chester. I'll pay for the beer. You leaving, Mr. Dylan? Kenny just came downstairs. I haven't seen her yet. I think I'll go over to say hello. Yes, sir. Like for me to go across the street and see if they're keeping the Alanza closed? No, it's all right. I told them they could open up again tonight. Well, thanks for the beer, Mr. Dylan. Sure, Chester. Sure. Welcome to Dark Stranger. How are you, Kitty? Fine. I'd be even better if you brought two beers over instead of one, but you can sit down anyway. Well, you can take this one, Kitty. It's kind of warm. I don't want it. Matt, do you suppose the day will ever come when having good manners will be a requirement for the marshal's office? Well, if it ever does, Kitty, I don't guess they'll need marshals anymore. Yeah, maybe you're right. At that. Well, how have you been, huh? Everything okay? Well, I was making out pretty good math till I broke my toe. Broke your toe? Yep. How'd you do that? In the line of duty. Right here in this saloon. I got tromped on dancing with a Texas cowboy who should have been spending his trail money on red silk handkerchiefs and soda water instead of me. He couldn't have been over 16. Darn fool. There's not much you can do for a broken toe, is it? No. At least it doesn't hurt when I'm sitting down. I hear you broke up Dolph Trumbo's party at the Alaganza this afternoon. Oh. Huh. You hear just about everything, don't you, Kitty? Men, they talk more than women. This place is full of men, day and night. You think if I closed my eyes and prayed real hard, they'd all go away? Well, if they did, what would you do for a living that'll keep me awake? Say, there's your friend Dolph now. Just came in. Oh, there's a stranger with him that. Well, I'll be. What's the matter? Who is he? He's a gunman, Kitty. That's so. Yeah, I guess he's about the handiest man with a gun that ever hit Dodge. Dolph's gone and hired him a gunman. Who is he, anyway? What's his name? He's a friend of mine, Kitty. A friend of yours? Yeah. Good friend. He saved my life once, but now I guess he's going to try to get it back. His name's Klein. Hack Klein. The government never did pay me much for enforcing the law and Dodge. But even if they doubled it, there were times when I'd like to acquit. I sat there with Kitty and watched the two men at the bar. They had a drink and they shook hands. And then Hack walked out. I got up and I followed him, Hollering me, Mac. Yeah, Hack. What for? Where you staying? Dodge House. Huh? Got a room? I. I'd like to talk to you. Street'll do okay. Dolph was trying to form a mob this afternoon. Hack, he wanted to raid his brother out of jail. I heard about it when I went to break it up. I heard him saying they'd be led by one of the best gunmen in the country. That wouldn't be Dolph himself? No. He's afraid of guns. He. He meant you didn't. Heck, I hadn't talked to him yet. He was just guessing I'd come in. And you have not with no mob. I told him that. I don't work with mobs. You should have known better than to say that. How do you work, Hack? Alone? By myself. I'm a pretty good gunman, Matt. Yeah, Yeah, I know. It saved my life once. You're being a good gunman. Yeah. Matt turn his brother loose. I get paid if you do. Look, Heck, Lee Trumbo murdered a man. He's gonna stand trial for it. I don't get paid if he stands trial. But you got paid for shooting me. That's what Dove said. That was his deal. Well. Oh, they tell me you're better with a gun. You used to be, Matt. Hack, I don't want to fight. You afraid, Mac? How'd you get to be marshal, anyways? It's a job. I took it. Well, I've been offered a job, too, and I took it. Yeah, but you had better jobs, Hack. Well, it's been bothering me some, Matt. I took an awful chance saving your life once. Now I got to take another to kill you. That don't make much sense, does it? Look, Hack, why don't you forget it, huh? Go on back to wagon bed spin. I'll lend you some money to see if you know it ain't that easy, Matt. I back out on this, the word will get around. Nobody will hire me for nothing no more. My reputation won't be worth probate. Did Billy the Kid pay you to kill men? Of course not. Of course not. That was for pleasure. You know how I hate John Chisholm. And you come down a long way, Heck, selling your gun. I killed a man for pay over to Lahunta. Didn't bother me none. Who was he? I don't know. Some gambler. Pretty good gunman, though. Tell me something, Hack. Did Dolph say how his brother murdered that man here? Dolph claims he didn't do it at all. Well, there were two witnesses who saw him do it. The man was a buffalo skinner, unarmed. He didn't even have a knife on him. But he refused to buy Lee Trumbo a drink. So Lee shot him unarmed. That's right. Shot an unarmed man. You think it over, Hack. I'll see you tomorrow. Good night. A man like Hack prime had his own peculiar sense of honor. The idea of shooting me seemed to bother him less than the fact that Lee Trumbo had killed an unarmed man. Later that night, I heard he'd been seen having an argument with Dan, so I figured I'd won. But another Killin and Dodge. Either me or Hack had been avoided until early next morning. Word came that a man had been shot at the Dodge House. I sent Chester on over while I went up and got Doc Adams. How do you know the man isn't already dead, Matt? I don't know, Doc. Well, it doesn't matter. I'll probably make more money off of him dead dead than alive. How? Well, I get paid for autopsies, don't I? Sure, yeah, but just try to collect for the ones I keep alive. Just you try it. And I'm glad I don't have to, Doc. But I still notice you buy a new buggy ever since. Oh, yes, we out before racing across the prairie, delivering babies, setting bones, digging out bullets. Delivering babies. Well, exercise, keep the man young. It's a good thing I don't depend on sympathy to keep me young. Now, here we are. Mr. Dylan. Mr. Dylan. Oh, hello, Doc. Where is he? Just in that room right there, number 12. And you know who it is? It's O. O? Yes, sir. And Hack Prine. Charlie. It's Hack's room, Mr. Dylan. He did it. All right. Let's take a look. Where's Hack now, Ch? I don't know, sir. Nobody's seen him for the past hour. I kept everybody out of the room. Mr. Dylan. All right, now, stand aside here, boys. Let the marshland dock through. Come on, let him. Let me through. Let me through here. It's O, all right. He's dead, Matt. Real dead. Three, four hours, probably. Nobody heard a shot or nothing. Mr. Dillon, when the clerk come on duty about an hour ago, he saw Hack Brian walk out of here. Why? Anybody want to kill poor little Oli? I do not understand. I'll bet I know. Mr. Dylan. What, Justin? You didn't talk Hack out of trying to kill you after all. He went back to Dolph last night and told him he'd take the job. Then he figured the only way to get you into a fight was to shoot somebody. Though you'd have to come after him. Yeah, maybe. Now, come on, let's start looking for him. I guess Alabanza is the only place we haven't looked in, Mr. Dylan. He's got to be there. Unless maybe he's going to try to bushwhack you. Hack may be a paid killer, Chester, but he always faces man head on. Yes, sir. That come right from Alphabet? Yeah. Mr. Dillon there, Jack. He's coming out. Yeah. All right. Get off the street, Chester. Yes, sir. Morning, Matt. Hello. Hack just killed a man. That saloon there. Dolph Trumbo. I killed him. I give him a chance, but he wouldn't draw. I killed him anyways. That's too bad, Hack. Ain't no man gonna frame me. I never thought you killed Olie, but I wanted to hear you say so. How you know I didn't do it? It wouldn't be your style to kill a defenseless little fellow like that, would it? Of course not. So while you were out gambling last night, Dolph killed him and dumped him in your room. I found him there and then I went after Dolph. Ain't no man can do that to me, Hack. Him. According to the law. You murdered Dolph. I'm gonna have to arrest you. What? You're gonna have to stand trial for it. Oh no, Matt. No, sir. I ain't going to jail. Not me, Matt. Never. I'm a law man, Hack. I gotta arrest you, Matt. I told Dolph last night I wasn't gonna take his job. I told him I was going to leave town. You're under arrest, Hack. All right. I guess you've got to do it. Let's go for it, man. No, Hack, no. Let's see what happens. Oh, you. You're sure good, Matt. You're awful good. Yeah. Better this way, man, than getting paid to fight. You sure? Sure it is. There weren't no reason to fight you. Not that way. I can't see you no more. It's like being underwater. I can't see nothing. Mr. Dillon, that was awful good shooting. I never seen nothing as fast as that in my whole life. My, I'll bet he didn't know what hit him. Way he's fun around there when. When you. Mr. Dillon? Mr. Dillon. What's the matter, Mr. Dylan? What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravinient. Okay. Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at am, pm. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at am, pm. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from ampm. What more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience. Am, pm Too much. Good stuff. Hey, this is Sarah. Look, I'm standing out front of a.m. p.m. Right now and, well, you're sweet and all, but I found something more fulfilling, even kind of cheesy, but I like it. Sure, you met some of my dietary needs, but they've just got it all. So farewell, oatmeal so long, you strange soggy. Break up with bland breakfasts and taste AMPM's bacon, egg and cheese Biscuit made with K tree eggs, smoked bacon and melty cheese on a buttery biscuit. AM PM Too much Good stuff. Now here is your host, John Hickman. Good evening, everyone. The story you're about to hear is long overdue in the telling. It's the story of Gunsmoke, one of the most successful radio properties of recent times. The story, like a typical Gunsmoke script, is filled with drama, love, tragedy, fact and emotion. It's also a story that up until the present has been largely ignored by serious broadcast historians. Cecil Smith, writing in his Los Angeles times column in September 1975, said Gunsmoke was the dramatization of the American epic legend of the west, our own Iliad and odyssey created of the standard elements of the dime novel and the pulp Western as romanticized by Buntline, Hart and Twain. It was ever the stuff of legend. Those legends, facts and fantasies were brilliantly blended by writer John Meston in his portrayal of Dodge City, Kansas, in the 1870s. Meston's Cowtown was a microcosm of the American west, and in the center of it was Marshal Matt Dillon. We met and came to know him, his friends and his enemies, and we learned of their life in a town referred to by historian Lucius Beebe as a suburb of hell. The picture that Reston painted of Kansas is remarkably accurate. There really was a Front street in Dodge City. You actually could buy a drink at the Long Branch Saloon, the same saloon where Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson called the bluff of psychopathic killer Clay Allison, branding him a coward and driving him out of town. Chances are there was a doctor similar to Meston's. Most likely, the buffalo steak served in the restaurants of the period did taste like shoe leather, and I can guarantee you that there were many kiddies in that Babylon of the plains. Tracing how the west has been dramatized by other writers would take five hours in itself. Suffice it to say that scores of writers have attempted to portray America moving West, from Ned Buntline of a century ago to Zane Gray of recent vintage. The west has been portrayed in feature pictures by such box office attractions as William S. Hart and Roy Rogers, and television has given us such thrillers as Hopalong Cassidy and Wild Bill Hickok. Radio Prior to a certain Saturday evening in 1952 offered Tom Mix, Red Rider and the Lone Ranger, all in stories about good guys and bad guys, roping, rustling, fights, chases and shootouts. And practically all of it was aimed at an adolescent audience. Looking back, it seems strange that it took from 1926, when network radio began, to 1952 a total of 26 years for someone to offer an adult portrayal of the American West. The reason for radio's disinterest is best explained, I think, by the Peabody Award winning writer, producer and director, William N. Robeson. It's the same old story who Bright young men who contributed the ideas to radio were urban oriented. We were operating out of Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. Those who operated out of Los Angeles, their subsidiary ethnic characters would be Japanese, like Mr. Watanabe, a house servant who featured in one some situation comedy of years ago. Those of us who operated out of New York, our ethnic characters would be the stock black or the stock Irishman. And those who did their radio out of Chicago ate the manners of New York, ate the mores of New York. But they wouldn't think for a moment to look towards the West. They were very close to it, therefore they overlooked it. One of radio's first attempts to treat the west on more adult basis than Tom Mix or Red Rider was with a CBS program called Hawk Larrabee. The program debuted in the summer of 1947 and was directed by Bill Roy. Come along, folks, and listen to the tale of Huff Laraby on the Western trail. The Columbia Broadcasting System presents Hawk Laraby starring Barton Yarborough and his stories of the timeless West. Stories of men and women, famous and infamous, who loved and hated, lived and died in the colorful drama of the American West. Stories chronicled for you by Hop Larrabee. Larrabee was an assignment for me. I did not dream it up. I think probably it was Ernie Martin's idea. Ernie Martin was the program director at that time. He went on to become a very successful theatrical producer with such things. Whereas Charlie and Mame and things like that. I don't know what his thinking was, but it was decided in the upper reaches of management to try a western and see what would happen, to see if it had any commercial bites. So they put it on Saturday afternoon. I doubt if it went 13 weeks. The original title was Hawk Durango. Then they discovered that Columbia Pictures down the street had released a movie called the Durango Kid. So they figured they better change that. It was a series of stories centered around the main character whose name was Hawk Larrabee, a cowhand on a ranch in Texas, played by Barton Yarborough, who had a wonderful and authentic Texas accent. Well, I might have knowed Rita wasn't fooling. Cause next morning I got a message to meet Colonel Grayson in his office next to the ranch house. And there she was, standing behind his wheelchair, looking like a poker player. Just filled a bobtail flush. Hawk, Rita's got a fool idea. She wants to go on that cattle drive. Hawk knows all about it, dad. Women is bad luck on a cattle drive, Colonel. I've been trying to tell her that, Hawk. Superstition. Well, how about Cape Mulroney? Went up the Chisholm Trail with a cross tea outfit. The herd was lost. Yeah, and the Comanches got Aggie Dawson's heard. And the drive at Sierra Parks went on. Well, they ain't never been heard from since. Oh, coincidence, that's all it is. Rita, this idea of yours is sheer tomfoolery. Dad, since you can't go along, you ought to have somebody on that drive to represent you. Laraby represents me. He's a good ramrod and I'm lucky to have him. Me crippled up with rheumatism this way. I want to go with a herd, Colonel. I was hired as boss. Is that right? Sure, Hook. Then either I have all to say about who's going to Abelina, or quit right now. Well, really. There's your answer. You ain't going with a herd. Now, Hulk thought his troubles were over. Colonel Grayson forbid her to go. For authenticity, we employed a man named Kenneth Perkins, who had written a series of Western stories for the Saturday Evening Post, was quite good and quite knowledgeable in his Western background or the Western background which could be found in argosy and True Stories and that sort of thing at the time. Now, whether that was authentic or not, I don't know. We would come up with such wonderful words that we'd never heard before, like take a pasia, which meant to go out and look around or make your play. And it's pretty heavy stuff for us, at least in radio, we hadn't heard these kind of phrases. The dialogue was peppered with it. And then, of course, any time, Barton, when Garber turned on that wonderful accent of his, it had a true ring of authenticity. I think what it ended up being was a kind of a pictureless B grade Western. Same kind of plot and character development that you'd find in a Roy Rogers movie. Maybe a cut above Hawk Never Kissed the Horse. In the fall of 1947, Burbson began the prestigious dramatic Series Escape. Well, Escape was an anthology show and the truly brilliant thinking of show business at the time. Since suspense was such a great success, why not another show of the same kind? So Escape was pretty darn close to suspense and very often we use the same material. The assistant director who was Norman McDonald for most of the Escape series when I was doing it and who subsequently succeeded me as director on it for a while. The assistant director's function was to time the rehearsals, to time the show and while on the air advise the director how he was running faster, slow, etc. And generally to take care of the mechanical end of the production. I used the finest actors in Hollywood. Jack Webb, who went on to become Sergeant Friday and Dragnet. Jeff Corey used to do a lot of things. Jeff Corey became and is now a well known actor. Director Ben Wright, an Englishman born in Brooklyn who had a magnificent English accent, did many, many wonderful performances such as the man who Would Be King. I remember particularly Sam Edwards wonderful Texas accent and an authentic one. You'd always get a Texas accent from these actors, but some of them weren't authentic. Jeff Chandler, the late Chandler. Jeff Chandler was one of our regulars. John Lund, a picture actor. John Dana, who was still very active in television. Then there was Parley Baer, who did much of the support work. Howard McNair was one of our absolutely invaluable support people. George Ellis, of course, was one of our regulars. And Georgia became Kitty in Gunsmoke. And of course the man who came on in a deep tone said Want to get away from it all? Want to escape that man was Bill Conrad. Tired of the everyday grind Ever dream of a life of romantic adventure? Want to get away from it all we offer you escape. One of the mainstays, one of the strong right arms that I had was Bill Conrad. This is Norman McDonnell, producer, director of Gunsmoke. Bill for a long period played the opening voice on Escape and would also play either bits or important parts. And Bill was, as were all the actors, perfectly content to. To have it work that way. Bill, for instance, played the great huge, powerful Dutchman in Laningen vs. The Ants, which was one of the better Escape shows I think that I was ever connected with. Harley Bear would be an example of a man who. I remember a show that Powell played the lead on Second Class Passenger. A funny kind of lost little man who gets into terrible difficulties in Alers or Morocco or wherever it was. And Parley was just beautiful. On the other hand, Parley would play a little bit of a school teacher or a little Bit of a country lawyer or doctor. The same with somebody like Howard McNair or a young ingenue, Georgia Ellis. If I remember correctly, she was the girlfriend of Will Rogers Jr. On a program called Rogers of the Gazette. So this little stock company was, was kept busy. Story editor for Escape was John Dunkle who in later years became a frequent contributor to Gunsmoke. Dunkle's departure from CBS opened the door for a promising young writer named John meston. Again Norman McDonald. It was mid year of 50 that John Dunkle left his position to freelance. He was indeed busy doing that. It was then that John Meston took over his job. John had been head of what we all called censorship. But a more high powered bit of nomenclature would be continuity acceptance. But anyway, he took over Dunkle's spot and busied himself with working on scripts that were submitted and were going to various shows that were on the air at that time, like Suspense, Escape and others. Shortly after he joined the staff, Meston wrote his first script. As far as I was concerned, the first script of his that I worked on was Crossing Paris that was on Escape and was as I say, mid year or a little after mid year of 1950. John had never thought of himself I don't think as a budding writer but it went well and Crossing Paris received critical acclaim and everybody was very taken with was. About two or three months later on the same series Escape, he, he did a western called Wild Jack Rat. You are standing in a moonlit street of a western cow town alone and friendless. While moving slowly down on you, their horses crowding every exit, is a band of killers, each one of whom has been paid to shoot you dead. It was something that John and I were becoming increasingly interested in this approach to a western which was not like the others on the air. John as a matter of fact said there ought to be a way to do an adult Western. Meaning that adults could enjoy it without any implication of psychological overtones or anything. When he said adult western he meant merely that it wasn't a kid western. It was that simple. While Jack Rhett was the first of several shows that we experimented with done in late 1950, we experimented with what was then called exaggerated sound patterns. They weren't exaggerated, it was merely that we avoided the old radio cliche of never have any dead air. We had lots of dead air and it seemed to work if, if our lead walked across the room, we took time to let him walk across the room and didn't keep dialogue going. If somebody was leaving and crossing the Street. We would hear the door close, down the steps, across the sidewalk and across the street. And it seemed to be very effective. Three weeks later, Wild Jack Rhett rode into Red mesa. He was 38 and at the peak of his reputation. He stood well over six feet, better than 200 pounds of plain sinew. Tawny blonde hair grew long in the frontier style and his features were boldly aquiline. He was a picturesque man until one looked at his eyes, which were large and pale blue and had the disconcerting trick of remaining too steadily on people. There was to be seen in them the suggestion of non humanity. He sent word to the committee that he would meet them at the mayor's office that evening. And it's eight o' clock now. Where is he? He's in town. That's bad enough. Now be a sport, boy. Ellen, we took a fair vote on Rhett. You'll learn. Here he comes now. Here he comes. Here he. My name is Jack Red. I have your offer. I'm Peter Wayne, mayor of Red Mesa. Do you accept it? That depends on what you want. Tell me. Well, Rhett, this is a difficult town. The Chisholm Trail lies just across the river and we get most of our money from the riders passing through with Texas cattle. We want them to have a decent time for their money. But we don't like a lot of gunplay and killing. I've always been accustomed to complete authority, Mayor. I presume to know my job and I won't have interference. That's agreed, Rhett. By the way, the last sheriff had a rule that riders leave their hardware at his office. He had trouble enforcing it. Poor rule. Let them pack their guns. Gives the wild ones a fair chance at you. I never give a man a fair chance at me. Is that all, gentlemen? What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm. It's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravenient. Okay. Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at a.m. p.m. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second. At a.m p.m. i'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah. We're talking about what I crave, which is anything from AM PM what more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience. Am PM Too much good stuff. If you're an H VAC technician and a call comes in, Grainger knows that you need a partner. That Helps you find the right product fast and hassle free. And you know that when the first problem of the day is clanking blower motor, there's no need to break a sweat. With Grainger's easy to use website and product details, you're confident you'll soon have everything humming right along. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. We tried it again on a show called Pagosa, which was done on a series called Romance. And we used the same understated, blunt, somewhat laconic style. And again, we liked it. We felt it was a good way to do a western. Bill Conrad was in that. He played a man called Jeff Spain. As a matter of fact, I've always referred to Pagosa as Jeff Spain, which it was not. You might say experiment number two or three on this new style. It's mid morning when Jeff Spain steps out of the lock into Cherokee Street. Across the street and a few doors down he sees a sign, neatly lettered District Attorney and underneath is the name of Duke Reese. Spain walks over, quickly throws open the door and enters. Well, Spain, I didn't expect you so soon. I always try to be a little ahead of the other man. Yes. Oh yes, of course. Sit down. I'll stand. You don't like me, do you, Spain? You were going to explain things to me, Rhys. Alright, it doesn't matter. We'll make a profitable team anyway. Now, my offer still stands. $500 a month and 30% of the take. How would I earn it? Well, your reputation will earn most of it for you. It's very simple, Spain. For the next six months I shall want campaign contributions from the gambling halls and saloons hereabouts. I'm running for the state legislature, you know. I didn't know. Yes, and I'm sure everyone will contribute generously, knowing that if they don't, our sheriff will close them down for some good legal reason or other. I'll provide that. Well, why don't you send for some other gunfighter, Reese? Why, when I can trust you? What's your point, Rhys? Just that in six months you can have title to your land. And I think you want that. And what guarantee do I have of it? You don't need any. In six months I'm leaving Pagosa for good. I don't care what happens here after that. And if I refuse? In that case, I won't be able to afford to leave, will I? If I do stay on here, Spain. Mitch Travis Will file that title in my name. I see. And he'll file it in my name anyway. If you accept the job and you and I, shall we say, don't get along, you have till tomorrow morning to decide. Don't be a fool, Spain. We all make mistakes, Reese. A few minutes later, Spain rides out of town, taking the trail towards the chaparral where Cy Quill is waiting for him there in the shade. They pass the afternoon in talk. Late that night, a pair of riders run in off the desert, put their horses in Teal Travers stable and walk back to the kettle house, where in Spain's room they make their final plans and then go quietly to bed. Next morning, they come out of the hotel and head for the district Attorney's. Reese, this is my partner, Cy Quill. Oh, how do you do, Mr. Quill? Howdy. Do you still want to appoint me sheriff for Pagosa? Then you've decided? Yeah. Where's a badge? Right here. Good. Now get one out for Si. I just made him my deputy. What? Give him a badge. I'm not new at this game, Reese, and I always appoint my own men. Well, all right. You insist. Now, go down to the sheriff's office and fire whoever's in there. Get him out by noon. I'll take over them. Now, just a minute, Spain. I'm not used to being ordered around. I can't fire your man. Tell him to turn loose any prisoners he's got in there. I don't like another man's leavings. Messman and I wanted to do a series called Jeff Spain, which was an offshoot of the romance episode called Pagosa of mid-1951. And we approached CBS management with it, but they said no. They were developing a. A western called Gunsmoke. Harry Ackerman had the title and he had the writers and he had the cast in mind. They made two, if I remember correctly, two audition discs with two well known radio actors, but neither were successful. Neither got on the air. Well, despite further urgings, we. We couldn't move the CBS executives to put the show on. A popular Saturday evening program in April 1952 was Operation Underground, a forerunner of foreign intrigue. Its director was William N. Robeson. Well, Operation Underground was another managerial brainstorm. They wanted to kill two birds with one stone, present an exciting adventure spy story and make it very American and anti communist. I think Harry Ackerman, who went on to television glory, dreamed this one up. What he dreamed up was a character named Ethan Allen Rogers, combining the identity of the conqueror Ticonderoga and the inspirer of Kenneth Roberts, Northwest Passage Rogers of Rogers Rangers. Our hero always went into the hotel room and found that it had been rifled or the climax was in on the Orient Express. And as it went into the tunnel, he tosses the heavy through the window. That kind of a story, you know. Lamont Johnson played the starring role of Easton Allen Rogers. Lamar Johnson, who has since then become a very fine motion picture director. Very interesting, very amusing story about this. Radio entertainment industry was undergoing the widespread attacks for harboring communist sympathizers within the ranks of its actors, writers, producers, et cetera. And I was aware of this and matter of fact, the target. And I laid on the anti communist aspect pretty heavily in terms of Mr. Rogers attitude towards his antagonists in Eastern Europe. And I was called in one day by an executive of CBS who said, come on, go easy on that anti communist stuff. I said, well, what the hell is your position? He said, well, you know, we're against communists, but remember, communist byproducts. 2. CBS canceled Operation Underground in the third week of April, 1952. Cancel is a harsh word. It was the victim of the usual network practice. The show is put on the air and if it isn't picked up for sale after a reasonable amount of time, it's discontinued and another type of entertainment is put in there in its place. And in this case, Gunsmoke was the other kind of entertainment. And I can't think of a better replacement. We had a week's notice to put a show together and get it on the air. And in that week we had to find a writer, we had to find a star. We had to have a theme, a Gunsmoke theme composed. So it was a busy week. We got Walter Brown Newman to come in, one of the better writers in town. We gave him an acetate disc of Pagosa and I believe, of Wild Jack Rhett and said, this is the style, this is the color, this is the feel. We laid out no other guidelines except told him how we felt Matt Dillon should be written and the kind of character he was, and sent Walter away. That was on a Monday. With the Gunsmoke script in preparation. A CBS program executive called composer conductor Rex Corey in for a meeting. He said, have you ever done a Western? So I said, no. I said, I don't think that. I'm not a Western writer in that sense of the word. But I said, I'm game to tackle anything. What do you have in mind? Well, he says, we've got a new show. We want to Put on. And a chap by the name of Norman McDonald is going to direct it. And Norm knows exactly what he wants. And if you think you would like to do it, why don't you go downstairs and talk to Norm? I proceeded to go down to his office. We sat down and talked. Immediately was charmed by Norm. He's a man with a magnetic personality. He knew what he wanted. He said, rex, this a different type of Western than I think that you have probably ever seen. We call this an adult Western. And they said our approach will be purely. This isn't the shoot them up chase type of western that the public is used to. These will be adult stories located in the West. But there will be emotional stories. There will be stories of suspense in action in various other aspects. And he said, we would like to have a seasoned musical director who can tackle a job with that understanding and that perspective. Would you be interested in doing it? And I said, well, from what you've told me already, I would certainly not want to turn it down. So he said, well, fine. Now, about the theme. He said, we want something that has a big, wide open sound to it. Something that suggests the open spaces. The main character, Matt Dillon, is a very complex character, One that you'll want to understand. We went into delved into the various aspects of it. I think almost immediately formed a cohesion of ideas that was to carry us through in what is turned has become a very, very long and extensive venture. I always wrote the. What I call the interior music first. The reason I did this was by the time that I had written the so called interior music, I had developed within myself the feel and the sound that I ultimately would want to establish for the whole series. So I always left the theme till the end. And the theme was written under rather frantic circumstances because I had gone to bed the night before, leaving that to be done with the feeling that I knew pretty well what I wanted and figuring that I could do it rather quickly in the morning if I got up early enough. I didn't get up early enough. And the music always had to be in what we call the copyist. Now, the uninitiated probably doesn't know it at all. Music that is composed for orchestra is composed on master score sheets. In other words, we work by the page, putting down all the instrumental parts, whether they be percussion or strings or woodwinds or brass or whatever, they all go on what we call a master score. Now, these parts, the individual parts that the instrumentalist plays, all have to be hand copied off the original master Score. So these, the music or the score had to be into the copyist. The people that did this work in plenty of time so that they could get their job done in time to have them on the music stands by recording time or by broadcast time. So that I had to have the music in, in this particular morning into the CBS copies by something like 9:30 or 10 o'. Clock. Here at 8 o' clock in the morning, I'm in the middle of shaving and I suddenly realized that I haven't written the theme. So I grabbed a magazine, piece of manuscript and a pencil and sat down in the most convenient spot. And that is where the Gunsmoke theme was actually composed. It was composed in a matter of about 10 minutes and rushed to the copies along with the rest of the music. There remained the problem, of course, the enormous problem of finding a star. The CBS executives, of course, were hoping for a big name. I do remember that we. There was a young actor from Pasadena who had some name at that time, Robert Stack, if I remember correctly, Ray Burr auditioned. I think when they started casting for it, somebody said, good Christ, let's don't get, get Bill Conrad. We were up to, you know, where with Bill Conrad. So they did not get Bill Conrad. They auditioned everybody in town and as a last resort they called me and said, okay, we give up. Come on in. And I went in and read about two lines and they said, okay, thank you. And I walked out. And the next day they called me and said, you have the job. I think Meston and I were more enthusiastic about Conrad than the executives because Bill was considered a heavy at that time. He just finished doing the Killers in feature pictures and everybody considered him a heavy. And of course he was a marvelous heavy. So I think the CBS executives were a little, a little concerned that William Conrad, heavy extraordinaire, would be playing our lead, Matt Dillon. The other characters were not set and no contracts were drawn because nobody had yet decided who would be playing with Bill. It just developed that Howard McNair played the doctor who became a running character. Harley Bear played Chester, who became a running character. Georgia Ellis was in one of the first shows, but Kitty wasn't actually invented until, oh, perhaps eight or ten shows into the end of the series. I think Georgia played another saloon girl, but was, but was not Kitty. What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm. It's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravenient. Okay. Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter available right down the street at am, pm Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at am, pm. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from am, pm. What more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience am, PM too much good stuff if you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner who makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for auto reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant gloves they need at the start of their shift. And you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. The very first broadcast occurred Saturday evening, April 26, 1952, 24 years ago tomorrow. The script revolved around a 12 year old boy who was to become a legend in the west. Can you direct me to the Marshall's office? Yes, ma', am, right here. I'm Marshall Dylan. I left Cottonwood as soon as I got your telegram. I'm Miss Barney. Where's my boy? Oh, we have him, ma'. Am. Satan's son. Here, let me help you down. Hitch that horse, Chester. Right this way, ma'. Am. Oh, I'm so sorry he put you in all that trouble, Marshall. The truth of the matter is he is a wild one and no mistake. Takes after his father one scrape after another. He was no trouble at all. I enjoy children. I like to have him around. Bob. Bob. Your ma's here, son. Chester, where's the boy? Did you let him slip past you? No sir, Mr. Dillon. He never got past me. Look, the back door is open. He seen me and he hightailed it the devil. We'll round him up for you, man, don't worry. Oh, I don't know why I bother hauling him back if he's run away once. He's run away a thousand times. This time he ran cause I wouldn't buy him a gun. He wanted a real one. That boy's just gun crazy, I swear. Got him a nice barlow knife instead. Barlow knife? I reckon it didn't signify. And off he runs. Barlow knife? A kid. Chester finds a kid. Marshall. Has he done something bad with it? Told him to use it. Careful. He promised he'd use it. Careful. No, never mind Chester. He's got Clay's strawberry ruin, which never catch up to him. I try to bring him up right. I tell him to be good, but he don't listen. He just don't listen. Now, calm yourself, ma'. Am. Just calm yourself. Here's your little bundle, Mr. D. Well? Yeah, Give it to me. That's pretty heavy. Here. You're better at knots than I am. Open it, will you? The moment he was born, he'd been nothing but tribulation to now. Please, ma'. Am. What's he got in it, Chester? Shirt, stockings, piece of sausage. And this.44, double action. Yes, Mr. Dillon. That's Clay's gun. Sonny didn't manage to keep it long, did he? Well, if he wants a gun that bad, he's bound to get hold of another one somewhere, somehow. Chester, call Mr. Hightower over. Hey. Hey, Mr. Hightower. Come on over. Mr. Dillon wants you. Master, could I have this? A drink of water? What? Ziegler? I forgot all about you. Chester. Where the keys? Right there on the desk. There we are. It'll be safe for you to go home now. I can go back by the farm? Yeah, that's right. I'll send for you for the trial. Watch where you're going, you dumb. Excuse me. Yes, Marshall? Mr. Hightower, it appears that we can do business after all. Get some paper and a pencil. I want some notices printed. Fire away. Wanted for murder. Wanted for murder. What's the boy's name? Bonnie. William Bonney. William, Bonnie, William. Bonnie. Age 12. Height about 5ft. Hair light, eyes blue. I don't suppose he's known by any other name. I know. Everybody just called him Billy or the Kid, also known as Billy the. We'll return to the biography of Gun Smoke in just one moment. And now back to Gun Smoke. Billy the Kid was the first show by Walter Brown. Newman received good reports, but nobody was quite sure upstairs whether we had a hit or a miss. Because our leading man didn't sound like a leading man. Though Conrad was not playing that as a warm, understanding, paternal figure whatsoever. During the first few months, other writers were called in to mold the characters. Les Crutchfield was a writer who was to become one of the solid contributors to gunsmoke, writing possibly 70 or 80 scripts. Les wrote a writer named Herb Purdem, Joe Murcott, Lou Houston, Tony Ellis. A cross section of the better writers in town. But each week it meant that Messton had to do a little editing and a little fixing and a little adjusting on the script. And after about a year, John said that he didn't quite know why he was working this hard and not having the fun of writing them himself. So he left cbs, left an extraordinarily good job with a great deal of promise, as a matter of fact, on what was really a gamble because who knew how long Gunsmoke would go. So for the next three or four years until the television series started, John wrote basically every Gunsmoke writing anywhere between 40 and 52 scripts a year. So he was a. He was a busy man. Colorado born John Meston had his own views about the west and how the Gunsmoke characters should be developed and portrayed. Well, I don't like phony stuff and I knew something about the west, sure, the way people are, the way they talk, the way they behave. And I never liked heroes much much. So we kind of reversed everything. So we did way I tried to do what I we did with narration, which is sort of an innovation, I think at the time. We tried to make him just an honest character, not a. Not a cook, like. Like Wyatt Earp. People like that who were just bums try to make him an honest guy and. And a guy with a sense of tragedy. Guy didn't particularly enjoy the job he did it. But then it took quite a while because, you know, we put Walter, put Chester in. We had to work torch on him a great deal for a long time. Kitty and Doc had to develop and Matt had to develop. And we did this over a long period. Time of no, we worked very closely. I used to go. I didn't go around, hang around TV much, but in the radio I was there all the time. I'm always hired the very best actors, no question of that. You know, they couldn't read a line. They'd let me know with great pleasure and they're generally right. I learned how to write dialogues so it could be read and short. I always wrote short. There were no speeches like that or, you know, almost absolutely missed occasionally for an effect. But the characters would develop very slowly. We'd go and after the shows, Conrad and Norm and I and whoever else was around, Parley represented, sit around, discuss the show. And we were all interested in discuss character and this and that, why they should do or that, how I should behave. It's kind of a joint effort. Beston once expressed his views in detail. Here's Gunsmoke announcer George Walsh reading a classic Meston letter addressed to the editor of the New York Tribune. It isn't often that a writer or any man is given an opportunity to destroy a figure. He's Always hated a character that all his life has cluttered his landscape like a slum. And to be able to do so and get paid for it to boot is to be doubly blessed. My headed figure is the western hero who rides along thumping his guitar nasally, singing a synthetic ballad and looking for all the world like a fugitive from a cheap circus. I spitting his milk, and he'll have to go elsewhere to find somebody to pour the lead for his golden bullets. Now, the best way to destroy something bad is to write it down with something better. And I've got a guy I think outclasses any of these phony big heads. His name's Matt Dillon and his hair is probably red if he's got any left. He'd be handsomer than he is if he had better manners. But life and his enemies have left him looking a little beat up. And I suppose having seen his mother back about 1840, struggling to take a bath in a wooden washtub without fully undressing left his soul a little warped. Anyway, there'd have to be something wrong with him or he wouldn't have hired on as a United States marshal in the heyday of Dodge City, Kansas. Dodge at that time was the wildest town in America, and it was populated by men just as warped and more so than Matt Dillon. The west, just after the Civil War, was, in a sense, a kind of arena for frustrated gladiators, homicidal psychopaths gathered along the frontier and had themselves a real circus with little or nothing to stop them from happily mowing one another down. And that more men didn't die in this senseless slaughter may be laid to their comparatively primitive weapons and certainly not to any civilized tendencies on their part. It ended finally, the murderers killed one another off and gradually disappeared from this section of the American scene. But the end was partly hastened by a few strangers who happened to get their satisfaction killing on the side of the law. Sheriffs, marshals and the like. I'm sure a few of these men had a hazy sense of what the coming of law and order meant. But for the most part, they looked on their role in the play of progress simply as a job. And they went ahead and did their job, often in the face of unbelievable odds, and then picked up their paychecks and went their way. Heroes. To us now, they were heroes, but to their contemporaries, the biggest hero was he who, by whatever means, murdered the greatest number of his fellow men. The rules were childishly simple. If the other man went for his gun before you did, you were Free to kill him with immunity. And anyway, if there weren't too many unfriendly witnesses about, you could always claim he did and probably get by with it just as easily. Mac Dillon, because of obvious reasons, he's a cut above the usual lawman I've described, but he's not, I trust, so far above the real thing as to be pure fiction. And the hardest thing for me, the writer, is to keep him on paper from goofing off into the never, never land of pure heroism. And the hardest thing for Norman MacDonald, the producer, director, and Bill Conrad, the star, is to translate the script's attempt at authenticity into the living character of Matt Dillon. But we try, then try and keep trying. Our attempt to create as realistic and entertaining a program as possible is not, of course, the only one of its kind, but we did precede and were on the air trying before the release of such pictures as High Noon and Shane. And we're still on the air, and we're still trying. Certainly, one of the reasons for Gunsmoke's hold upon its audience was Meston's style of writing. To try and analyze John Meston's contribution to the writings of Style of Gunsmoke would be difficult because John's writing is not flashy. It's not filled with purple prose. It's not. If anything, it's understated and simple. John and I always felt that good Western writing didn't necessarily mean double negatives and so on, that it really required research and understanding of the cowboy. And John was an avid researcher also. Of course, his boyhood in Pueblo, Colorado, helped color his scripts. But John used a great deal of the language that came from the cowboys that he had known and the friends he had known in Colorado. For instance, there was one phrase that John always loved, particularly. A cowboy was talking about his mare to another cowboy who asked if the mare was a fast runner. And the first cowboy looked for a moment and then said, yes, she's swift. She could run a hole in the wind. She set her mind to it. Well, this was the kind of phrase that John loved because it was the man of the earth and the country. Using the things that he knew and using the things that he saw around him for descriptions which gave the dialogue or the speech patterns a richness and a fullness was a strange combining of words and a strange combining of emotions that gave John's dialogue, as written in the Gunsmoke scripts, a special meaning that was hard for anyone else to duplicate. Meston always had a feeling about names, too. He Felt that a name was a whole indication of the character that was to come. A friend of Matt's who arrives in town, if I remember correctly, was a ex lawman or a lawman and a friend of Matt's. Meston called him Nick Search, which is a marvelous way of painting the man's whole background just with a couple of words or other names like Toque Moreland. Or a funny little fellow who was running a town and was a crook, but a kind of a pathetic little crook. His name was Joe Fy. There was a doctor who came into town and got in trouble because he. Well, because of the laudanum that he was putting in his medicinal bottles. His name was Professor Lute Bo Bone, which is a marvelous name for a doctor or the buffalo hunter called Gatliff. John never gave Gatliff any name because he felt that Gatliff was enough. But he did mention that he was a man with speckled eyes, which is a beautiful way of describing a man. There was a family who lived out on the prairie, who lived in a sod hut, a sad excuse for a home. And they were called the Beatles. As a matter of fact, John called the script Smoking out the Beatles. When it was done on television, it was changed to Smoking out the Nolans. For some reason that nobody yet has been able to figure out. John Winston was a thorough technician and a writer of great integrity and accuracy. This is Parley Bear, the talented and versatile actor who portrayed Chester Proudfoot. And I think that since that era was probably the most colorful in Western history, that he strove to create and paint the most accurate image of the times that he could. And I. I think he succeeded. Now, so far as we know, you know what. What a genius John had for picking out names that describe the character. Mount Dillon was so faithfully written and so impeccably reproduced by Royce, the way he built it, that at one time we had a letter from the then secretary or president of the Chamber of Commerce in Dodge City, wanted to know, since they had already determined that Matt Dillon had lived in Dodge City, did we have accurate knowledge as to when he lived in Dodge City? Now, unless it was just a matter of coincidence and conjecture that there had at one time, according to the archives and the historical pages of Dodge City's history book, that there had been a Matt Dillon there. But so far as we knew, and so far as John Messen knew, Matt Dillon was completely a brainchild as well as the name. And it was very flattering for God's City Chamber of Commerce to Assume that we would know when he had lived there when so far as we knew, he never had. People came west for a variety of reasons and cheapest among them, it seemed like was a tragedy that had occurred either back east or in Europe or people came west, it's true, to forget or to hide something that some malfeasance of their own in the more civilized sections of the country. And I think the west as it was developed indeed our whole country was developed as a result of disappointment elsewhere. And his pen had the ability to pick that up. There's a kind of trite expression. I don't even know who originated it. The whole world belongs to the actor for his use only, not to keep. He must give it back. And when you analyze that it's kind of true. You I know that I've seen lots of people when I think my he would be fun to play and then you're not above plagiarizing a little bit of that man's character a little bit of his life, a little bit of his way of speech, a little bit of his background. And John, Chester and Matt were talking and Matt asked Chester why he got up so early. And he said, well, I. I can't sleep. He said, it's a trade I have. As soon as the sun up my feet start to sweat and I get uncomfortable get up. Well, John knew a person who said that some old codger he had met said that he got up because there was something about the sun coming up caused his feet to sweat and he became uncomfortable in bed so he got up. That was a good line for Chester to have humanisms. John did those things. Chester acquired this dog that he loved dearly and the dog liked everybody with Chester. And after he had bitten him soundly Chester's own comment was goes, he'll come around, John Beston. You could see the mud. You could see the. The slough that they were in. You could see the filth. But it was done because it was adroitly painted in. Have you found him, Mr. Mill? Yeah, I thought I'd better come along and see. Toby's dead as I it. Yes. All right. Well, Gatlus down there in the middle of the hollow but we can't get anywhere near him as long as he's got that sharps rifle. He's killed a small herd of buffalo in there and now he's lying out in the center of him. Well, that's the darndest thing I ever heard. I mentioned only he must have gone crazy just like Toby said. Yeah, what's he shooting at now, Mr. Dylan? The way he's facing them. Shots. Yeah, that's a signal for help. Chester. Come on. Hey, maybe this is a trap. Be ready to take cover behind one of these animals. It might be. Sounds like he's been hurt. Yeah. Keep your head up. There he is. Behind that big bull. Yeah, I see him. But Mr. Dillon, he's all. There have been horses in here. Indians. My goodness. Come on. Well, that was his last effort. Chester. He's dead now. Mr. Dylan. That's awful. Yeah. Come on, let's get out of here. I don't know how the Indians caught Gadliff. He'd gone a little and maybe that made it easy for him. But they finally got themselves a buffalo hunter. And into their unbelievably savage torture of him had gone all the hatred and desperation of a race being slowly starved and driven from their homeland. Then they'd put him there, surrounded by his own bloody slaughter. And they'd gone off with a gesture of contempt. Even his rifle and his ammunition by his side. And having seen what they did to him, I'll never know how he managed to fire even one of those shots. For all of his evil gatlef had died harder than any man I'd ever seen. Chester and I rode back to Dodge and it was never mentioned between us again. What do you think makes the perfect snack? It's gotta be when I'm really craving and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravenient. Okay, like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter available right down the street at am, pm Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at am, pm. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from am, pm. What more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's Cravenience ampm. Too much good stuff. If you're an H Vac technician and a call comes in, Grainger knows that you need a partner that helps you find the right product fast and hassle free. And you know that when the first problem of the day is a clanking blower motor, there's no need to break a sweat. With Grainger's easy to use website and product details you're confident you'll soon have everything humming right along. Call 1-800-GRAINGER clickgrainger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. John is a most Unique talent. A lovely man who is a great bleeder. He bleeds for everybody. And perhaps that is the key to the success of that show, is that it is so filled with the repulsion of man's inhumanity to man, seasoned and highlighted by red streaks of magnificent violence. And yet the final total compassion with whatever the problem was. You add all those up and they spell mother under any conditions. The people were human beings. Georgia Ellis, who portrayed saloon madam Kitty Russell. Kitty was human. And some of them had very homely touches in them, like perhaps a dress fitting or Howard fussing about how to kill a pain in the tooth which might even have consumed a minute or two minutes. It was not continuous action or bloodletting or mystery or anything. You had a sense of continuity. You could almost taste the dust in the streets. Perhaps the beer wasn't very cold, but at least it was beer. And the cowboys were not clean and the horses were sweaty and not everybody was pretty and beautiful and wore white hats. Supporting player John Dana. Each show had to do, yes, with Matt Dillon, but Matt Dillon in relation to some one individual, some one family that comes to town or that lives in town that has a problem, which means that you didn't have so much plot as you had character, interesting people to listen to. You see. And this is what happened with the television Gunsmoke too. It was a novel. We were all so used to hi O Silver as a way that. That this was a total departure into the area of serious examination of people and their problems. And then when you get that kind of writing and that kind of concept, it's a glorious thing for actors because this is the very thing that an actor wants to play a person, a human being. Running through many of John's scripts is a. A thread of the dignity of man. And yet at the same time, so frequently man's inhumanity to man or the inescapability of life and problems in the Western frontier. One of the things that John did in his scripts was to paint the difficult position of a woman. Nowadays we're inclined to. To say, well, if life's that difficult, why didn't they go somewhere else? And as John had his characters explain, where was there to go. They had no money. The household probably consisted of one mule. And you can't ride too far on one mule. No money. And if the woman did get into town, what was she going to do? She couldn't suddenly find work in a boutique. She even was a dance hall girl or something less so. The frontier life was a hard and unforgiving sort of life as John pictured it. And I think quite, quite accurately. One script that perhaps illustrates what I'm saying was a script called the Cabin. I remember parenthetically that John wrote this to go on the air after a particular soft Christmas show. And he said, we can't have people think we're going to do soft shows. So he wrote the Cabin simply. The story was Matt finding himself almost isolated in a blizzard, approaches a cabin where he finds a young girl has been savaged by two men who have killed her parents. They've been with her for a week during this extended blizzard. Matt, by the end of the show, is able to. Well, I shouldn't say able to kill them, but he does gets them out of the way. And the closed scene is. Is indicative of a messton honest approach. Marshall. Marshall. Dylan. What? Oh, morning fell. Come on out in the kitchen, Marshall. It's warm there and I got some hot coffee waiting. That sounds good. It looks like the storm's lifted. It has. The wind's gone, but it's mighty cold out. Well, I don't mind the cold. It's that wind that breaks a man down. There. Get some of that in you. You make mighty good coffee, Bill. Tell me something, Marshall. Tell me the truth now. Oh, sure, Belle. What is it? Are you married? I'd make a poor husband, Belle. Or any woman. Why? Well, in my profession, it's too chancy. Thank you, Marshall. Thanks for putting it that way. Now, Bell, I didn't mean. Forget it. I'm leaving this place, Marshall. What? Soon as you go. I've packed what I need and I'm clearing off. Where'll you go? I got three horses. I'll ride up to Hays City and sell them. Then what? Buy some pretty clothes. Find a place. Won't be hard after this. I. I wish I could help you, Belle. You have, but. I mean, I can take care of myself, Marshall. I just want to get away from here, that's all. Sure. I'll stop at the nearest ranch and tell the men to come over here and take care of hacking Alvy soon as it warms up. Whatever you like, Marshall. Well, goodbye, Belle. Goodbye, Marshall. Look me up in Hays City next time you're there. Sure. Sure I will. But, Belle, don't let all this make you bitter. There are a lot of good men in the world. So they say. So long, Marshall. I. So long, bill. A few minutes later, I'd sidled up and was on the trail to Dodge. The sky was low and a slate gray. All over everything there was no wind. The blizzard had gone, leaving the land still white, bitter cold. There wasn't a sign of life anywhere. It was like riding through a vast tomb. I found myself feeling like a trespasser, as though something had gone wrong and I wasn't supposed to be there at all. John Maston had a very firm, fixed feeling about Matt Dillon's character. And he often said that Matt didn't want to see America grow west. And with the sound of trumpets and flags flying, he. He always said that Matt was a very honest, real man who was doing a difficult job the best way he knew how. Writer John Dunkle. I think that he was a typical hero in the sense that he was a pretty intelligent, a very compassionate man. Probably the ideal lawman. There was certainly the way Bill played in a tremendously pathetic quality to Dylan. His opening line was, it's a chancy job. Harley Bear. I think probably Dylan trusted Chester and Doc and Kitty as much as he dared trust anyone. He knew that if he needed someone to stand at his back, Chester would be there. But I'm sure in the back of his mind he wasn't sure that Chester would function at all times. I think he had the same feeling about Doc. Doc was dependable, but every now and again he'd get sauced up, you know, and maybe at the moment of removing the appendix, Doc could have been a little stalkered. Chester was dishonest with many people but had to be completely honest with Dylan. And there was Dylan's strength. Everybody had to be honest with them because insofar as the human being is concerned, I think probably of the whole. The whole cast, Dylan was the one who was most completely honest in his dealings with lawbreakers and his dealing with the town and his dealing with his everyday associates. The woman in Dylan's life was Kitty Russell, owner and operator of the Long Branch Saloon, played by Georgia Ellis. She was very generous, loving human being. Adored, of course, the four men in her life. There was Matt predominantly, and then Chester, Doc. Not to say that she didn't have a certain kind of a. Of a feeling towards Matt. I do think that she considered him sort of the boss man and she adored him dearly. And I'm quite sure they were very compatible. Yes, they were lovers, the best kind, because they really, truly understood one another. There wasn't need for too much talk. I don't think there was any forgiveness to be done because I don't think Kitty was available to anybody else but Mac. Undoubtedly she had wild dreams from time to time which she realized were completely Unrealistic. The Matt and Kitty and some large spread. But doing what? Who knows? Because Matt would never be happy doing anything but what he was doing. And she knew she would never be happy with Matt if he were not happy. So no, she was resigned to serving booze and saying, be careful, Matt. And she didn't have anything left in the east or wherever she came from to go back to. So what the hell, she was stuck in Dodge City. She was a good girl. She made a lot of it. All right, remember, the machine knows if you're lying. First statement. Carvana will give you a real offer on your car. All online. False. True. Actually, you sell your car in minutes. False. That's gotta be true again. Carvana will pick up your car from your door or you can drop it off at one of their car vending machines. Sounds too good to be true. So true. Finally caught on. Nice job. Honesty isn't just their policy, it's their entire model. Sell your car today, too. Pickup fees may apply. If you're an H VAC technician and a call comes in, Grainger knows that you need a partner that helps you find the right product fast and hassle free. And you know that when the first problem of the day is a clanking blower motor, there's no no need to break a sweat. With Grainger's easy to use website and product details, you're confident you'll soon have everything humming right along. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. There was a character in the first Gunsmoke script identified only as Townsman. Thanks to Bill Conrad, that townsman became Chester Harley Bear recalls the story Bill Conrad named Chester. He said, no, and I can't say, hey, Townsman. Canary said, he's got to have a name. While I was playing him as I played Chester. And so Bill said, colin Chester or something like that. And so Chester he became. When I gave Chester his last name, I had a broken speech. And this was weeks after we were on the air. I became just Chester. And I had a broken speech that read something like, well, ashores and will just let me flounder. He didn't stop me. We used to do that to each other quite a bit. And I just added, be sure my name is Chester Wesley Proudfoot. And that's how Chester Wesley Proudfoot was named. And I can remember Bill, Chester Wesley Proudfoot. Where did that come from? I said, well, got a broken speech and cut in on me like, you're Supposed to. And I won't come up with those names. So who does? Chester Pod put Gunsmoke. TV producer John Mantley once referred to Chester as a dim witted town loafer. But Parley Bear, who created and portrayed the character on radio for nearly 10 years, disagrees. I don't think he was a dim witted town loafer at all. He was lazy, but he still did his work and he, he spun his wheels a great deal and kicked a lot of gravel. I would describe Chester as being a dependable non thinker to this extent. If we had a hypothetical case with nine desperados holed up and Bill as that Dylan had said, Chester, you watch the back door and as they come out you plug number 1, 3, 5 and 7. Chester would have said yes sir. And as they came out he would have said one bang. He'd have let two go and he'd have gotten three. He'd let four go and he'd have gotten five. Even though maybe two and four were bearing down on him. He would have said Mr. Jones had to shoot them others so them were the ones I'm going to shoot and that's what. But no, Chester was energetic. He was loyal at times put upon by everybody but Dylan as we played it. Chester was not really, he was never really deputized. Chester got Dylan out of scrapes every now and again there was a pathetic tone written in Chester. Chester realized his shortcomings. I remember one script he did, I can't think of the name of it. Chester saved Dylan and they rolled back the time and he said, you best not tell anybody about that, Mr. Dun because it could embarrass you if people were to know that, that I had saved. You said we just won't talk about that. And I think that that was basically Chester. He was loyal, sensitive man who much to Dylan's annoyance, put sugar in his rye whiskey and was overly fond of jelly. And as he confessed one time when Dylan said that chewing tobacco was a filthy habit, he confessed that he didn't really chew tobacco, that it was licorice. That was Chester, I think, and I tried to play him that way as simple but not a simpleton, loyal if not intelligent. The economy of the day got to him. Chester was never affluent, yet great loyalty and pride. His, his family, I guess you would have been tenant as sharecroppers or tenant farmers. I don't think they were ever great landowners. But Chester was fiercely proud of his family and defended them and had an absolute adulation for Dylan. Dylan was the ultimate so far as he was concerned, the part of Doc Adams was brilliantly played by veteran character actor Howard McNear. Howard McNear probably is the most fascinating human being I've ever known in my life. He was a consummate actor. He was a consummate human being. And all of this wrapped up in a pixie like body. A wonderful comic mind that would make a laugh out of anything in the world. For, I guess, 10 solid years. He was the life of our cast. He and Parley combined were unbelievable in there, making lightness and happiness and joy out of common everyday experience. Howard and Parley are two people that everybody should know in their lives. Bill named Doc, too. He was just Doc in there. And Howard McNear, who was so delightful in that role, but he played him with just a trickle of blood dripping from his fangs into it. You got the feeling that Mephistopheles was looking over your shoulder a little bit as Howard played Doc. And Bill Conrad christened him Dr. Charles Adams, just, you know, for the cartoon. Well, when you talk about Howard, all the adjectives like wonderful, unique, magnificent come before he. Howard, I think, was one of most truly delightful people I've ever known, ever met. And I had never heard anyone who didn't like him. Everybody loved him and he. He was an absolute asset to anything and everything he did. Later on, he became Floyd the Barber on the Andy Griffith show. And he fell upon evil times. He had a series of strokes, he recovered from some, and then he would have some more. And Mr. Annie Griffith's return of credit, that for a couple of years, when Harvard was no longer ambulatory, he stayed on the show and they would. They would revolve scenes around him. He would be seated in his own barber chair or in a place out in front of his shop, but they always fixed it, accommodated the scene to Howard. And I think it's a great tribute to his ability as a performer and an actor that many people didn't know that he was suffering from any handicap at all because he was sharp. He still had the same wonderful sense of humor, a real pixie sense of humor. And I can truthfully say that some of the happiest hours of my life were spending his in his company. He lived between my house and the studio and I used to pick him up and bring him back. And those minutes that we had week after week discussing the day's happenings or whatnot were marvelous. He was a man of strange attitudes at times and in strange inconsistencies. And that's what Added to his charm. Howard is a thoroughly conscientious man. Prepared at all times with his work. I've never known him to give a bad performance. And I worked on many shows with him. Aside from Gunsmoke, we were on there together. But he did a lot of lineups and escapes and whatnot. But he lived in absolute terror. And this I can't understand. Because he was a graduate of the old stock company circuit. Where you had to learn a new part a week while you were playing one, you know. But he was terrified that dialogue would be changed on it. And he had it specified. Once he was given a part, that was it. And they wouldn't change lines on him on the set. And he didn't even like to write in changes on radio scripts. And he abhorred change of any kind. And he sort of. He developed an aura about himself as being very nervous and this, that and the other thing. And he. A little on the hypochondriac side. He carried a variety of pills which he was willing to share. I don't know how many people he started off on. Or gave them some malady that they didn't have through sharing his pills. I know he had a box of pills. One day I had a bad headache and I asked for aspirin. Said, you don't want to put that stuff in your stomach. He said, that's not good. He said, here, take one of mine. He said, don't take that one. They cost 50 cents apiece. And besides, it's not for a headache. But he had a bottle of all shapes, sizes and hues and colors of pills. And I tell you, not only our business, but the world suffered a great loss when he was taken. And I don't know of anyone who is remembered more fondly by our profession than Howard. Stories told about Howard McNear. Exemplify his wonderful wit and charm. And Parley Bear tells some of the best. Several years ago, Parley and Howard attended the funeral of Gail Gordon's mother, Gloria. We went to this funeral in Hollywood Cemetery in a very small chapel. In the pews were very small. Only four people could sit in them. And they were. They were very tightly squeezed in them. And as it came time to show you, I have to first of all say that in the old days of radio. You never had really achieved until you had what we called a conflict. That you had to get permission from one director to be late to his rehearsal or leave his rehearsal time to go to another. You had finally arrived when you had conflicts or when you had to pay a page to open an exit only door for you to get from CBS to NBC in order to make the show. The conflict was the ultimate thing for an actor. Well, we were tightly packed into this pew and as you do at a funeral, you remain quiet and your tones are subdued and your attitude too. And my watch was being repaired. Howard was on the outside on the aisle. Funeral was set for 2 o' clock and we were sitting there. I leaned over to Howard and whispered, what time is it, Howard? What? I said, what time is it? Howard's reply was, what's the matter? You got a conflict? I said, now cut out the nonsense, Howard. Tell me what time it is. Well, I remembered too late that Howard carried a pot walk pocket watch. My tongue's perspiring and not a wristwatch. And so he had to lean way out and I had to lean away from him. He's tugging to get this watch out. And he pulled hard. The fob and the ring on the stem came out there. Now are you satisfied? Well, it's not my fault. Why don't you wear a wristwatch like everybody else does? So he got the watch out, fixed it, put the ring back on, snapped the watch open, looked at it, snapped it closed and put it back in his pocket. I said, well? Well, what? At what time is it? He said, I just looked. But, Howard, you didn't tell me. He said, they're not late. He never did tell me what time it was another funeral. I told you. A good friend had passed away, Will Wright. And we kind of got everybody on there. I was on the member, member of the Board of directors for the American Federation Television Radio Artists. Will had served on the board for many years. And we attended the service in a body. Will was Presbyterian and also a Mason. And Howard went to the funeral with me, but he didn't sit with us on the board, but he sat with a very fine character actor by the name of Dick Ryan, who was a staunch Catholic. And as the service went on, they did half a world service, Presbyterian, and the second half was a Masonic service. And when the service was over, we waited and came out and I saw Dick Lyon and Howard come in, come out of the chapel, and Dick Ryan's face was just suffused with purple. He was really visibly upset. And I thought, well, I'm sorry Dick's upset. I knew he and Will had been good friends, but it didn't seem possible that Dick would be that emotionally upset about it. I walked with him over to his car and I said, dick, Are you all right? And his reply was rather stinky. I will never sit by Howard McNair at another funeral as long as I live. Got in his car and drove off. And I said, howard. And I got home, I said, what did you do to Dick Ryan? And he said, oh, he's emotionally unstable. I said, well, he's all upset. What did you do? He said, well, he just went all to pieces for no reason at all. He said, while the colonel was on, he said, as you know, it was first of all Presbyterian and it was Masonic. And I just leaned over and asked Dick, I said, are you fellows going to demand equal time? And what had happened? Dick, in his monumental effort to refrain from laughing and guffawing up, I signed Treaty of David's letter. He. He said, my rib cage is still sore from that guy. He said, I nearly strangled to keep from laughing out loud. He said, that's a terrible thing to ask you at a funeral if we're going to demand equal time. The pixiest charm of Howard McNear was even evident in where he went to church. Again, parley bear. Howard was a tremendously religious man, but really embrace any of the hates as we know them today. He went to the church of his choice, which was one week one, another week another. Sometimes Unity, Sometimes, if there was a speaker he wanted to hear, Emmanuel Baptist Church, he would go there. But when he passed away, his wife asked me if I would deliver the Unity funeral, which terrified me. And she said, the only command I lay upon you is that it not be lugubrious, it not be sad, that it would be something that Howard would like. And the chapel was pretty cool. We were in Forest Lawn, and I didn't go into the usual, he was born on this date and so on, but in eulogizing him, I said some of the things that I've said today. How wonderful. He was but a brilliant performer. And one thing that I do another, I kind of got off my text and I started to reminisce from the pulpit about some of the things that he had said and done. And the chapel was filled with friends of his. And as I told one story that had taken place there, it got a laugh. And that scared me, terrified me a little bit. And at the end of the. The thing, people, in recalling the wonderful times that they had had with Howard, I got chuckles and real laughs in this thing. And I. I finished the eulogy. I. I didn't take it upon myself to rewrite any of the psalms, but I. I edited some and I I joined several psalms to what I felt was a fitting tribute to Howard. And I said to my wife, I don't dare face Helen. I said, the last thing I wanted was to get laughs at a funeral. I didn't mean that. I said, I think I committed a terrible thing. And as I walked over, Helen came up and she put her arms around me and she said, that's just exactly what Howard would have wanted. And it was an ironic thing that of all the things I've done, I think I got more lettership approbation from his friends saying holiday, if it were possible, had enjoyed a funeral. And I got a little note from Bill Conrad. He said, I know Howard loved you, but now he must adore you. I was Howard. He was renting and forgiving, even death. If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for auto reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant gloves they need at the start of their shift. And you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-granger click granger grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. If you're an H vac technician and a call comes in, Grainger knows that you need a partner that helps you find the right product fast and hassle free. And you know that when the first problem of the day is a clanking blower motor, there's no need to break a sweat. With Grainger's easy to use website and product details your customer confident you'll soon have everything humming right along. Call 1-800-granger. Click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. Howard was a dream to work with. Not only did he have a great sense of humor, but he was a. He was a much deeper actor than just the superficial comedy. Howard's background was legitimate theater, which he loved, and he was able to play a great number of things. But I think one of the shows that showcases Howard's work more than any other would be a script that John Mastin wrote called Cow Doctor. Hey, Mr. Dylan, look who I got with me. Well, hello Kitty. Come on in. I have ran into Chester on the street, Matt. He insisted I come along with him. I'm glad he did. I mailed them letters and things to depot, Mr. Dillon. Oh, good, good, Chester. I took that circular over to Mr. Hightower. He'll print some up in a couple days. Oh, good. That's all you want me to do, ain't it? Yeah, yeah, that's all. Ain't nothing else you need? I mean, not right now. No, no, nothing else. Everything's pretty well took care of, ain't it? Yeah, everything's fine. Fine, Chester. Yeah, except for that buzzing and your head. My head? Come on, what is it, Chester? Just speak it right out. Well, thing is, I run into this friend of mine a few minutes ago. I ain't seen him in years. I knowed him a long time ago, way back in the Army. This is, you know, know how it is. Well, go on. Well, see, he's stationed out at Fort Dodge, right here. Only five miles away. My, just imagine that. Chester, I got an idea. Yes, sir? Look, why don't you ride out and see your friend, huh? Now, you can stay a couple of days if you want. There's nothing for you to do around here. Well, you think that'd be a good idea? Well, it's my idea, isn't it? Yes, it sure is. Well, I better get going and no use wasting time, is it? Bye, Chester. Bye, Miss Kitty. I'll be back in a day or two, Mr. Jones. Yeah. Well, you have a good time, Chester, and leave the door open. It's awful hot in here. I will. Goodbye. So that's why he wanted you here. I guess he thought it might help, but he forgot to mention something. No. What's this? Dear old friend of his has got a pretty interesting job in the army. Yeah, Is that so? Yeah, he's a mess sergeant. A mess sergeant? Well, after a couple of days of that, I'll have to go after Chester with a wagon. You may never see him again. Marshall Dillon. Ah, come on in, son. I'm looking for Doc. Well, his office is right next door. I've been there. I've been everywhere. Oh, you need him, Ben. I was sent to fetch him. Somebody sick? My paw told me to bring him out to our place. Well, is it your PA who's sick? He wants the doc bad. Marshall, who is your pawson? Ben Pitcher. You've been Pitcher's boy. My name's Jerry. Oh, Jerry. Your PA must be pretty sick if he sent for Doc. I know he hates doctors, don't believe in him. But he wants Doc to come, Marshall. He told me. Had to find him. Now I've looked everywhere. Well, there's a back room at the Dodge House, Jerry. Doc sometimes plays a little poker in there. Thank you, lady. I'll go look if you don't find him there. Come back and I'll help you, Jerry. Thanks, Marshall. Oh, and Jerry. Yes, sir? If you do find him, be sure and tell him that I want to see him before he leaves. I'll tell him, Marshall. That's a surprise. Yeah, I've heard about Ben Pritchard. How he hates doctors. His wife's just as bad. I remember he got caught up in a knife fight here in town sometime back and then threatened to kill Doc if he got anywhere near him. He almost bled to death as a result. You know, there's something wrong about this. Kidding. I think I'll ride out there with Doc. Good. I'd sure hate to see anything happen to Doc. Yeah, so would everybody. Except Pitcher. Dump. How do you like riding in a buggy, Matt? Make you feel important? Yeah, it sure does, Doc. But the way you drive, I'd feel a lot safer on a horse. Yeah, you'll get used to it. Well, I hope not. And I don't see anybody around. Do you expect a sick man to be waiting on the porch for you? I'd expect almost anything of Ben Pitcher. Well, a man can change, Doc. Oh, change? Not him, not Pitcher. I will soon find out. What are you doing here, Marshall? I came along to keep Doc company, Miss Fisher. Oh, man. Where's the boy? Jerry said to tell you you'd be along directly. Why didn't he come with you? Well, he said that you gave him a list of stuff to buy while he was in town. Oh, forgot. We're wasting time. Where's Ben, Mrs. Fitcher? He's out back. He's out out back? In the barn. What's he doing in the barn? You ask him, Doc. I don't interfere in my husband's way of doing things. Is he sick? Isn't he? He's in the barn. You go see him. I got work to do. That woman could fair drive me crazy now. Maybe that's what happened to Pitcher. Between the two of them, it's a wonder the boys made out at all. Jerry seems okay. They have their way. They'll make a spook out of them yet. You know, you're not very charitable, Doc. You don't fool me. Mad, Dylan? You don't like them any better than I do. I always try to look for the good side in people. Oh, sure. Hogwash. Pretty good bond he's got here. Yeah. Look, I'll go in first. What's that? Or you, you follow me. Pitcher. Hey, pitcher. I'm back here. Come on, doc. Over here in this stall. I thought it was Doc. He's here. Bishop, what are you doing in there with that cow? I thought you were sick. It ain't me that's sick. Well, who is sick? MAU. What? Macau's got the colic or something. I've done everything I can for her. You mean you had me come all this way, way out here to doctor a cow? I wouldn't let you doctor no human. I thought there was something wrong about all these cows. Cows different. I don't mind so much you working on a cow. Oh, you don't? Cows are different. Humans can get well by themselves, but cows is helpless. They're kind of pitiful. Listen to her. She's hurting bad. Dog, I ought to kick you right in the head. Ben Pre, don't take it out on me that you doctors don't know nothing. If you're so smart, do something for my cow before she dies, Doc. All right, I'll look at it. But you sure don't deserve it. Ben, you ain't doing it for me. You bet I'm not. Now get out of the way and let me in there. Take your time, Doc. I'm in no hurry. What's he doing in there all this time, Marshall? Leave him be, Ben. He'll let us know if he wants any help. How's my cow, Doc? Oh, I guess he's through. Here's your knife, then. Did you stick her with it? I did, and she's gonna feel a lot better. You can give her all the water she wants, but don't let her eat anything for a day or two. She gonna live? I don't know. If she dies, I ain't gonna pay you. I wouldn't take any money from you anyway. What's wrong with my money? It's not your money. It's you. What do you mean? Hey, Pa, I'm back. I got all the stuff. Tomorrow morning. You had better, Rose. Oh, Doc. Marshall. Jerry. Say, Doc, you missed. All excitement happened just after you left. Everybody was running around looking for you. What happened, Jerry? Old Mrs. Hill, she was walking down the street and I guess the sun was too much for. Or something. Anyway, she fainted and she fell against the window right there to general store and it cut her arm real bad. Nobody could get it stopped bleeding. They couldn't. That's why they were looking for you, Doc. I told them you'd come out here, but they wouldn't believe what happened to Mrs. Hill, Jerry? She died, Doc. Just before I left. She died? Did you hear that picture? A woman Died. If I'd been there, I could have saved her, but she died. Don't talk at me. She died because of you. Your rotten, twisted wings. Ah. None of you doctors is any good. You couldn't have done nothing. Oh, no good. Well, I'll show you. No, wait a minute, doctor. You're not. I'll show you. Nobody hits me. Pa's got a knife. No picture. Finger. He caught him. Here, Doc. I got you. He gripped me with a knife. Matt. Yeah? You heard that. Well, it's bleeding. I can see that. You help me in the house. That way we can look at it there. Yeah, sure, Doc. What about Pa? You let me know when he comes to. I'll come back and knock him out again. Well, it's pretty clean now, doc. Oh, well. Oh, it looks better. Yeah, but it's still bleeding. Now, I don't care for that mess you're making on that bed. Marshall, go get me another pan of hot water. You ordering me around my own house? You do it, Matt. All right. Yeah, Doc. I'm not sure, but I. I don't think that knife ruptured anything. Oh, that's good. But a couple of those veins have to be tied off, and then it's. It's gotta be sewed up, you see? Oh, needles and thread in my bag. Now, I'd do it myself. I can't reach it easy enough. You mean you want me to do it? Yeah. I'll tell you how much you think I can. Oh, it's easy, especially for a gunfighter. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I can bleed to death. This way I won't have any trouble, Doc. Here, you hold the cloth on it, huh? I got it. I'll go get your bag, Marshall. Get out of here, Pitcher. You hit me awful hard. Did I? He jumped me first. You saw him. I was protecting myself. Picture. If Duck doesn't come out of this all right, I'm gonna quit being a marshal. And I'm gonna come after you as a plain man looking for revenge. You're threatening? It's wrong of me, but I'm gonna kill you. Pitcher. Oh, no. Get out of here and stay out of this house. Go on. I'm going. I'm going. It wasn't easy, and I felt like I had fence posts for fingers. But I finally got Doc sewed up. He'd lost an awful lot of blood, and he passed out before I finished. So all I could do was sit there and watch him. And maybe that was the hardest part. In the morning, however, he Seemed better, and he insisted that I take him in the Dodge. So I made him a bed in Pitcher's wagon and had joined drive the buggy alongside. He was in bad shape by the time we reached town, but I got him into his own bed and then sent for Kitty to help me out. I don't know what I'd have done without her for that next week. Matt. Yeah, Kitty. I'm coming. You know what he wants now? What? He's tired of drinking plain water. He says if we don't start cutting it with some good corn, he won't drink anymore. Then let him go thirsty. He won't hold out long. No public servant's going to tell me what's good for him. You send that lawman down for some whiskey, Doc. Now, we've gone to a lot of trouble to keep you alive. We sure have. Oh, don't you worry about me. I'd get out of bed right now. I like being weeded on. Now, who's that? No, that's a d question. Who's that? Hot iron or go. Look, Doc, I never thought anything could make you any orner than you've always been. But getting stabbed. Oh, never mind the gab. Just answer the door. Well, come on in. Oh, what manners. Come on in, I said. Oh, good heavens. Well, go ahead, Doc. Fire me. Doc. Doc. In here. Oh, it's Jerry. Yeah, come on inside. Oh, Doc. Marshall. What are you doing in town, Jerry? I come for Doc. What? Paul's sick. He's about to die. So sick. Oh, now, look, it's the truth, Marshall. Paul made me lie last time. But he don't even know I'm here now. He doesn't know you're here. He's too sick, Doc. It's like he's out of his head. He don't know nothing. What about your ma? Does she know you're here? I didn't tell her. She'd have stopped me. Doc. Jerry, your PA tried to kill Doc the last time and he's still in bed. Now. He can't go anyplace. Please, Doc. Why should he risk his life for your Paul? Wait a minute, Matt. Now, just wait a minute here. I'll come. Jerry. Now, don't be silly. I'm a doctor, Matt. A man's dying. Doesn't matter what man. I knew you'd come. I knew you would. Crazy Doc. You'll open that cup riding out there. Besides, you're not strong enough. You'd be taking an awful chance. Jerry. What? How'd you come to town? I figured you'd need it, so I brought the wagon. I thought so. Well, you gonna help me out, man? All right, I'll help you out. Do. Sa. I wish you'd let me carry you, Doc. No, no, I'll make it. He's awful weak, ain't he? Yeah, he is. Here, I'll get the door. Come on in. Ma's probably in the bedroom. It's over this way. We know where it is. Jerry. Oh, I forgot. That you, Jerry? It's me, Ma. Where you been, Doc? What are you doing here? Jerry came after me. Mrs. Pitcher, we don't want no doctors. Your husband's sick. He's terrible sick. But you can't do him no good. Yeah, I can try. Jerry, I'm gonna whoop you. No, Ms. Pitcher. No, you're not. Don't you tell me what I'm gonna do. Look at Doc, Ms. Fitcher. You can tell he shouldn't be here at all. But he came. He came to help a man who tried to kill it. And nobody's gonna stop him. Now, come on, Doc. Get out of the way. Ms. Pitcher. Wait a minute. I'll get you a chair, Doc. Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. Here you are. Yeah, he looks pretty sick, Marshall. Go on. Me? Hurry. Now what? She's got a gun, Marshall. Who? I told me. I said I got her, Jerry. I'll kill you. You and Doc both. Give me that. No. There. Now, you sit down. Go on. Jerry, you go see if Doc needs any help, huh? Okay, Marshall. You know, Ms. Pitcher, you don't deserve Doc being here. You don't deserve it at all. Marshall. Yeah? What? I've been thinking all night. I've been sitting here thinking, oh, I don't want my husband to die. I can't have him die. Doc's doing everything he can for him, Ms. Bishop. Can he save him? You think he can save him? I don't know. Well, Mrs. Pitcher. How is he, Doc? Well, he's past the worst, and I think he'll be. Can I see him? Can he talk? Yes, but not for long. Needs a lot of rest now. Speaking of rest, Doc, you. You look like you could use some, too. Yeah. We're going back to Dodge, man. I'll sleep the whole way. Good. Doc, he wants to talk to you. What is it, Ma? Ma says you was here all night. I was, yes. She says you saved my life. Maybe I helped. Maybe. But what I want to say is that I ain't gonna pay you. I didn't ask you to. But you, Pitcher, Doc saved your life. Maybe he did, but I ain't gonna pay him. It doesn't matter. But why not? Of course my cow died. No, for pitcher. I'm gonna. Don't bother. Come on, let's go. Let's go. Okay. Dr. Doc. Yes. He means what he says, Doc. I can't change him. It's all right, ma'. Am. I can't change him. But there's something I gotta say. Yes? I'm proud to have you in my house, Doc. I'm real proud. I can't say no more. Well, Doc, I've been paid, man. I think I've been paid pretty good. What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific? When it's cravinient. Okay, Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at a.m. p.m. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. p.m. I'm seeing a pattern here. Well, yeah, we're talking about what I crave, which is anything from AM PM what more could you want? Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience. AM PM Too much. Good stuff. Hey, this is Sarah. Look, I'm standing out front of a.m. p.m. Right now and well, you're sweet and all, but I found something more fulfilling. Even kind of cheesy. But I like it. Sure, you met some of my dietary needs, but they've just got it all, so farewell. Oatmeal. So long, you strange soggy. Break up with bland breakfasts and taste AM PMs bacon, egg and cheese biscuit made with cage free eggs, smoked bacon and melty cheese on a buttery biscuit. AM P M. Too much Good stuff. We'll return to the biography of Gun Smoke in just one moment. Here again is John Hickman. Two trademarks of a Meston script are violence and tragedy. And for a very good reason. John Meston. What? Most stories do end rather tragically sad, despite the propaganda, in the great United States of America. No, Most people, they've had sad endings. Versus a great number of them did. Jeez, it was a hard life. Didn't live very long while they lived. It was pretty rough then. The brutality and the violence. You talk about violence these days. Of course, the stuff they put on television is terrible, I think. But the violence in those days was. It was rampant. My God, the violence. A poor way of life, you know. No Medicine? No. Sanitation? No, not much of anything. Not heat and sand and little water. Not much food. It wasn't a great life. Been romanticized fairly well. Maybe that's. That answers the question. I don't know. It didn't romanticize it so much. Beston scripts are filled with odd and tragic figures. One of the best examples is the guitar. First heard in December 1953, it's the story of a not so bright guitar playing ex soldier named Weed Pindle who transports himself about the west on an old mule. Pindle, played by Vic Perrin, is bullied by two cowboys in one of the first scenes of the show. Now, what in the world was that fella who just came in the door there with Tyler and Short? Oh, him. That's Weed Pendle. He rode in on a mule a couple days ago. Which has the bigger ears, him or the mule? He is funny looking, all right. And he acts peculiar, too. That's a mistake. His scrawny mule, Pendle. I seen you on him this morning. Pendle here is kind of scrawny yourself. Short. Maybe some beer to fat him up a little. I'd like some beer. All right, but I got no money. Why'd you sell that guitar? Yours? Sell my guitar? No, I'd never do that. You must have a nickel at least. Last money I had got stolen. Now, who dares steal money off a tiger like you, Findle? I was asleep. I started to wake up, but they kicked me in the head. You call that a head? Looks to me more like your neck just growed out and haired over. I ain't very handsome. You sure ain't. Hey, what'd your old lady think of you when she saw you, Pendle? I don't know. She died. Yeah. Laughing, I'll bet. That's enough, Tyler. That's too mean. Pindle's a harmless little fellow. Ain't nobody talking to you, Chester. Bartender, three beers. You buying, Tyler? I'm proud, too. As the story develops, Tyler and Short ignore Dylan's warnings and continue to torture Pindle. They even mutilate his mule. What do you suppose they've done to him? Now look at his mule, Chester. That's what they've done. Oh, my goodness. Mr. Dylan, he's lost the ear. I thought he meant to like their mules that way, Short. Least I always heard they did. I guess there's just no pleasing to some men. Tyler, you shouldn't have done that to my mule. Well, it's the marshal again. Did you men do this? Now, Marshall, we ain't done Nothing to Pendle. Did they do it, Pendle? I tried to stop him, but Tyler held me. Then they gave me my mule's ear. Marshal. Right here, see? Yeah. Turn around, both of you. Turn around, I said. Now take the guns, Justin. Yes. Can't do nothing to us, Marshall. We didn't hurt Sandal. I don't like what you did to his mule. I got him, Mr. Dillon. Now that you can turn around again. I ought to cut an ear off of each of you, but I can't do that. So I'm gonna do the next best. Now, look here, Marchie. Now, leave him there, Chester. Pendle, I'm sorry about your mule. He ain't much of a mule anymore. Well, you better go take care of him. And maybe these two will leave you alone now. Poor mule. Tyler and Short reach their sadistic pinnacle when they destroy Pindle's guitar. The next morning, the two cowboys are found murdered behind the long branch. In the closing moments of the show, Dylan talks to bartender Sam Noonan about Pindle's whereabouts. The free evening, Sam. What'll it be, Marshall? Where's Weed, Pendle? Sam? Oh, I just sent him out back for a bucket of sawdust. What do you want him for? Short and Tyler got their throats cut early this morning. Good. I guess they're smashing. His guitar was too much for Pendle, that's all. There he is now. Pendle, come over here. Morning, Marshall. Good morning, Bindle. Where was you last night? I don't know. Here, I guess you don't know. Now, wait a minute, Marshall. Bindle, where was you after they wrecked your guitar? Yeah. Sat in the alley a while. Then I come back here. Yeah, that's right. He was so broke up about his guitar, I didn't want to leave him alone. So I took him up and let him sleep on the floor of my room. That right, Bindle? Well, go on, tell him now. Sure, Sam. That's right. Are you trying to alibi for him, Sam? Why, no, Marshall. Dylan. But I care about him. Some people care about me. Who, Pendle? He's just talking, Marshall. Who cares about you, Pendle? Tell me. Those men. What men? He means some of the boys that was here when he come back with his busted guitar. Marshal. They just told him how sorry he was, that's all. I see. They liked his music, didn't they? Yes, they did. They liked to hear me play. Who was in here then, Sam? Well, now, Marshall Dillon, you know how it is. I'm busy pouring drinks and I don't pay no mind. To who's here and who ain't. I? I couldn't rightly say it all. Okay, Sam, I guess I can't beat the truth out of you. Oh, now, Marshall Dillon, who cares about Tyler and Short Dodgers, is better off without him. There's a law against murder, Sam, and it's the same for everybody. I'll be back later. What are you going to do now, Mr. Dylan? Well, I've done all I can, Chester. The whole town's just plain quit talking. Nobody knows anything. Well, I guess they're all trying to protect Pendle. Yeah, they are. That he didn't do it. Well, who did, Dan? Well, if I could prove who did it, Chester, I'd have him in jail. Say, come over here. Well, I declare, Mr. Dillon, it looks to me like he's leaving town. I told him he could go. He looks funnier than ever on that one eared mule. Yeah, now, Dodge treated Pendle pretty rough. It sure did. Poor little fella looks kind of empty like that. His guitar, don't he? Well, maybe you'll find another one somewhere. Anyway, they sure like to hear him play in this town. And a couple of the boys in particular, I guess. Yep, they liked it just fine. Sam. Another Messton trademark was his factual treatment of the plight of the American Indian. He had good reasons for this. Well, as I recall, or I've been told we were, I've forgotten, we were about the first show that treated Indians as human beings. Not just redskins, really good Indians and bad women. A number of shows about that. And Intermarriage across the Buffalo. Yes, but the Indians before that. As I remember, I wasn't around much before that. I wasn't really. I never heard radio or anything. They were treated in the old way, you know Indians, they are enemy and that kind of thing. I think Gunsmoke was understandable. The first show that really changed us somewhat. No, the white man, the way he treated the Indians. National disgrace. Still is. I've been concentration camps trying to destroy that culture. What we're doing now, assimilate the Indian. Sure, Indian can be assimilated, but he can't get a drink. Oh no, it's a horrible thing. The Indians are no worse than anybody else. Most of the white men out there were not nice guys. They're all a bunch of nuts who went west anyway. Most of them. We get down into it. Jesus Christ. That goes through that Washington policy against the Indians is wipe them out. So the poor Indian retaliated a little bit and got a bad name. Perhaps one of The Better Meston Scripts with an Indian Theme was Sunday supplement broadcast in June 1956. This story concerns two New York writers named Sprig and Bunker, who come to Dodge looking for sensational stories that will thrill their Eastern readers. The writers disturb a Pawnee burial ground and steal an Indian totem, causing an uprising that is brutally extinguished by the calvary. Following the massacre, Spring, Craig and Bunker returned to Dodge for the final confrontation with Dylan. Hello, Marshall. Get on, Bunker. Your tooth, Spring. Now. Well, we saw it, Marshall. We saw practically all of it. It was exciting and with no help from you. Oh, it was magnificent. The cavalry really got their own back this time. What are you talking about? The Indians. The cavalry practically wiped them out. What? Yesterday, Marshall, just before dark. We were driving along the Arkansas and heard all that gunfire and commotion up ahead. And we got there just in time to see what few Indians were left running for their lives. They killed all but half a dozen of them. And they got that chief Little Hog. You saw this, Marshall? We wouldn't be making it up, would we? And I might add that it's about time we saw something around here. You know, Sprig, I was talking to Doc Adams over there when you drove in. You know what he'd like to see? No. He'd like to see you and Bunker hung. Why, that's so. What? What's the matter with you, Marshall? Why did you tell me a soldier gave you that totem? Oh, you. You found out. Why did you lie about it? Because you were choking me and because I didn't know what you'd do next or why. Why? You men robbed a Pawnee grave. You stole a totem. A totem of Little Hawk's clan. That's all we took. Who cares about a savage idol anyway? Little Hawk did. He went on a war path. Nonsense, Marshall. Over a fool thing like that? Marshall, you're not standing up for a bloodthirsty redskin, are you? I knew Little Hawk, Sprig. He was a good chief. He was a brave man and a peaceful one till you shamed him. Well, he's. He's not shamed now, Marshall. He's a good Indian. Now, you get out, both of you. You get out today. Enough men have died because of you. And you go back to New York, and when you get there, you write a story about a marshal who'd have liked nothing better than handing you over to Little Hawk if he were still alive. Sam, Think advertising on TikTok isn't for your business, think again. With TikTok ads, we went from 250,000 downloads to over a million downloads in less than a year. 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Download Airalo today. That's a I R a L O Airalo and use code CRAB for 15 off your first ESIM terms apply. One of the things that gave Gunsmoke a lot of special color were the sound effects. Again, Norman McDonald. It had always been a rude rule of thumb in radio that there should not be any dead air, that people must keep talking. Well, we, we changed that. Not because we deliberately set out to change it, but just because the people we were working with didn't talk all the time. So we had to fill it with sound patterns. We had three sound men for the most part. Bill James, Tom Hanley, Ray Kemper, who contributed more to the show than anybody could ever imagine. For example, the boys on their own time realized that we were having trouble with live gunshots. So they, on a Saturday, went out with some equipment of their own and recorded shots on tape with a.45 and with a.38 and with a.32 and I think with a.22. These effects then could be played directly through the line so that it didn't flatten out and become just a dull pop on the air. So we had on a McKenzie machine, I think the boys called it in those days. We had Matt's gun and we always used a.45 for Matt and for the other heavies there was be a.38 or a.32. So they lynched it. They done it. Why you dirty jobs. This is the kind of thing that the boys did in order to make the sound better and in order to make it work more fully for the show. They also really work on the smallest possible details, Like Matt getting up and walking to the stove to get a cup of coffee. The boys knew exactly how many steps it was from Matt's desk to the stove. Or they knew how many steps it was from the front of Matt's office to the jail cell. The one place that we cheated a little bit was on the walk from Matt's office down to the long branch. If we were running short on time, it was two steps across the boardwalk, five steps across the street, one step up on the other side. And then the doors. If we wanted to stretch a little bit, that walk sometimes became considerably longer. But the boys made the walk work because they used spurs for Matt. Whoever was walking with him would be without spurs. So you could differentiate between two people, Matt and Chester, for instance. Walking down the street, they went into the whole bit of the squeak of the leather. When Matt would mount a saddle, you could hear the stirrup leathers stretch and squeak. And we took time to play the sound patterns, which I think contributed in great part to the color and the feel of authenticity, if you will. Mr. Dylan. Mr. Dylan, come here quick. Look. Lynched. Scared me half to death. I seen him hanging there. It isn't a very pretty sight. There ain't no horse around. Where's his horse? He probably stole it. The man caught up with him and took it back. Who do you suppose got it? I don't know. I don't know how we're ever gonna find out. Oh, come on. Let's cut him down and get him into the ground. You know, when they did horses hoofs effects, for example, I can remember Bill would use one set of coconuts to depict our horses, which were shod. And they'd use another set of equipment if an Indian horse came up or something like that. And probably for the listeners, there was no difference. But to them, there was a vast difference. And they would change background noises from one saloon to another. And they were punctilious enough that they had a different set of street sounds for the day and for the night. These fellows were really dedicated to their jobs. Must have been easy for you, dope. Really easy. Marshall. It's kind of fun. Fun? Killing that nice boy. Fun. Ah. Taking my time that way. What are you doing? Give me my gun. You're not gonna be needing a gun, dog. He sure never expected that, did he? No gunman would, Kelly, but he's sure never going to forget it. I became a challenge, I think, to the two soundmen that were assigned to the program then, Ray Kemper and Tom Handley, announcer George Walsh. And as I remember, it was around the 4th of July because they had a firecracker. And during the middle commercial of the dress rehearsal, they decided they were going to shoot off this firecracker. Well, as anybody who's ever been on the air can understand, my only concern was not their firecracker. My only concern was how I could read that middle commercial and make it sound like I was at a regular pace, but I was really killing time so I'd have some time to play with when I got on the air and they shot off the firecracker and I just went right on. I think this may have impressed Norm MacDonald a little bit because he was kind of surprised that it didn't stop me. But it really impressed those two sondmen because for the duration of the program, they tried every week to break me up at that middle commercial during the rehearsal, of course, but they'd bring up a table full of equipment for the program and a table and a half full of equipment to try to break up Walsh. Middle commercial we had some high old times. Funny Howard McNear sometimes used to refer to Saturdays, and we recorded them as dirty Saturdays. Sometimes somebody would make an inflection and a little line that would come out slightly spiked and colored, and from then on, no matter what you said, the most innocuous line became really a dirty bunch of words when they were not intended. So. But these guys would spend hours working up a ribbled sound effect or something of the sort, and then we would all beautifully collapse. One of the nicest things of the Saturday morning table reading was when Parley Bear would arrive with two enormous boxes of goodies from Benesh's Bakery, which was a marvelous bakery. And of course, everyone would always complain that Parley brought the wrong kind of torts or the wrong kind, which would drive Parley up the wall. And Howard McNair would laugh and. But anyway, it was a pleasant way to start out. And all of the members of the. Both the casual and the regular cast were such professionals that they could. They could kid as they worked without losing emphasis. Georgia Ellis recalls a particular Saturday morning when supporting player Vic Perrin appeared wearing jeans that were held up with elastic. Perrin reportedly had a special interest in another casual player, Gene Bates, who happened to be working this particular program. He had Sort of a, kind of a secret crush on her. He was lusting through his script and had her sideways in a nice sweet way, of course. But Vic was standing off the Jean Bates and he was so impressed with her. You see this kind of a calf like thing and she was playing a scene with him with this one microphone. I walked up behind him and pulled down his pants. Elastic. I just pulled him down and went back and sit at the table. And there was Bill, you know, and Dana and everybody looking. I don't know what they thought of me. No, I'm looking out of the booth there, said Vic in his shorts. And he gets over me. Script factor is always. Gene just raised hers a little bit higher. What I had hoped to be complete utter confusion turned out to be nothing more than thick turning purple, but at the same time acting away, reaching down with one hand and pulling on his head. Well, you said I wouldn't see any part of this. Except later on, Vic said to me over lunch at Nickadel's, well, for heaven's sakes, you might at least have checked to see if I was wearing underwear. Actor John Dana was a regular member of the Gunsmoke Stock Company and he too looked forward to those Saturday rehearsals. Oh, they were the most happy because, for one thing, we all knew each other. And once the show was established, and we were rather established as a. As a group, we worked so well together. We knew what the other's reactions were going to be and we felt at ease personally with each other. Princess. We'd come to work in the morning and we wouldn't get down to the first reading for an hour. We'd be sitting around with Danish and coffee jabbering, you're having a marvelous time. And I mention that only because it is from this kind of intimate relationship with the other actors, the other people, let alone being actors on the show, allowed you a tremendous inner freedom, a relaxation, a feeling of comfort that there was no tension at all in those days. It was an absolute ball. We'd do two shows on Saturday. We'd do one on the morning, morning, go to lunch and there'll be one in the afternoon. And the total, we'd probably start at 11 and be through by 3:30 or 4 or something like that. It was joyful, it really was. Everybody looked forward to coming to work. I wanted to ride out to OD Richards Camp that night, but Obie insisted on staying in Dodge. I wanted to ride out to Obie Richards. Excuse me. The reason I got screwed, because on this side I. I Wanted to ride out to od Rich. Well, I'm a son of a. Yes, you are. I wanted to write out to OB Richards. Well, I can't possibly do it now. Okay, all right, here we go now. God damn it. All right, quiet, everybody. Jesus Christ, fellas. I wanted to ride out to Obie Ridgers camp that night, but Obie insisted on staying in Dodge. For years, Bill and I had a running gag where he'd say, hand me those handcuffs or hand me this. It's in the drawer. And I don't know what started it really, but it became a running gag as you'd have the sound effect of the door open. I'd say, here. Well, there's my. I've been looking all over for that. How did that get there? Or would you hand me my jacket or handing my gun out of the closet? And I said, yes, sir, here's your gun. Well, who put my. What? I don't know why people put my things in. What's that doing there? And after this had been going on for many, many years, Bill said to me one day, for nearly 10 years we've been playing this show and you've been looking for something and found it. Now for heaven's sake, what is it? I said, it's right here in my pocket and here it is and you can have it. So he appropriately pithy and his comment, and we went. But I couldn't have told you what it was. It just seemed like a good gimmick at the time. And it used to annoy Bill through Dylan, the fact that I always referred to circulars as circulars. And I'd say, new batch of circlers. Come in, Mr. Dylan. Circlers? Yes, circlers. How do you spell it? S I R, K L U, R, S. And he was just droned. I came bouncing into the office one day all excited because there was a stranger in town and Dylan wanted to know some particulars. And I said, well, he's some sort of Dutchman. Says, how do you know he's a Dutchman? So. Well, he talks funny and he comes from Europe or Asia or one of them towns. And Bill, who was easily broken up Europe or Asia, one of them times yesterday, said, and then the wonderful quality there. Bill would never pursue it. He would rise above Chester. Chester talked Doc into helping him make a garden. And when Doc wanted to know what he had planted, Chester didn't know. He had just found some seeds and had planted them where they were going to come up flowers or vegetables. One of the best running gags in the show was recalled by John Dator. The idea would be that Matt Dillon would be riding along with Chester and a little fellow of the town, little guy who sort of always admired Matt, would just call out hello Mr. Dillon. Matt would answer very so will he was hello John, and off you'd ride. And this happened time after time, time after time. Out of, out of the blue, along come this little character saying hello Dylan or hello Marshall Dylan. And that's all he said. And sometimes I remember now, Matt would be out in the prairie somewhere, isolated way, Helen gone out somewhere. And out of the blue I would walk up to the microphone and say, hello Marshall Dylan. You just say hello John, and off we go. Pass it off as though, you know, is the most ordinary thing in the world that this little guy should be out there among the Arapaho Indians. We were doing a show called the New Hotel sometime in. Well, I don't remember the date exactly. Let's say it was in 55. And it was one of those mornings where just everything was on a tilt. Conrad at one point broke up so much that he. I thought he was really just through for the day following whatever bill I had left or whatever Larry Dobkin ad libbed or whatever John Dana ad libbed. The sound men would ad lib sound underneath to go right with it. The story of the new hotel concerns a hotel being built which is later destroyed by a fire. And it's a very dramatic moment. And the Q line comes up from Conrad and the hotel is in flames in the background. And Rex Corey plays I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire which of course broke up the cast completely for about five minutes. Well, so that's Enoch Mills's new hotel. Well, it will be when they get a bill. Chester never heard of a cattle rancher going into hotel business before. Mr. Dylan, Enoch Mills is a man of enterprise. Look yonder at him. Well, he's as proud as the new father there, ain't he? Well, it isn't every day a man builds a new hotel in Taj. I always say. Hello, mark Chester. Oh, Mr. Mill, it's going up pretty fast, isn't it? Oh, it's got most a month before it's finished. Marshall, how many rooms you going to have? 15. Could have more. But this going to be a class hotel, not some hay tent like Jim Dobie's Dodge House. I'll bet he's jealous. Doby's had Monopoly in this town long enough. You're right about him being jealous, J. He's already done everything he can to keep me from building. Oh? What's he done? Well, he tried to buy up all the good lumber in town, for one thing. Good lumber in town? Thought he'd leave me with nothing but a lot of warpy cottonwood. But I got on to him soon enough, and I'm building with the best. Marshall. It's all ash and hack. Very. Oh, hello. Scouting the enemy, I guess. Leave him, Scout. He'll be out of business soon. Scout the enemy. Scouting the enemy. Yeah. Looks like a town meeting we're about to have. All right, Marshall. Hello, Mr. Doby. Coming along fine, Doby. Of course, it's only a little bitty hotel. Half the rooms, but twice the class. The Dodge House. You won't get my trade. I've been in business too long. Oh, my God. A figure. Who's your little friend, Dobie? You'll never beat me, eunuch. You're getting too old. Old? I'll eat the goose that fattens in your grave, Jim. Dobie. Not likely. Anyways, what do you know about the hotel business, Enoch? You won't last a month, Weston. Now look, you men. Dodge can use two hotels, plenty of it. Trade here. Why don't you quit fighting each other? You're too scared of a little competition, Dobie. You ain't slept a night since I started building. You got a ranch to run, Enoch. That's enough for one man. You shouldn't be pushing on other people's territory. Well, you ain't going to stop me. I've tried to stop you and I'll go on trying. All right. He's threatening me, Marshall. You heard him. I'm going to fight you, Enoch. I'm going to fight you all away. So now you better start staying up nights. Man belongs in jail, Marshall. Dobies are hard. When ain't it? He'll give you a fight, but I don't think he'll do anything illegal. He won't, huh? Well, you wait and see. And it's going to be your fault for not stopping him. Now, the whole blame is going to be on your shoulders, Marshall. And I ain't going to let nobody. Buddy. Forget it. Kitty, get that thing out of here. This is the loneliest jailhouse I was ever in, man. You and Chester don't think spend much time here, do you? I would be around more often if you drive in occasionally. I haven't got a license. Oh, I see. Well, you never did have. Well, that's one reason I'm going to live so long. I came by to tell you something, Matt. Oh, yeah. Look out for this Christmas traffic. Don't tell me that's around again. Yep. Met a guy at the Long Branch this afternoon. He didn't say much, but a man like that said stands out like a white buffalo. Ah, you can pick him, Kitty. Gil Shank's a gunman and a crook. He isn't wanted that I know of, but he sure ought to be. I didn't figure him for a drummer. Oh, well, I think I'll let him stay around a few days, see what he's up to. A drummer? There are a couple of men with him, but it's hard to say if they're friends or if they just met. Well, they're probably friends. Gilshank never liked traveling alone. Him much? All right. Didn't look like Gunman Matt. They're just a couple of saddle buns. Maybe I'm wrong, then. Well, thanks for telling me, though, Kitty. How's Enoch Mill's hotel coming? I haven't been by there lately. Oh, they got the frame up. Enoch says it'll be another month. Anyway, Jim Doby been letting him along. Well, he keeps prodding pretty hard, I guess. Those two will never get together. Not the way they're going. Gone. I got my knee again. Oh, Kitty. Something scary at Chester? Oh, worse than that. Oh, new hotel's on fire. On fire and oh, Enit san Jim doit. Oh, my knee is killing me. You better get down there, Mr. Johnson. Oh, dear. Worried about your future in tech? Master new skills, accelerate your team's impact, and redefine what's possible. With pluralsight, we're more than just another online learning platform. We're shattering the skills gap and shaping future generations of technologists. Transform your work, transform your team. Ready to tap in? Visit us@pluralsight.com to learn more. My place in tech changes every day, but I don't fear the future because I'm with the leader. Pluralsight, their online learning platform, has the hands on expert led courses I need to master new tech skills and create bigger impacts so I can learn quickly and stay ahead. With pluralsight, I don't fear what's next. I embrace it. Tap in@pluralsight.com and see for yourself. Those were happy, happy halcyon times. It's been close to 14 to 15 years since we did them. Some of those Saturday recording sessions seem as though they were just yesterday. And I wish they were tomorrow. Within two years, Gunsmoke had become a smash hit. Favorable reviews from the critics came first. Then in 1954, the program acquired its longtime sponsor, L and M Cigarettes. The series began to receive numerous awards. It was. It was aired twice a week. There was a surprising amount of fan mail to answer. The program inspired several Western spin offs. And there was even talk of transferring Gunsmoke to television. George Walsh begins the story. The sponsor I remembered best, probably because I had more to do with it over a long period of time, was Liggett and Myers Tobacco Company. In those days, it was permissible to advertise cigarettes on the air. And I did the L and M competition commercials. And George Feniman did the Chesterfield commercials. This brings to mind the day that we were in the middle of a rehearsal. One of the agency men representing Liggett, Myers Tobacco and L and M and or Chesterfield Cigarettes was in the control room and out on the prairie. All of a sudden, Marshall Dillon and Chester were riding along. And how a pistol shot came out of nowhere. And they hit the dirt and crawled down behind a clump of range grass. And Chester turned to the marshal and said, Golly, Mr. Dillon, it's lucky he didn't have a rifle. Cut. Yell the agency man. We can't have that word lucky in there. And everything came to a halt until there was a great deal of editorial judgment. Finally, it did turn out in the. The script as Lucky. But because Norm MacDonald, I remember him standing there drawing himself up to his full Scottish 6 foot 2 at the time and saying to this man, do you mean to tell me that I am to have Chester Proudfoot say to Marshall Dillon it is extremely fortunate that he didn't have a rifle? So Lucky stayed in the script. But this is the type of thing that I never have understood the advertising agency business. I've been exposed to it, and I use the word advisedly. I've been close to it from my standpoint, my side of the business. But I've never understood the aura of fear and wonderment that surrounds this business. I remember once that the small agency the Cunningham and Walsh had on the West Coast. Now my name is. My real legitimate name is Walsh. And I have no relation whatever to the Walsh of Cunningham and Walsh, a very big successful advertising agency. But one time during the course of commercials that we were recording, aside from the program, we were wild tracking the commercials. One of the representatives of the west coast agency was having a difficult time. It just seemed that I couldn't do anything to please him. No matter how I did this L and M commercial, it just wasn't right. He didn't like anything about it. He didn't like the speed, he didn't like the pacing, he didn't like my accents. He didn't like anything about it. And after the tension began to build and I had done many attempts at it, I had a moment of, I thought was jest. I leaned back to the microphone and said, well, if that's the way you want it, okay. But I'm not sure the Knuckle Fred would like it that way. Now, I had learned shortly before that Fred Walsh was a real character who in those days was an old man, but still used to terrify everybody at the headquarters back in New York. So I just threw this in facetiously. But the man in the control room didn't take it that way. He thought, good Lord, this guy might really be related to the old man. From that day on, I could do nothing wrong for that man. And as long as I knew him, there was always this aura of doubt mixed with fear that he might be related to the old man in New York. I wasn't. But I cherish this memory because I'm bad when it comes to a put on. But this was one time, I think I got away with it. Over the 10 years that gunsmoke was on the air, we were fortunate to win a number of awards. For instance, the Radio Television Mirror Daily awards. We won one for Best Radio Drama or Best Radio Western in 54 and 5 and 6 and 7 and 8, and I believe in nine, but I'm not sure about that. One of the things, I always hesitate to say this, but I think it should be known that perhaps the most deserving award, which was never passed out was the one that should have gone to John Meston, who wrote hundreds of these scripts and to the best of my knowledge received no specific award for it, which I think is rather a tragedy and. And an oversight. There were times that John came in for his good notices. For instance, in a Jack Gould column in the times, late 52 or early 53, Jack Gould gave us really quite a rave review and I think was largely responsible for the show continuing on and indeed picking up commercial sponsorship. The Gunsmoke name appears in a lot of odd places. As a matter of fact, it's in the Congressional Record. A rather amusing thing when someone was saying that Matt Dillon would never have done that. And then he was reminded that Matt Dillon never really existed. And he said, no, but he was so real, it seemed as though he really existed. At this time, it is with great pride that Gunsmoke is able to bring you a specially recorded message by the honorable Edward F. Arne, Governor of the state of Kansas. Ladies and gentlemen, Governor Arne. It's a real pleasure for me on behalf of Kansans everywhere to congratulate the CBS Radio Network, the writers, producers, directors, actors and technicians on the splendid job you are doing with Gunsmoke. Here is real adult western drama without the usual horse opera cushion. Portraying an era and community of Kansas that graphically mark the formative years of our great state. Let me point out, however, the Dodge City of today is a far cry from the Dodge City so vividly brought to life in gun smoke. From those early pioneer and frontier days. Dodge City has developed into one of the fine cities of our state. Industrially, agricultural, culturally and historically. The folks of Dodge City and indeed all the people of this great Sunflower State, thank you for a good job well done. Thank you, Governor Arne. It was released twice a week. It would be released first on a Sunday night and then re released the following Saturday morning. We had a tremendous audience, as I recall. I think we were something like. Because of the double show. We had an audience of something like 50 million people every week, which was fantastic. You know, Gunsmoke got its share of fan mail. No more nor less than other shows that were on the air at that time. We tried to answer our fan mail. We had special letterheads printed up in period style saying Officer of the Marshall, 1871, Dodge City, Kansas. And at the bottom it said 4 Marshal Dylan by. And then I would sign my name. And everybody was satisfied. We tried to answer it all. And I think. I think that's good public relations. Chester got a fan mail that generally showed some irritation. Wanting to know why he had behaved like that or why hadn't he used. Little sense, you know, People were always wanting to do Chester over, which was kind of remarkable. The letters that came weren't advising me to shape up or ship out. That bill got a lot of letters for his. The magnificence of his portrait. I never got any unfriendly letters, but you got the feeling some people would shake me good. There was one letter that I can still remember addressed to John Mesta, who came from Texas from a fan named Effie. And she had some particular ideas about what should be done next. Well, let John tell you. Well, this is a letter, fan letter I got. The only one I ever got from Rogers, Texas, September 1953. It was addressed to me, and inside there's no date or anything. It's from a woman called Effie, and I won't use her last Name. It's an ordinary name. The letter reads very simply. Oh, John, you have to come home. Stick your toes to this fire. I've just been wondering about you and this cold. Ma, am I hungry? I want supper. Been down in the timber rolling them logs. How about the kids? Done fed them. Bake their toes, put them to bed, have to milk them cows. Seen them hens laid, feed that old mule. Well, I guess that all. Oh, my back. What's wrong with you, John? Thinking about that hard day tomorrow? Honey, honey, you got to work to make them kids something to eat. Oh, my back. Got to see a doctor, get some pills. Oh, God, my. Oh, John, you just got nerves. You will be all right. Them children can't eat rabbits to live. Signed, Effie, My favorite fan, whoever she is. Great. Lovely lady. From taco night in Tulum to sushi in Tokyo, make every bite rewarding with gold from E. Wherever you dine. 4 times. Membership rewards points at restaurants worldwide are piling up. Learn more at americanexpress.com Explore-Gold terms and points cap apply. Five or six years after we've been on the air, I am. I parked my car and I'm walking across the parking lot to go into CBS to do another set of two, and a guy walks up to me and he says, Mr. Conrad? And I said, yes. He said, boy, I just think that you're fantastic. It's a great show. Gunsmoke and the way you play Matt Dillon is just absolutely super. And I just. I think you're great. Would you do me a great favor? And I said, well, sure, if I can, certainly. He said, would you do the opening for me? And I looked at him and I said, the what? He said, the opening. And I said, I'm sorry, I really don't know what you mean. And he said, the opening. The gun smoke, the thing you say every Saturday or Sunday night when you open the show. I said, gee, are you not thinking of another show maybe? Because I really don't remember. And he said, oh, okay, fine, you big star. Huh? Well, fine. Thank you very much for being so courteous to me. And he turns furious and walks away from me. And I still didn't know what it was. And I walked into the rehearsal and I said, hey, the funniest thing happened to me. And I related the story. And they said, oh, God, it's the opening that. I said, what open? They said, you recorded it seven years ago and you haven't done it since. When Gunsmore went on the air In April of 52, it was really the only one of its kind. In the years that followed, I think there were a good many imitators, Some very successful and some just poor imitations. Shows not only went from radio to television, but a couple of shows came from television to radio. For example, have gun, Will Travel, which was on adjacent to the television program of Gunsmoke, became a radio program after the fact several years later and was quite successful. John D. Played the lead. He played Paladin, the part that Dick Boone originated. We never really went into depth about Paladin except that he sort of came out of nowhere. He was the Robin Hood. He was the man who could do no wrong. He righted all evils and protected the poor from the depredations of the wealthy and so forth. He was a rather one dimensional character, if you want my honest opinion about Paladin. And even on the television show it was. It had that aspect to it. Unlike Gunsmoke where the. The characters seem to be more real. There was fantasy in Paladin, you see, but that didn't take away from the fact that it was a lot of fun to do Then there were. There were other shows that were in this general area of western or period. One of them that I was connected with was Fort Laramie starring Raymond Burr. It was a cavalry show again 1870-1875 in Wyoming and a successful one. John Dana starred in another radio show called Frontier gentleman. That was the brainchild of Tommy Ellis. He was a writer. He wrote a lot of escapes and, and romances. And he, he just got the idea that there should be a. A civilized individual showing up in the west and the adventures that befall him. Thinking mainly of the English remittance man who is sent over to this country by his family in England because they don't quite know what to do with him. But he's better off out of sight. Sure, they'll send him his monthly stipend to keep him going, but as long as he doesn't bother them, that's what they're after. So he shows up in the United States and goes west. And this is by the way, quite common in the west in those days. You know, the remittance man idea was, was quite worldwide where the English would send them in off to the colonies, their unwanted scions. But the English man was a great force in the development of the west. And Frontier gentleman was based more or less upon that idea. The radio show had been on the air about a year when it became apparent it was. It was a fairly solid operation. It Also was a apparent in those days, the television was looming large. So Meston and I talked to the radio executives about was there a way to move it to television? And indeed, they'd already been thinking about this and it was a. It was in the works. So Meston and I were convinced that we'd be producing and writing the television series, which, as it turned out, we were not, which was probably a very good thing. They hired a novelist and a motion picture producer director named Charles Marquis Warren to come in and get the television series organized. And I was allowed to come in as a. As an associate producer, which I must admit, I was very pleased to do. Then came the matter of, of course, the cast, once that had been determined to go ahead with the television version. And it seemed obvious to me that it should be Bill Conrad, Howard McNair, Parley Bear and Georgia Ellis, because they created the parts. And they were indeed Matt and Doc and Kitty and Chester. But I didn't know enough to know that it didn't always work that smoothly. The determination was made to test several people for these several parts. And it looked for a while as though the Gunsmoke radiocast wasn't even going to be considered or tested. There was a Los Angeles newspaper man named Hal Humphries who was a great fan of the radio show and a great fan of the people and the actors. And he petitioned and lobbied in his Los Angeles Times column day after day, and I think was largely responsible in securing for the radio cast an audition we taped in Studio 43, I think it was, at TV City. It was all right. It wasn't staggering, it was all right, but I don't think anybody upstairs even saw it because it was purely a token audition so that the radio people would keep on working in radio. And which they did for another seven years. It was determined to go with Jim Arness, who was a protege of Duke Wayne's and a good actor, although a newcomer, and Dennis Weaver and Amanda Blake and Milburn Stone, all good, solid actors. Bill Warren really should get a tremendous amount of credit for transcribing or transferring the shows from radio to television. I think he was able to keep in his production and direction of the first script, which was a Meston television script, in being able to keep the feel and the intent of what the radio show had been. It was Bill who wardrobed the principal, and for many years they were the only well wardrobed Westerns on the air. Beau was responsible for the kind of photography and the kind of sets. I was able to be of Considerable help, I hope, by being able to describe how we had pictured the sets. And how we had pictured the long branch and the street and where the jail cells were. And all the other things that we'd worked with in radio. When the transition was made to television, the first any of us in radio knew about us when we read it in the trade papers. We were a little disgruntled that we hadn't been considered right for the parts. It's a little nonplussing to be told that you're not right for something that you had created. But that happens all the time. The character transfer to television was generally faithful. Except in the case of Chester, played on radio by Parley Bear. CBS officials started by changing Chester's last name from Proudfoot to Good. And when they made the transition, I was told that one of the officials with CBS said he better change his name. Because Parley might have caused for plagiarism. Suit. I saw this man the lobby of the station one day. And I said, I trust cbs even though CBS doesn't apparently trust me. And I said, and I have less cause to trust cbs. And CBS has trust me. And that is, I got the story that they changed his name because they were afraid I would kick up a puss. What I should really have kicked up a fuss about. As well as Bill and Howard, you, everybody else's. For the first 156 shows. They used radio scripts for the television thing almost in total. And it was a little irritating to hear lines that you'd written. Hear your own ad libs incorporated into the television series. But why joust with windmills? You know, we didn't get it. And those fellows did a good job. I think Jim on S as villain became sort of a pillar on the national scene. And I'm not taking away from him anything that he did in his performance and in painting the character. Because he had 20 years of great success. But my opinion is this. I do think Bill would have been better. Dennis Weaver's television portrayal of Chester was different, too demonstrated. Played him as a younger man. And I always considered Chester sort of ageless. If somebody had said to me, how old is Chester as you claim? I honestly say I don't know. He could have been anywhere from 30 to 50. Chester was certainly no romancer. He was embarrassed by ladies. And he had his moments. They never quite came to fruition, even with Kitty. To Chester, it was always Miss Kitty. He was unusual for those times. Was quick to rise when the lady came in. And he had little or no contact with women in those days. They didn't marry the likes of Chester because he was. He was sort of on the outside looking in. And of course, there was always a scarcity of women in Dodge City and those cow towns along hill. And the marriageable ones were already married or the ones who had a future for marriage were very zealously guarded. And they were always looking for someone with more money to come along than Chester had. But we played him differently. Someone said, did Chester limp on radio? And I said no. How true this story is, I don't know. I've heard it repeated many times that Chester was given a limp on his character for TV because he was coming on pretty strong as a romantic figure. And they felt that if Dennis played him, Dennis is a very handsome man. They thought he was overshadowing the character of the villain. And so they gave him some physical handicap. I don't think he was necessary. But again, we'll mitre five a success. Dennis was very successful as Chester for a great many years. The television show was bought quickly from the pilot film that Bill Warren made and went on the air in September of 55 and was almost immediately well received. Part of this, of course, was that there had been three. Three years of pre publicity because the Gunsmoke radio show had been enormously well received in those three years prior. So it was a. It was a happy wedding. Bill produced and directed the first 26 shows. And I think a combination of fatigue and pressure and, well, just the. The weight of carrying that Bill a job all by himself made it difficult to continue. And he left after 26 weeks to do a feature. When Bill left, I was able and lucky enough to slip into the mantle of producer of the series, not attempting to direct any. So I stayed with the show as producer from the 27th show through the next nine years and left the series in 1964. We'll return to the biography of Gun Smoke in just one moment. Here again is John Hickman. By 1957, much of John Meston's time was devoted to writing the television series. Other writers were called upon for the radio scripts. Again. Norman McDonald, one of the other people that wrote for us was Les Crisis. I first came to know Les when he was still working at Caltech as an engineer. But at that time, which must have been 46 or 47, he came in to see Bill Robeson with a script for a Columbia workshop which Bill bought. And Les was on his way toward being a very successful writer. Les worked with me on later on Escape and on romance and a number of shows. And when we did start Gunsmoke, it just was obvious that Les would have to be part of the family, which indeed he was. He wrote not as many as Meston, but more perhaps than any other single writer. Les was a warm and. And very funny and very charming man. He was his own man, and he did what he wanted, when he wanted. So if you needed him desperately to do a script, he might be available, or he might have been on his way to Africa and you really never knew. But when he was in town, he wrote well and he was dependable. Perhaps Les did more of the light or of the comedy shows than John Meston. One in particular that I always enjoyed was a script called Colleen so Green, which in which this attractive girl comes to town and completely befuddles Doc and Chester and everybody else in town, including Mr. Botkin at the bank. But one of Les scripts that I remember particularly and perhaps personifies the kind of writing that made him such a valuable piece of manpower for Gunsmoke was a script that he wrote called Tag. You're it. Believe me, the family that takes the Internet on vacation is the family that finds a better beach in peak crab mating season. Be prepared for anything with an ESIM from ao an esim. ESIM is a digital SIM card built into your phone. Download the Airalo app, activate your ESIM and get online in minutes, anytime, anywhere. No more surprising roaming fees, weird public wi fi or fiddly plastic. Just super connectivity at your fingertips. That's Airalo. Airalo, the world's most powerful esim provider, loved by 20 million savvy vacationers. It's as essential as packing your bathing suit for the beach. Don't get caught in a pinch. Pack the Internet. Download Airalo today. That's a I R, a L O Airalo. And use code crab for 15% off. Your first ESIM terms apply. If Objects Could Talk Takes art and artifacts out of the Getty Museum's vaults. Oh, my goodness. Can it be any brighter in here? And puts them in front of the microphone. A podcast. Oh, yeah. Hear from a fancy Egyptian cat, a satyr who's right at home in Malibu, dudes, and many more. Listen to if objects could talk. Wherever you get your podcasts and on Getty Edu podcasts. Chester. Oh, Chester. Chester, Was you saying something? Mr. Dylan? What is that? Oh, this is a duck call I ordered all the way from St. Louis. Just come in the mail. Doesn't sound like any duck I ever heard. Oh, it's guaranteed, Mr. Jones. See, any duck that hears this, comes right at you. You better be careful. We don't want the jail overrun with them. Oh, well, they ain't run around yet, but they're just about do. When they start coming through, I'm going to get down there in them bushes along the river with a shotgun and this thing. And Mr. Dylan, we're going to be eating roast duck eggs every day for three months. I'm glad to hear that, Chester. Takes kind of a knack to blow. It takes a little D of practice. And I ain't got it down exact yet, but I will. Gentlemen. Gentlemen. Oh, come in, Sir. You're Marshal Dillon. Yeah, that's right. I am. Cyrus Taggart. Marshal. Possibly you've heard of me? I'm afraid not. But what can I do for you, Mr. Taggart? You can give me your complete cooperation. Oh, I have here a photograph of a young lady. I have reason to believe she is in dodge city. Why, Mr. Dillon. Go on, Mr. Taggart. Suppose she is here. She's my daughter, Evie Taggart. She ran away from home nearly a year ago and she has made it very difficult to find her. If you do find her, I shall take her back to New York with me. Naturally, I assume from your partner's exclamation that you do know her. Not by that name. Well, she has used a number of false names during the past year. Very well. You will take me to her at once. How old is your daughter, Mr. Taggart? 24. And then she's of legal age. Suppose she won't go back with you, Marshall? The Taggart enterprises include railroads, several banks and finance companies, along with mining and cattle interests. I, with my father and my grandfather before me, did not acquire them by tolerating interference with our wishes. Why did she run away in the first place? Because she's a willful, headstrong little fool, Marshall. We're wasting time, Mr. Taggart. I'm not going to take you to her. Not just yet. May I remind you your enterprises, sir, don't include the United States Marshal's office. I imagine my influence could extend that far if you compel me to use it. You do as you like, but I'm going to talk to the girl first. I'm going to find out what she wants to do. What she wants is of no import. Day, Mr. Taggart. She keeps pretty late hours, Mr. Dunn. Maybe she ain't up yet. Yeah, maybe not. Hello, Marshall. Chester. Morning, Patsy. Or I guess it's Evie Taggart now, isn't it? Oh, he's here, huh? Mm. Over the Dodge house. He says he's come to take you home. It's all right, Burl. Come on in. No, thank you. Wouldn't do any good to run. Not now. I thought I heard you talking to some. Oh, you know Burl Alden, don't you, Marshall? Yeah, you do blackjack, don't you? Over the golden horn part time. That's right. What's the trouble, Marshall? My father's here, bro. Finally caught up with me. What of it? You're over 21. He can't do nothing. You don't know him. What can he do, Marshall? She's got a right to live her life the way she wants, ain't she? As far as the law is concerned, he may try other ways. He will. He'll do anything. I know him. He'll be sorry if he tries anything. I'll stick with you. You know that. I know girls, but I know how he can be. That's why I never wanted him to find me. Are you sure that you don't want to go back with him, Evie? Of course I'm sure. That's a rough life you're leading here. Working in a long branch, having to put up with any man who comes along who's got the price of a drink. Anything would be better than going back home. You don't know what it was like, Marshall. I don't really matter to him. I never did. Just a family name he cares about. Sweet. I'll disgrace it. Not going back. He says you are, Evie. And I'd say he's used to getting his own way. No matter what I have to do, I'm not going back. No matter what. Sam, the men back at the faro table one another round when you get a chance. Let Margie take it back to him, huh? Okay. Hello, kitty. Oh, Matt. I didn't see you come in. Oh, you look busy. So I kept quiet. You know, I just as soon you hadn't come in tonight and that. Oh, well, I can always have a beer up the street. No, it's just that I did something this evening that I hate myself for. Oh, well, what do you mean? Come on, let's sit in. All right. There you are. Oh, what's it all about? Well, that girl Patsy, who's been working here the last few months. You know who she is, man? Yeah. Her name's Evie Taggart. Her father came out from the east yesterday. Yeah, I know. I met him. You know, he's trying to force her to go back to New York with Him? He didn't waste any time going into action. He just sent a few telegrams east and that did it. Oh, did what? Well, Mr. Botkin came over from the bank this afternoon. He was real apologetic, but he had all from the big bank back east that holds part of his stock. Oh, on a Taggarts banks? Yeah. Either I fired Evie or Botkin had called in our loan. And just a half hour later I got a telegram from our wholesaler in Kansas City. Fire ev or pay up all our consignment accounts immediately. I let it go, Matt. I had to. You couldn't do much of anything else, could you? Got my partner to think about. About the girls. You can't fight an army bare handed. There's no reason to feel guilty, Kitty. You didn't have much choice. I don't clean. The life she's leading here is very good. Good or bad, at least what she wants to do. And she ought to have the rights. You know, rights are pretty hard things to hang on to sometimes. Well. Well, there been any other way? Oh, he scared you off, huh? You started the ball rolling. Now nobody will hire. Take it easy, Pearl. Well, whose side are you on anyway, Marshall? There's no law against what Taggart did, Burl. And Kitty didn't have any choice. She had to go along with it. Words out all over town. Nobody will give her a job. They're afraid of his money. Well, I got reason to be trying to starve her out. He thinks he'll get her back home that way. Well, it's worked before. Well, it won't this time. We'll figure something. Way to beat that old buzzard. Why don't you support her, Mr. Alden? I assume you are Burl Alden. I guess you're tagged. That's correct. As I said, why don't you support her? I understand she's been supporting you for several months. That's a lie. I got a job. Yes, it's part time. But you've been taking money from her, haven't you? And with loans. What are you getting at anyway? The fact that you're an utterly worthless gopher who lives off the earnings of a woman. Why, you dirty old. All right, hold it, Burrow. That's enough. He's talking to. Can I give you a hand, Mr. Taggart? No, thank you. It would seem. It would seem to me that it's your job to prevent such occurrences, Marshall. You can sign a complaint if you like. No, thank you. I have something rather more drastic in mind. Good evening, gentlemen. That's a cold fish. What's he talking about, Marshall? He can't do nothing to me. I wouldn't bet on that, girl. Just. Good morning. Morning, Matt. Oh, hello. Hello, Doc. Come on in. Oh, Chester, for heaven's sakes, put that thing away. Now. There's some coffee on the top of the stove. I don't guarantee it, though. Our duck made it. Oh, well, then I pass. Well, you drunk it plenty tongue before and it never hurts none. Well, a man's luck runs out, Chester. Let's pull up a chair, Doug. No, no, no. Haven't got time, man. I don't have a problem. Fleshline seed at the public trough like some people I know. Is that so? A professional man like myself has to get out and scramble if he wants to keep body and soul together. Doc, the only time I ever seen you scrambles when Sam Noonan says, have one on the house, boys. That's for two cents. I wouldn't even tell you what I know. All right. What do you know, Doc? Oh, yes, you got your ears there, Vince. Yeah, you're starting to sing a different tune now, Doc, It's a fine thing when I have to do your job alone with my own. Just out of the kindness of my heart. Doc, there's going to be a killing. Killing? How do you know? Because I keep my mouth shut and my ears open. You know a gunman, name of Bill Jackson? Yeah, he's been around town for a month or so. Why? Well, they say that old man Taggart hired him to kill Burl Alden. That's what Taggart meant about something more drastic. Yes. Anyway, I've done all the brain work for you. Now go on out and arrest them. On what charge, Doc? They'll both deny it. Well, you're just going to sit there and let it happen, are you? And I'll listen to suggestions, Doc. But in the long run, it'll probably come to just that. Matt Dillon let me in. Evie ain't here, Marshall. She went down to the Chinaman's to bring some grub. Now, you're the one I want to see, Burl. All right, come on in. What is it? What do you want, Burl? You made a bad enemy when you knocked old man Taggart. Now, I'll knock him down seven days a week if he don't stay away from it. Oh, he'll stay away, all right. The man he's hired to kill you won't. What are you talking about? The words after these offered bill jacks $2,000 to. To put you on Boot Hill. You got to do something, Marshall. I. I know about Jax. You got arrested. I got no proof, Burl. All I can do is warn you. Well, then. Then I got to get out of here. I got to get out of town right now. I'll get a horse from Moss Grinnick and head south. What about Evie? Evie? What? You be better off back home anyway. Oh, I see. We'll hit in the trail, on the run. That. That ain't no kind of a life for a woman. You think the Long Branch is any better? Now, you got no call to talk like that. What's going on, Evie? You tell her, Marshall. Where you going, girl? So you see, he's gone. Where? What do you mean? Your father hired a gunman to kill. So both getting out, running away, leaving me. I guess a lot of men would act that same way under the circumstances. Try to make excuses for a Marshall. I know the kind he is. I've known all along. Well, the life I've been living the last year isn't a very pretty one, I admit it. I guess I've done it on purpose. Sunk as low as I could. It was a way of hitting back at my father. Yeah, it works that way sometimes. Wasn't a very pretty life at home either, Marshall. I guess not. Kirk wouldn't have turned you to this. I'd kill her. At least I'll get that stuffed bull. Doesn't deserve dying. He's just what he is. And that's all he claims to be. There's no reason he should pay. But my father's going to. I'm going to see that he pays. Pays how? I don't know exactly, but he's going to. He's going to pay for things once and for all. Don't look to me like neither one of them ain't gonna show up, Mr. Jones. They might not, Chester. All I know is Taggart bought two tickets back east on this afternoon's train. I swear, I never thought. Evie give in and go back with him. Well, he's a hard man to beat. It's just a doggone shame the way he goes around treating people and gets by with it. He won't get by with it forever, Chester. If you keep pushing people around, sooner or later you're gonna push one of them a little too far. Speak to devil, Mr. John. Yeah, and by himself, too. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Nice of you to drop around to see us off. Us, Mr. Tiger? Oh, my daughter is just looking after some detail of her luggage. She'll be along much as I Hate to disappoint you, Marshall. I want to disappoint me. It's none of my business. No, not officially, of course, but I imagine you did hold certain personal opinion. Yeah, I still do, as a matter of fact. Indeed. Such as? Such as, I think you're making a big mistake taking that girl back against her will. I assure you I am. Using those straight jacket or manacles? It amounts to that, though. Why don't you give her a chance, Mr. Taggart? You can get her out of Dodge if you want. Away from what she. But why don't you let her live her own life? She will live precisely as I tell her to live, Marshall. Won't work that way, Mr. Taggart. You can't treat people like horses. You can't own people, Marshall. I'll build an empire on the principle of owning people. I own hundreds of them. Body and soul, block, stock and barrel. I call the tomb and bathe down. And she will dance with them. You ready, Father? Quite ready, my dear. Let's go. Good day, gentlemen. Goodbye, Evie. Good luck. Thank you, Marcia. But I think we may meet again soon. Come along, Evie. Yes, Father. Just look. You there. Just look how he broke her stair mission. Guns. He's going along. Me through the line. Yeah, it looks that way. Now, what's he doing here? That's little Jackson. I want to talk with you. Tag it. Come on, J. Look. Look here, Jax. There's nothing for us to talk about, all right? Hold it, Jack. Stay out of this. What are you up. Don't try it, Jack. You drop your gun or I'll fire. And I'll drop. You. Got him, Mr. Jones. Your father's dead too, Evie. Father. So this is how he was supposed to pay, huh? What you mean, Marshall? Bobby had a disagreement over the price on the burl's head. What price did you put on your father's head, Evie? How much were you gonna pay? Bill Jacks for loose. I can't put a thing. Not you, not a thing. We'll let the judge decide that. I don't care. As long as he finally lost. What? Father sure doesn't own anybody now, does he? Russ Crutchfield, script tag. You're it. Originally heard October 5, 1958. Rex Corey was Gunsmoke's musical director. Corey entered radio in the 1930s, and his music has been heard on every major radio and TV network since then. Today, Rex is delighting theater audiences around the country with his pipe organ accompaniment for silent films. Cory is especially proud of the work he and his musicians performed on Gunsmoke. And he vividly recalls the first broadcast. I remember that when we started the music on Gunsmoke, the very initial broadcast, we used a larger orchestra. In fact, the theme material, opening and closing, was recorded with a larger orchestra. And we continued to use that larger sound to give it a bigger and more impressive opening and closing. Then we went into what we called our standard, I think six or seven piece combo that we used, which not so much in the interest of economy, but for the specific sound that we wanted to acquire. We felt it that a large orchestra was out of place with the time, the tempo, it didn't do the job for us. Whereas a small group which included accordion, some harmonica, guitar, timpani, effects, that sort of thing were much more practical and aesthetically correct for the stories and the people involved in the smaller orchestra. Rex played the T accordion while he conducted. Now, this was not the standard accordion that you strap on yourself. This was an electric T accordion, as we called it, which stood on a. On its own standard. And you could regulate the volume from a pedal control. And the nice thing about it was that you could play both hands on the treble portion if you wanted to, or use the buttons or whatever it could be. It was very flexible, not. Sir George Walsh has his own recollections of Corey's tea accordion. When they changed the orchestra from full size, that was probably 20 pieces, it became a much smaller group and Rex changed with the big orchestra. He played the organ, the pipe organ, and he used to conduct from the organ bench with body English. Well, when they cut down on the size of the orchestra, he went from the organ to an accordion. He had an electric accordion built. I don't know whether this was his invention or not, but I had never seen one like it before. He didn't have to pump the bellows by hand. It became a T shaped affair with an upright and then the accordion in two sections across the top forming the T. So that with his right hand he'd play the keyboard and then with his left hand he'd play the button. And then with his foot he had a control of a pedal that gave him air pressure and so forth. It was quite a strange looking. Of course, Bill Conrad didn't have much respect for it. He referred to it as Rex Coy's electronic urinal. If objects could talk takes art and artifacts out of the Getty Museum's vaults. Oh my goodness. Can it be any brighter in here? And puts them in front of the microphone. A podcast. Oh yeah. Hear from a fancy Egyptian cat A satyr who's right at home in Malibu and many more. Listen to if Objects Could Talk wherever you get your podcasts and on Getty. Edu Podcasts. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busy work, finding leads, drafting emails, and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo I.O. and sign up free today. I think that Bill set the tone and the the pace for Jim Arness, who later followed. Now, of course, they're two different people and two different talents, but Bill had that great ability to establish a character in your mind, to set an image. And Bill, being the type of performer he was, with such a wide range of capability, was perfect for the part of Matt Dillon, because Matt Dillon had to be a man who could be tough and who could be very sensitive at the same time. Bill had a very virile, manly voice, low pitched. He could be very positive in his speech, he could be very tough and hard, and he could be very, very soft and sentimental. In approaching the music for the show and realizing that Bill was a simple character who set the whole pace and tempo, I had to consider music that would be fitting and proper for this rather complex person. This meant that the music had to be coarse and rough and tough, and it also had to be very tender and touching. Well, what can we do now, Devin, to help you? Boy. Buried dead right here, Right here. He'd like that. It's about as far west as he'll ever get. Sa. It gave me a wide scope in which to operate musically, and it put demands on the musicians we had because we had to produce tonal effects to suit the situation. And again, it became a wonderful challenge because you had such a wide latitude in which to work. Many of the scenes in Gunsmoke took place in the Long Branches Saloon, and to provide just the right atmosphere, a bar room piano was necessary. Corey recalls how he first created that realistic sound. We had to establish the very first scene in the Long Branch, and we had to establish the fact that there were all sorts of coarse Western characters involved, that there were dancing girls and various degrees of activity, and the music had to be something that would set the scene and yet be just a part of it. Nobody really knew what they wanted, I don't think. But I went over to the piano and I started messing around with it during rehearsal. Norman said, hey, that's good. He said, what can we do to make it a little more tinny? So we did the quickest thing we could do and that was to get a whole bunch of paper clips and string them together and lay them over the strings. We later refined that by getting an old beat up upright piano and putting thumbtacks in all the hammers so that we got a real honky tonk sound out of it. And I also had to think about the type of melody that would have been possible, popular at that time and still not come up with a recognizable piece of music. So it was always kind of improvised on the spot in the real sort of an early 19th century Western barroom style of composition. It got to be a thing where we would do things on the piano just for the entertainment of the cast, Even during the broadcast because extemporaneous noise and laughter was all to the good anyway way. And I found that I was having a lot of fun being invented and trying to get reaction out of the cast, but by the type of music I played. My goodness, quite a crowd in old long Bench tonight. Over here, Matt. Come on over here. Enjoy this. There's Doc. Mr. Butt, can you. You want to join him, mister? Yeah, I might as well. Oh, would you par me please? Hello, Matt. Good to see you. Hello, Kitty. Can I get you something? Yes, matter of fact, you can. The usual if you don't mind. The same for me, Miss Kitty. It will be at the table after all Right, fine. I'll join you. Good. Pull up a chair, Matt. We chest it. Join. Join us solid respectable citizens for a change. Well, there's some who would agree with you, Doc. How are you, Stockman? Bye, Marshall. Now buy a drink? Well, I got one coming, thanks. Oh, I just saw Ms. Gross outside. She tells me she's going back east. Well, I can't say I'm sorry to hear it. For some reason she seems to blame me for what her son did. Yeah, most of us felt that we would make the transition normally and naturally. Certainly in my particular experience, that was the way it worked. I knew that I was going to make the transition. In fact, I was already making the transition. We were doing radio and television shows at the same time with the particular cast of Gunsmoke. The Blow was a very hurting one for those involved. When CBS decided to go ahead and produce it as a television show, it was a big disappointment. They had figured, I'm sure, that they would go ahead and work into the television aspect. The whole accent was on the television series. The musical direction for it had passed into the hands of the man who was then Mr. Gluskin, who was then the musical director for the CBS network on the West Coast. He had gotten full control of the situation. And I did some composition here and there. And on top of that, some of the radio music has been carried over and used into the television series. As such, when the show went to an hour long production, why, it was obvious that one composer couldn't begin to handle it all anyway. So there have been various writers along over the years that have contributed to the music that has been used on Gunsmoke. In 1957, the radio show was dealt two severe blows. First, Liggett and Myers dropped full sponsorship of the series. This led CBS to offer the program to participating advertisers. Complicating matters was the poor economic health of network radio in general. Thanks to television, advertisers were becoming reluctant to sink huge sums of money into a medium that supposedly had a dwindling audience. As a result, the network was finding it increasingly difficult to sell all the commercial time available. Public service announcements and promos started to fill the slots where only months ago, announcers George Feniman and George Walsh extolled the delights of smoking L and M cigarettes. The second serious blow to the radio program was the loss of the live orchestra. Recounted by Rex Corey. For economic reasons, it had been discovered that live orchestras might not be all that necessary. Now this, unfortunately was triggered by a rather tragic and ill timed musician strike called by the AF of M, the American Federation of Musicians. At a time when I suppose the timing was right for experimentation with recorded cues and bridges and backgrounds. I say it was ill timed because it taught the producers and the networks that they could get along without live music. Not only did it hurt the professional musicians who were involved on many of these broadcasts, but it damaged the caliber of music. Because instead of having music specifically designed for a given situation or a given performance, they were picking up on a hit or miss basis, recorded music of various sorts imported from various parts of the world with various combinations. And so much of the music didn't fit. And unfortunately, our listening public has been. Has been become conditioned to poor music in much of our drama today in television and many other uses. Because of this, Gunsmoke started on the air in 52, as we've mentioned, and network radio was beginning to die just at the time we were starting. I guess what I mean is that in those early days, if you were Doing a. A series, and the series was canceled. Something else popped up and you were told to start preparing for a show called Such and Such, which would go on the air next Tuesday. There was always something to replace the show that went off the air by the end of the 50s and certainly by the 60s, when the show went off the air, that was just the end of that half hour or that hour or that two hour segment, and it was filled with something else. And that something else usually came from New York. It was a sad period for those of us who were fond of radio and enjoyed radio and indeed had been brought up in radio. And it was not, believe me, a matter of sour grapes, because all of us who were then working on the radio show were also busy and gainfully employed on the television show or some other television show. Bill Conrad was producing and directing in television. Later he became an executive at Warner Brothers. At the same time, John Meston was writing, I think he wrote as many as 40 half hour television episodes in one year. He was also writing regularly when it went to an hour, the television television version, some 12 to 15 episodes a year. So we were all busy. But it was really the fact that dramatic radio from the west coast was drying up. Gunsmoke passed away, if you will, just at a time when there were new kinds of audio equipment coming on the scene that would have made it marvelous, for instance, if Gunsmoke had been done in stereo or quadraphonic. If you can picture Matt's horse coming down Front street, the whole length of it passing from one side of your living room to the other, just as it passed from one end of Dodge to the other. Or Matt's booted feet working their way all the way across the street and up the steps and into Doc's office on the second floor. It would have been rather wonderful to hear this, but radio was already on its way out there. As a footnote, Gunsmoke had the dubious distinction of being the last network dramatic program to originate in Hollywood. During the program's final four years, scripts were authored by such top Western writers as Kathleen Hite, John Dunkle, Les Crutchfield, and Marion Clark. Their scripts were often alternated with some of John Meston's better offerings from previous years. Even some members of the Gunsmoke company became authors. Director Norman Macdonald wrote numerous programs. Supporting player Vic Perrin contributed several scripts. And soundman Tom Hanley authored a hilarious story entitled Marshall Proudfoot. This program centered around Chester's father paying a surprise visit to Dodge. Barley Bear doubled his role, playing both Chester and his dad. Here's Marshall Proudfoot. As it was heard on July 20, 1958, if objects could Talk takes art and artifacts out of the Getty Museum's vaults. Oh my goodness. Can it be any brighter in here? And puts them in front of the microphone. A podcast. Oh, yeah. Hear from a fancy Egyptian cat, a setter who's right at home in Malibu. Dude. And many more. Listen to if Objects Could Talk wherever you get your podcasts and on Getty. Edu Podcasts. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busy work finding leads, drafting emails, and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo I.O. and sign up free today. There. Matt, you here? Yeah, I'm here, Doc. Come on up. Oh, how come you're in bed so early? I'm not in bed, Doc. I'm just resting. Oh, I see the cost of government's going up again. Oh, what makes you say that? The soldier. Your boots, they're worn. Almost. I don't care. What's the matter? Aren't you feeling good? Sure, I feel fine, Doc. I always lie in bed till noon. Well, it just doesn't look right for you to be. Oh, for heaven's sakes. What's the matter now? That's cold. The coffin's cold in the rabbit rattlesnake's belly. Don't drink it. And it's no better hot here. No, Matt, like I was saying, a man in your position should have more to do than just lie around. Well, maybe I'm just tired, Doc. Oh, now, don't try to tell me it was brought on by upholding law and order all night because I don't want to hear about it. I had a bad night myself. Well, then sit down and rest. Yes. Aren't you going to ask me what I was doing? No. Well, I spent the whole night working for four dollar fee. Oh, it must have been somebody who didn't know you. They knew me? Yes. It was Jeb Dorn. His wife had a baby girl. Jeb, huh? He was hoping for a boy as I recall it, and that's what it worried. Oh, why? He refused to pay me. No wonder you're tired. Well, who's this poster on? It says right there, doesn't it? Yes. Dead or Alive. Jack cargo for the torture and subsequent murder of this man is noted for armed holdup and is believed heading in the general direction of Missouri, Kansas or Nebraska. He's a mean looking devil, isn't it? Well, I can see that. He'll certainly find his comeuppance if he sticks his head and dodge. Well, I tell you, Doc, I'll worry about that if he comes here. Oh, that gives me a nice safe feeling. Marshall here, is he? Yeah, yeah, I'm a Marshall. I say Marshall Proudfoot hereabouts. You see Marshall Proudfoot, huh? Neither one. I'll say neither one of you. You ain't the Marshall I can tell. I'm his pa. I know him anywhere. Doc, go find Chester, will you? Sure, man. No, no, no need to get up. Just come see my boy. Marshall Chester Proudfoot made good somehow. He did. Chester never was one of my brightest boys. 11 boys I had. I remember. Say, I ain't shook a hand here yet to. What's your name, sonny? Dylan. Matt Dylan. You know, that's a funny name for a man I knew. A man one time had the name. Ha ha. I thought that was the funniest up till now, but Doc, you better go get Chester. Who's that fella? Well, that's Doc Adams. Nice to know you, sir. Saying something is a. I said it's nice. Now, my name's Wesley. Proud put. Sired a Marshall, turns out. Yes, sir, 11 boys I had. Chester was nowhere near the brightest. No, sir. He'd rate about number nine there. That's very interesting. Chester bordered on being ignorant, I'd think. Oh, no, I can't imagine how he ever got to be a marshal. Chester Wesley Proudfoot, Marshal of dog city. Look, Mr. Proudfoot, they named all them boys with a middle name of Wesley after me. I did. Hoped at least one of them would mount something like me. Say, name was? It's Dr. Adams. Doctor, horse or people? What matter, Hugh? I say, do you doctor horses or people? People. It's too bad for you I wouldn't ever let a people doctor work on me. And I got a great many things wrong with me too. Where's Sister? Why, he's out getting the mail for me. Well, good for him. Got spunk. Probably running down some of them bad men he always writes about. Used to have an assistant name of Dylan working for him. Whatever become of him, Dylan? That. That. That's me. Mr. Pot. Matt Dylan, that's me. Oh, yeah. Well, you do a fair job, Gordon. Chester says he can usually depend on you. Well, that's Very nice of him. Look, Mr. Proudfoot, maybe you should know something. I. Hello, Doc. Yeah, Chester. I won't run too much mail, Mr. John. Forget it, Chester. What? Chester, you've got company. Who's a fat fella? That's Chester. That's the Marshall Proudfoot. You, Mr. Dylan? That's you, Chester. Yeah, that's him, Mr. Bradford. Ah, you fatted up good deal, Chester. Your assistant here looks better than you do. I'd like an explanation. Matter of fact, so would I. Chester. Mr. Dillon. Doc. Oh, Paul, What are you going to do about Matt? About what? Chester telling his father that he's the marshal. What can I do? Well, not going to let him get by with it, are you? I don't know, Doc. Wait a minute, Matt. No, man, let me buy. Oh, an assistant doesn't make too much, you know. Easy, Doc. Hello, Doc. Man. Oh, Kitty. Doc, you're looking pretty strange today. How come? Yeah, tell her that. You tell her, Doc. You're the one looking strange. Well, come on, somebody tell me. Yeah. Thank you. Have you seen Chester, Kitty? No, why? We may never see him again. What? What happened? Not much, really. But I'm sure he wishes he was dead right now. Oh, what's this all about? Trusca's father came to time today. Well, what's the terrible about that? That's a. He thinks Chester is the Marshall here. What? Yeah, that's right, Kitty. Chester wrote to his father and he probably stretched the truth a little bit, like we all do sometimes. Oh, no. Where are they now? At the Dodge House. He's got the old man a room there. I never saw Chester look so scared in my life. Kitty, you should have seen him. He grabbed his pawn. He live out the office like his coat was on fire. Don't be hard on him now. I'm not going to be hard on him. His father must be pretty old. Oh, he's older, I guess. He can't hear good and he can hardly see, but he's a bright old fell. Well, you can't let the old man be disappointed, Matt. What would you suggest I do, Kitty? I don't know. Just don't hurt him, that's all. I'm not going to hurt him, Kitty. I don't care if the old man thinks Chester's a marshal, Matt. We should think of something to make Chester look good while his father's in town. Yeah, I heard the old man tell Chester that he was only going to stay for a few days. Oh, say, Matt, now maybe you could lie low for a while. I Wouldn't mind that. I need a rest. Hey, I got it. Why don't you get somebody to pretend to hold up and then let Chester play marshal and take him in. You can turn a moose when his father. Now, Kitty, I couldn't do a thing like that. Well, something's got to be done. Yes, I could put you to bed, Matt. What are you talking about? Yeah, you get sick and I'll examine you and say that you've got a. Oh, a rare blood disease and you have to go to bed for a few days. Get my work. Matt, I can't let that old man go away thinking Chester's been lying to him all this time. No, we'll get Mouse Grinnett to stage a fake holdup, you see? Then we'll come and get Chester, and right in front of his father, he'll capture the bandit. You're the one with a rare disease, Doc, and it's not in your blood, it's in your brain. I do it, Matt, you got to. No, I don't got to. I don't want any part of a fake holdup. You just get that out of your hands, Matt. Well, I'm going back to the office. Oh, sure, go ahead. Yeah, go ahead. Ruin an old man in his last days. What do you think, Doc? Man, I. Old Matt will come around all right. Did he? He always does. I'll go talk to Moss Brimmick and. And have it all set. Anybody here? I see. Anybody in here with the. Oh, there you are, Dylan. Took to your bed kind of early, didn't you? Ain't but four o'. Clock. Hello, Mr. Proudfoot. Where's Chester? Yes, well, I guess you got such a dead little town on your hand. You can do that. You and Chester. I say, where is Chester? Saying something. I said, where's Chester? Don't yell like that. Hurts me to pan when you bellow out like that. Got a pretty big voice on you there, Dylan. What's the matter with you? Ah, feeling poorly, are you? I say, feeling poorly, are you? I feel terrible. Ah, too bad. Esther ain't feeling too good neither. Oh, been lolling around on my bed over at the Ruin house all day. Good thing you boys got this dead town on your hands. Yeah, yeah, people me up the creek with both the marshal and his sister in bed. Hoot over there, I say. Hoot over there. Let me take a look at you. Let me look at your eyes. Tell everything about how a man feels by looking to his. Look at me, Dylan. I can't help looking at You. That's it. That's coming. Yes, sir. You've got bad eyes there, Dylan. That one in particular. You got a good voice, but bad eyes. Reminds me of Chester's uncle, Hector. Last time he looked all slack jawed like that, he died the next day. Huh. What say? Nothing. I didn't say anything. Oh, thought you talked. That's Hector was Chester's fighting uncle. Reckon that's where Chester gets all his get up and go. Uh huh. Well, something different, though. Hector fought agin the law, Hector did. Ever seen a man stirred up again the law the time like old Hector was. Have you had your dinner yet, mister? Probably. Oh, indeed. He was a winner. You're right there. Won all his battles. Killed two marshals, Hector did. Killed him dead. Good thing Chester's on side of the law, man, that the pair like that ought to be on the side of the law. Hello. Oh, DeAndre. Here, look here, you got a sick family here, Adams. Better go get a horse doctor and get him straightened out. What are you doing in bed, man? I'm in bed because I'm sick, Doc. Did you ever hear of anything like that? You're sick, huh? You are mad. Oh, see, that's fine. Yeah, well, I figured you'd think so. Doc, would you do me a favor and take Mr. Proudfoot out to dinner? Anything. Just get him out of here. Yeah, sure. Man, you've got your old. Your eyes look kind of beady there. Yeah, well, we've been through all that. Well, if I didn't know that, I'd say that you had a feeling, Adam. I say you got a sick boy there, Doc. Would you go right now? Yeah, okay. Oh, sure, Mr. President. Come with me, Ms. Bravitt. I'll take you to dinner. Dinner? No, no, too early for dinner. Take a little glass of Dutch water with you, though. But don't let on Chester, will you? I'll see you later, Matt, and I'll. I'll let Kitty know you're with us. Oh, fine, Doc. Good. You let Kitty know I'm with you. Just go. Yes, sir. Adam, that boy there, sicker in the pig. Let Kitty know I'm with you. Doc. Doc, you come back. Hey, Kitty. Where's Doc? I don't know, Matt. He was here a little while ago. Why, I've wasted a half hour looking at all the evening houses for him. He's got Chester's father with him. I got to stop him. Stop him from what? From that fool idea that you and he had. What do you mean, fool idea? Doc came by and Said it was on that you were playing sick and fast. Kitty, I was in bed because I really was sick and I still am sick. Have you and Doc lost your senses? Well, we're just trying to help Chester, that's all. Now look, what if somebody else sees that hold up? Moss Grimm and Staging. How do they know that? He just playing games. Doc and I aren't going to let anybody get hurt. N know Chester. He'll play along all the way. That's exactly what I'm afraid of. Oh, Kitty. All set, Kitty. Oh, hello N. Oh, you're on your feet for the fun. You call this thing off right now, Doc. Oh, no, no, no. It's too late. Chester and his father up at the Dodge house in exacting three minutes from now. Moss Grimit is going to rush up there and say there's a hold up at the memory station and I'm putting a stop to her before somebody gets. What's that? I don't know. It's not time yet. Oh, come on, Doc. You can watch the fun you started. Yes, come on. You know, something ought to knock your head off. Now, Matt. Now take it easy. Matt Marshall. Dylan, you better hurry. Chester just shot a man at the dog's house. Good Lord, let it through there. Will you please move aside? Let me through. Stand there. I'm not that way. Well, look, Chester. Sitting on somebody. Chester, what are you doing? Get off of that man. Doc, check that one line over there. I will. He shot and wounded one fella and we subdued the other one. All right, Jim Cole, we did. Ain't a bad night's work. Oh, Chester. Will you get up? Mr. Dillon, he. He tried to kill me and Paul. Get up, I said. He's unconscious. Oh, Matt, wait a minute. Look here. What is it? Document. Look at this, man. It's Jack Pargo. What? You're the man on that wanted poster. Yeah, that is Pargo all right. Matter, Dylan, that fellow friend of yours, is he? He tried to hold up the hotel office here. No, Mr. Proudfoot, it's not a friend of mine. Huh? What say? Or anybody. Catch that car, man. Trust her. Hurry. Yep. Truster. There. He's a whole lot up at the livery stable. Moss, go home. But my doc told me to. Just go back to your livery stable and call off the hold up. Huh? Forget it. M. Forget it. We've had the real thing, right. Well, well, well. Goodbye, Moss. Yeah, sure, sure. Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye. Come here. Notice something here, did you? Dylan? Chester was right on the spot. He was. That's the reason he took my bed for so long. An instinct for these things, Chester has put him right here on the spot for this. Hold up now. There's a reason for everything, I always say. Yeah, well, there's a reason. All right. What say, Dylan? Mr. Dylan, I can explain all this. No, Chester, you and your father take care of things here. I'm sick and I'm going to bed. Don't count on me taking care of things. Dylan, I'm leaving on morning stage now. I saw my boy in action. Yeah, well. All right, Mr. Proudfoot. Goodbye and good luck to you. You, you wait right here a minute, Paul. Mr. Dillon. Yeah, what? Mr. Dylan, I can explain. You don't have to, Chester. But yes, sir, I do have to explain. I swear, I never been so humiliated in all my whole life. I've been thinking about it all day. Mr. Dylan, I, I, I never wrote but two letters to Paul and, well, maybe I did stretch it. Couple things that Paul, he, well, Paul, he, he put it all together and made me out more important than what I am. But I'll set him straight, Mr. Dylan. On I will. I'll tell him the truth and I'll do it right now. Chester, You do and you're fired. You go on back and help your father take care of things. Yes, sir, Mr. Dillon. Marshall Proudfoot Written by sound man Tom Hanley. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busywork, finding leads, drafting emails and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo IO and sign up free today. Hey, I'm Dr. Z and I'm a neurosurgeon. So that means long hours, early rounds, late nights, and everything in between. And through it all, I wear figs because they're built for what I do through the chaos, through the hours, and through whatever the day throws at me. They do their job so I can do mine. They're comfortable when it counts and functional when I need them the most. So where do you wear your figs? On shift? On call? On the couch, in the break room listening to this podcast. Wherever it is, they fit right in. And now listeners of this podcast can get 15 off their first order. Just head to wherefigs.com and use code FIGS RX at checkout. That's wherefigs.com code FIGS RX another frequent contributor to Gunsmoke was Marion Clark. Again, Norman McDonald. Marion Clark wrote some 65 to 70 gun smokes and interesting. Interestingly enough, one of two women that was terribly successful in the Western field. I met Marion Clark through Kathleen Height, who had taken Marion under her wing. In a way, Marion was confined to a wheelchair and not able to get around. But Kathleen had told me a great deal about her during the time that Kathy and I worked on other shows together, like Romance and Rogers of the Gazette and so on. She felt that it would be good therapy if Marion could do a script. And I thought this would be fine. And Marion not only did one script, she did some 69 or 70 more because she had a marvelous insight into the. The woman side of the Western idiom. There were several things that were almost a trademark with Marian. And strangely enough, one of them was the sort of sad, wistful tragedy of people moving west and bringing their most treasured belongings with them. And one script in particular of Marion's, I think exemplifies this. It was in July or August of 1958. It was called the Piano, and it's a great example of Marion's work. You want some more pie, Kitty? You might as well, since Doc's paying for it. No, thanks, Matt. I've had plenty. Yeah? What happened to make you such a big spender, Doc? Some forgotten relative leave you something in his will? Might as well. What do you mean, Doc? Well, you remember that cowboy got himself shot up in a long branch brawl? That was a year or two ago. And more than one of them. I know that, but Kitty might remember this. She helped stop the bleeding until I got there. Oh, I remember Doc. He didn't even have enough money to buy a beer. And we figured he never would have. Well, what happened to him? Well, sir, I had a letter from him this morning. He's had some kind of a payoff in California. And he sent me a $20 gold piece to pay me for what he called my medical services. Well, let's find out. I'm glad he made out. Yes, men like him don't often do it. And you don't often get paid either. Well, you never know in my business. What you doing, Chester? Matt at the door. And you too, Doc. Hurry up. He means that, Doc. Excuse us. He's going back outside. Somebody must be hurt. I didn't hear you shooting. Now, there are other ways to get hurt, Doc. Well, we're here for the stage, Mr. Jones. That man has been Heard m. That's the shotgun messenger, Doc. Somebody must have held up the stage. Then Mike got shot. Mr. Jones, he's hurt pretty bad. Let me take a look. What happened, Chester? Well, I don't know for sure. I seen the stage come in just now and Mike was driving. Mike was driving? Yes, sir. So I knew something was wrong. Then I could see he is hurt, too. He's trying to say something. Make it fast, man. I got to get him up in my office. Mike, it's Marshall. Dylan, what happened? Held up. Driver killed. Were there any passengers? No, no currency. Shipment 20,000. Why did it happen? Mike? He's going out now. Mike. Mike, try. Please try. Tell me, why did happen? How many men? Huh? North Hat Creek. Two men, that's all. M, He. He's unconscious. I'll find a couple of men to help you. Jack. Jester, go get our horse. Horses. Yes, sir. And hurry. They went along here. Right now, Mr. Jones. That cracked shoe showed up real fun. Yeah, they've been riding hard, too. But they must have slowed down or stopped for a while somewhere. I hope they didn't get no more sleep last night than we did. What's the matter, Chester? You getting old? No, sir, it ain't that. But my gracious, two hours sleep. It just don't seem worth bothering about, that's all. And I hope our friends bothered a little about sleep. Well, if I was carrying $20,000 in bills, I wouldn't never stop. Yeah, you'd have to be riding a pretty unusual horse. Well, yes, I guess you're right. Wait a minute. Looks like they did stop after a while. Fly. They built a fire over there. Yeah, he was mri. Yeah, Same tracks. I think we picked up a little time on them, Chester. Come on, let's pick up some more. I swear I'm feeling them men riding like they stuck to the saddle. They're near dark again. They'll have to stop someplace along here pretty soon, huh? I don't know. Hold up. Those tracks are heading down to those bushes along the creek. Here, let's go. Easy. What you doing? Yeah, up yonder above the stream there. There's a shack. Yeah, I see it. You think there might maybe a hit out in it? Maybe. I'm not going to ride straight up to find out. We leave the horses here. Yes, sir. We'll circle around back. Just keep low. There's two horses tied up there, Mr. Dylan. There they are. Yeah. All right. Hold it, children. They're him. The horses. You got him? Yeah, but the other one's getting away. He's out of range, sir. You go bring the horses up. I'll see about the man I shot. Well, ain't you going after the other one? He's got a pretty good head start, and it's near dark. I'm not going after him. Blind. Morning soon enough. Go on. You get my brother. You get wrecked? Not yet. You heard? Bad? Yeah. Yeah, sure. Anyway. Chester. Yes, sir. Tie up those horses and come here. We'll carry him into the shack. Be right there. Yeah. He smell his horse. What about it? Well, his legs broke. Must have stumbled in there trying to get away. You reckon? I better shoot him. All right, you can do it. As soon as we get this man out of the shack. Easy. Easy. All right. Open the door, Chester. I'll keep hold of him. My aid's locked. You suppose somebody lives in this forsaken place? I will find out. Go ahead and knock. Anybody in there? Open up. Anybody in there? There's no need for any more noise at my door. Just finished telling you men you can't stay in my house. You don't need that shotgun, ma'. Am. We don't mean any harm. I intend to defend my home, sir. No rough men are going to tramp around amongst my fine things. You open the door a little wider, ma', am, and you'll see we're not the same men. I don't open my home to any stranger. A marshall, Dylan, from Dodge City. And we got a badly injured man here. A United States marshal. That's right, man. Well, then I guess I'll have to let you in. But I don't hold with your Yankee government. I want that clear. All right, ma'. Am. Fine. Come on, Chester. Now, you just show us where you want us to put it. He hurt bad? Not bad enough. Well, I suppose even a rough man has a right to. To die in the bed. But mind you be careful of my thing. All right, ma', am, we'll mind. I took care of Miller's horse. Mr. Jones brung the saddle good. Hey, ain't things a little strange in there? A little? All that talk about not hurting her. Fine things. Ain't nothing there that's worth carting with except May that old pine. Yeah, I know. Everything else all cracked and broke. Why, most ladies wouldn't give that stuff. Possible you gentlemen would care to join me? I. I fixed this small supper. Well, that's very nice of you, man. You say it's nice? Mr. Hanford, he's my husband. Mr. Hanford always said I could spot a gentleman right away. I could see you two were gentlemen as soon as we exchanged pleasantries. There in the entryway. Well, thank you, ma'. Am. Mr. Proud. 40, ma'. Am. Please take your hat off my cherry wood piano, my lamb. Ma', am, it can't hurt nothing. I do not allow anything to mar the finish of my beautiful cherrywood piano. Yes, ma'. Am. Thank you. If your plate please sit down. Thank you. I don't imagine your wounded friend was able to partake. I know. No, Ms. Hanford. He's not likely to come to for some time. That is, if he ever does. I can't imagine how he got his wound. I'd seen him just a few minutes before you gentlemen. Miss Hanford. Ma'. Am. Didn't you hear the shooting right outside your door? I have trained myself not to see and hear the ugly things of life. I just live here alone among my things. But you said that you have a husband. My husband has been gone for two, three, four years now, Marshall. Oh, I. I'm sorry to hear that, man. Mr. Anod will never be content to live a quiet life. He thought he could. When first we came here directly after the war, I had in mind he'd build me a new plantation. Marshall, just between you and me, Mr. Hanford didn't appreciate my lovely thanks. And one day. Well, one day you just move down west. Oh, that's too bad, ma'. Am. I do not need your pity, sir. I'm content. Well, sure, of course. I'd be obliged if you gentlemen would sleep out there. There on the veranda. Veranda? Oh, that's all right, Chester. We'll sleep on the veranda. I am going to have to keep an eye on Miller, though, man. I will watch over him. M. Well, no, that's not your job, miss. I'm mistress of this house. Marel. Dylan. I will watch over here. I will call you if there's any change. As a matter of fact, I'll look to him right now. Well, there are right, ma'. Am. Mr. D. Yeah, Chester, what you doing? Is that slanty old portrait rambler? Well, it is to her. My, if she don't be off. Sail every time I dig a grave. The ground scene than the last time. Our grave digging isn't supposed to be easy, Chester. It's too permanent. Funny how many men dies at daybreak, ain't it? I mean, when everything else is starting up and all. Well, I guess when you have to die, it's as good a time as any. Where do you reckon his brother is? Banana rack? I don't know. We're sure gonna have a long ride to catch up with him. They sure ain't one the of hurry up man about his d. But I sure would have been glad to have been shot of this place for now. What's the matter, Chester? Don't you Enjoy Southern Hospitality? Mr. Dillon, I have to walk around in that old shack on my tiptoes. She's after me every minute about not hurting her things. Gracious goodness, I couldn't hurt them old things if I tried. Well, we can be leaving soon now, Chester. We've done about all we can do. Here we go in ambushes. Yeah, and my guns are in the house. Come on. I believe it's customary. Will you get out of the way, please? I want my gun over there. That crazy fool's thinking of. I don't know, Chester, but he must have a good reason for sticking around his brother. No, I don't think he'd take on these odds when he was pretty sure his brother was done for. I think he's got another reason. Where's the saddle that came off Miller's horse? Over there in the corner. Oh, be careful your heavy footsteps. Yeah, let's see now. Yeah, that's it. I want to stuck around. All that money makes up into a right poor little package, don't it, sir? Gentlemen, I don't understand this sudden rudeness on your part. I'm sorry, ma', am, but I'm not too polite when I'm being shot at. And you stay away from those wonders. I thank you. Not give me orders in my own house. Chester, let's push the piano in front of that window over there, huh? We're like sitting ducks this way. You will not touch my chair. All right, come on. Oh, don't harm it. Oh, don't harm it. All right, now, watch the part. You take the side, huh? I don't think you'll wait long. Long, mister? Endure this. How long? As long as that outlaw's out there. Ms. Henry, he's not going to let us out of here alive. Who going to stay here tramping around among my nice things until he goes away? I'm afraid so. Then. Well, I'll just order him off my lap. Miss Hanford, come back here. See here, sir. Miss Hanford, your trespassion. I want you to ride. He shot her. Yeah, There he is running for the creek he's down. You got him? Yeah. You go make sure. Will you just. Yes, sir. I'll see to Ms. Hanford. Miss Hanford. Miss Hanford, I sure did in. You were right. I'm sorry, ma'. Am. He was no gentleman, was he, Marshall? Trespass on the lady's property. Oh, man. He wasn't. He's dead. Mister. Gentlemen. How's Ms. Hanford? Not good. Not good at all. Ms. Hanford, they're going to take you into your house. No, not just yet. Marshall. Don't move me. Let me die here on the veranda. But you'd be more comfortable, Marshall. I won't delay you long. Is there anything we can do? I mean, is there any way to make you feel better? You just see. You just see that somebody takes care of love. She gone? Yeah. Well, I can carry her inside, huh, Mr. Dillon? Yeah. She really believed Rack Miller to listen to her and go away, didn't she? Yeah. That he was no gentleman. Well, it's just a shame. That's what is. His piano sure must play pretty the way she loved it. Took care of. It's good. What are you doing? I just thought I'd hit me a note or two. She. She wouldn't care, would she? Well, I guess she wouldn't. Why? Why don't play at all. And look here under the top. All the strings rusted away, just hanging there that you're doing. This P ain't made a sound for years. Well, I guess it didn't have to play. Chester just had to looked pretty. It was all she had. We'll return to the story of Gunsmoke in just one moment. And now back to gun smoke. By 1960, practically all the lifeblood had been drained out of network radio, and the handwriting seemed to be on the wall for what dramatic programs remained. CBS no longer canceled individual shows. They canceled entire program blocks. Change seemed to be the watchword. And the executives that were lowering the curtain on radio drama seemed to be of a different breed. Gone were the men with programming backgrounds. It was quite a change from the late 1940s, as Norman MacDonald recalls. It seems to me that in the old days of radio, and I'm going back again to the 40s and 50s, the executives, whether. Whether men like Guy Della Chapa or Harry Ackerman or whomever, were men with a. An experience in. And a feeling for the theatrical end of the business as opposed to the business end of radio, there was a wonderful meeting of the minds when you went in and said you wanted to do such and such a kind of show. They could. They could picture and understand and either agree or disagree with what you had in mind, but they knew what you were talking about. It was really Extraordinarily easy to get a, a conference or a meeting with the then CBS brass. Usually it was one man or two men and that one man or those two men said yes or no to your idea and you either went with it or didn't. There was no feeling of committee and that somebody upstairs would say yes or no. I had an idea that there could be a. A sort of a female Gunsmoke, if you will, only modern. I went to Harry Ackerman and said that I thought if we could get Joan Fontaine to play the lead in a script I'd written, we could cut an audition record. That was in the days when we used 16 inch acetates and it would be a thing of beauty and everybody would be crazy about the whole thing. And of course it didn't work that way. Ms. Fontaine did do the audition record, but it wasn't very good. My point, however, is that in the space of about a six minute conversation in Harry Ackerman's office, I walked out with the knowledge that I could have a studio, an engineer, an orchestra, a recording session, a cast and Ms. Fontaine all agreed to in about five minutes. And it takes more than that to ride up in an elevator today to one of the executive's offices. Writer John Dunkle agrees. I think that the decisions are made now by people who really have no training or understanding in the creative fields. They are mostly businessmen. Their only concern is economic. And the young people who move into the so called creative spots. I don't know how they're supposed to have the understanding to do it because they have no training, they have no background at all in any creative work. They don't understand writing, they don't understand directing. They don't understand anything about it. It's all economic. And this began back in those days. It began with the great importance placed upon the sales department. John Dana summed it up this way. Radio was deserted by its own mother and father. It was left to lie on the doorstep and wither and die consciously and willfully. Gunsmoke's final broadcast was in June 1961. Harley Bear and George Walsh recall the cancellation. I'm glad we didn't know when we were doing the last show. It would have been a terribly depressing thing to know that this was the last time. As it is, we went blithely on our way. We did the last show and I think I was working on a petticoat junction on. I got word that it had been taken off the air. The last program had a line at the end. That said, this concludes the current series of Gunsmoke on CBS Radio, and I think that was the extent of it. There were personal feelings involved too. We had, I think, more more of ourselves put into that show than almost any other series. I know that I never felt about any other series that I did as keenly as I did about Gunsmoker. Loved it as much and the others were the same. The same way we loved doing what we did, we felt, and Norman allowed this feeling that we were all a contributing factor to it in whatever facet we appeared. Following the program's cancellation, practically everyone connected with the series went on to other lucrative areas of the entertainment industry. All have done quite well. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers, and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busy work finding leads, drafting emails, and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo I.O. and sign up free today. Planning a trip out of the country? 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Arrive Connected with airalo the past 15 years has also given the Gunsmoke company time to reflect on the ingredients that made the show a success. First, John Dunkle the people involved were simply excellent. It was kind of a combination that had been building all through the 40s. There we had some marvelous actors, many of them went on to stardom and we had good Good writers, the very best writers. Les Crutchfield and Walter Newman and Jim Poe and all kinds of people. And we had Norman at the helm, who was a very talented man, and John kind of riding her and riding so many of them. And it was just. Just a great combination, that's all. From the very beginning, Norman McDonnell used to say very often, because we had a success story almost overnight, that the success of Gunsmoke was a three way effort. The script, the actors and the music. He was very generous in saying this because of course he was also a very able director. And the direction should have been sewn in there as well. I think it was an instant success because it was different. Westerns up to that time had been all pretty much the Hopalong Cassidy type thing, the Lone Ranger, more or less simple stories that appealed to youngsters of all ages. I think even today's Westerns tend to. Tend to be fairly simple storylines, as they say. They're about four basic plots and you change the names. Gunsmoke came along with stories that were not necessarily the typical Western. They were emotional stories. The stories were again, more adult, more sophisticated, more far reaching, I suppose you might say, say in so many aspects that I think the show was different. It was something that hadn't been presented to the American public before. I think that it gave the listener the benefit of a respect, possibly that Western producers hadn't up to that time, I think time taken. Whereas most of the radio shows were done with a sense of. Of hurry and time. There was time to pause to think. There was time to establish in the minds of the people. Again, I can't do anything except say that radio. The magic of it is to give a visual feeling to the listener. There was time taken for that, to establish a character. The writing, the writers were brilliant in that. The sound men were the greatest. They had these guys on the console. The sound were imaginative and they were inspired. And Norman was so good. Norman had this beautiful sense of timing a show so that he was never too pressed and you never felt pressed as an actor. So that you had to keep your eye on. One eye on the booth to gauge your dramatic reading. Usually if you had a sense of timing the scene played as it played a press rehearsal. All I can say is it was 10 years of. Of having a ball every Saturday morning, of not only enjoying the drama of it, but of laughing, of humor, and of having your wits exercised a little bit. The success of any series has to do with the charisma that the leading character has. You can give it the best stories and the best production in the world and the best support in the world. And if the guy or the gal does not have isn't going to make it and it can get by with a minimum of all of those things. If whoever it is has the lead causes people to say, hey, come on, let's tune in on old so and so tonight. By God, I sure like to see how he's going to whip all those bad guys. You know, it's charisma, that's all. I can't define it. I don't know what it is, what causes it, what causes the lack of it. Some people have it, some people don't. That's all. Please don't think that I'm an egomaniac. I stand back and look at this. I've been on the other side for so long that I can evaluate quite clearly without being involved emotionally or ego wise. There was great character development. God, we used to go in with 11 page scripts, take all the time in the world to do and the production values of really paying attention to sound effects and playing them for what they are realistically. And John's contribution of taking an incident and making it a story instead of doing a full fledged, full blown opening closing with the middle and contrapuntal characterizations. It was the story of a man basically. Or if it wasn't that man, then it was somebody else that that man was involved with very deeply. We all really felt very strongly that we had something. And I think we all treated it very carefully. We were lucky people. Well, we really were. This became a labor of love with everybody on the show. And I know I still have in my library a number of books dealing with that phase of United States history in and around Dodge City and western Kansas and eastern Colorado and around there. None of us could have written like John Neston did and some of the subsequent writers on there. But if there was a detail that was inaccurate or a period of time or an era that was not painted, we would all give tongue and say, no, that is not right. And he went about bringing some of our reference books in there and said, look, I might. And that was, you know, that was kind of the amazing thing when Bill was. When it made the transition from radio to television as they described Wyeter and Tildman and some of the Clay Allison and some of the lawmen of that day. And many of the lawmen of that day and era had been former gunmen and doctors, brothers themselves. And then robbing got to be too competitive or hijacking or road agenting became too competitive and they quit. And these guys were good, they could control the baser element. And so some of the world's greatest outlaws became well known for being lawmen. But you see, men in those days, women too were not as big as they are now. A six foot man was a true, tremendously big man. And Bill had, was not as heavy then as he is now. But it was amazing how well he physically fit the descriptions of many of the old time lawmen in there. And you know, Bill I still think is one of America's great unsung heroes. So far as acting is concerned. Bill had a built in mechanism, still does, that allows him to act with a greater reserve than he uses. I don't know if I'm making myself clear, but I know we were told in drama classes and whatnot, don't use everything you got in every scene. Well, Bill doesn't you feel that no matter how angry he got, how strong he was, how sad he was, how happy, how joyful, he still had 60% of his potential left. And that's an amazing thing that he does that today on canon that you feel don't push him any farther because he still has more than he's got right now. And very few actors have that. You strive all your life to acquire the ability to act with reserve. And I, by that I mean reserve of power. But Bill has it. And that came over so forcefully in radio. With it, of course he has voice like a pipe organ. It's a magnificent instrument. And Bill could command with his voice and had the ability to paint such pictures in his shadings and readings and whatnot. I don't think that today Bill has ever really come into his own. As great as he is in canon, as great as he's been in other shows that he's done, his full potent ability has never really been unleashed. Well, I don't know. In these days I think they'd say the chemistry was right in those days. I guess radio had just about come to its golden age. The, the mistakes and all the hard knocks were pretty well behind it. And TV had not yet made any serious inroads. So I think that the timing was one thing to be considered. And of course I wasn't privy to the information having to do with the selection of the four principals, Bill Conrad and Parley Bearer and Georgie ellis and Howard McNear. But that was a masterful stroke. They certainly where were represented a quartet of a fine talent. And then when you put with them people like John Dana and Lawrence Dobkin and Vic Parin and James Nusser and some of the others just couldn't miss. Now, this is not even getting into the area of John meston and Norman McDonald. Well, I think first place, you have to go back almost before imaginative. But it was fairly new. The style, the form, the approach to the Western and so on. Also, I think, because it was goddamn well done. I mean, great actors. Norm did a hell of a job. And sound. God, what he did was sound marvelous. And it was new. And I guess people. You never know what they're going to like. They ensured that characters. You never know where it comes from. I ran into a guy. I was waiting in a line somewhere recently and my name came up. And some guy said, oh, you have the same name as a writer. I said, yeah. He said, did you ever hear of Master? I said, yeah. I said, what me? And he blew his. He just had a fat. He said, my God, he was so a guy from Chicago. And the really interesting thing is that in Chicago, he said, in the radio, they had a club that would meet every week or 10 days and discuss Gunsmoke and the scripts and the ideas. But, you know, when you write something, send it in or do it, you kind of forget there's an audience out there. And then these people would sit around in the school, discuss the. What had gone on. I don't know, the moral aspects or whatever. I suppose that's the one reason it was popular, I guess. But you never know how to approach them. You do what you want to do, and if you like it, somebody else likes it, you're in luck. Otherwise, they send you down the street. I would truly enjoy going back to the old days of being completely involved in radio. There was a marvelous feeling, which doesn't often exist anymore. Marvelous feeling of going home after you finished your day's work and indeed finished your program and sitting down and saying, boy, I. I liked what happened today. I liked the show we did. I feel good about it. And being able to sit there sometimes if it was tape delay or something and hear your own show was a great sense of satisfaction. No committees, no groups. You, as the director, handled the music and the sound and the announcer and the cast. And you were completely involved and. And so were usually completely satisfied. The beauty, of course, was that the. The next morning you got up and started on the script for the following day or two days later or five days later, and you were starting a whole new world all over again, which you wanted to deliver in three days. And had to be confined to 29 minutes and 30 seconds. And this, I think, was the beauty of radio. Each member of the audience, however big or however small, had a chance to exercise his own imagination and to draw his own pictures and add it to what he heard. I'd had my own private Matt Dillon, My own sexy particular kitty, My own bumbling doc and my own nutty Chester. And they all did things and looked exactly the way I wanted them to look. Bill Robeson said that America may well have forgotten how to listen. And I think this might well be true. So many of us are apt to sit in front of the television set, Whether we really absorb anything or not, I don't know. We sit and we watch. In radio, which has been called the theater of the mind. Your imagination worked and drew for you whatever pictures you wanted. The theater of the mind has been dark for nearly 15 years. Years now. And I think perhaps it's time somebody turned the lights up again. Oh, hello, Chester. Oh, come on in, Doc. Ah. Where's Matt? He ain't here, see? Where have you two been the last couple of days? I haven't seen either one of you. Well, I just got back from Hay City. Mr. Dillon sent me there to fetch some government papers. And you know what? I took the Santa Fe both ways. You did? Well, that beats right. But where's Matt? You said he left the note, but he didn't say exactly where he was at. Well, you mean he's out of town? That's what the note said. It seems somebody told him where he could find Jack Brand. Jack Brand? Well, what's he doing around here? I don't know. I guess Missouri got too rough for him. Why don't they handle their own outlaws instead of chasing him into Kansas for Matt to catch? Mr. Jones says Brann's got three of his gang with him. You mean Matt's gone out alone? Alone? After four men? Well, if I knew where he was, I'd go help him, Doc. Oh. Well, there's nothing you can do about it, Chester. You worried me, though. That last hold up the gang pulled. They say four men got shot down. Well, maybe they've quit. Maybe that's why they came to Kansas. Do you ever hear of a bunch of outlaws quitting? No, yes. Not. I guess I was just talking to myself, that's what you on knock. Where is he? There he is, sitting on that wagon. Oh. Who's that with him? Some fell. Give him a ride, I guess. Hello, Mr. Dillon. Hello, Chester. Doc. Hey, you lose your horse, Matt? We left Our horses out at Bowers Ranch and borrowed this wagon. One of his riders will bring him in tomorrow. Who's this William at Dylan. You've seen his picture? Trustee. Oh my goodness. He's Jack Brand. Let's get on, Brandon. You first for sure. How come you let him drive the wagon, Mr. Dylan? To keep his hands full, Justin. Here, take my shotgun and lock him up. Yes, sir. Where's the others? I thought he had three men with him. Well, tell him, Marshall. Tell him where they are. They're in the wagon, Chester, out of that canvas. But are they all dead, man? All three of them? They're all dead, Doc. Bloodiest Marshall I ever saw. It's just a wagon load of meat to hear. That's enough, Brandon. It ain't hardly enough. I never seed such killing. What happened, Mr. Dunn? Doesn't matter. They put up a fight and I had to take him. Well, I'll tell him what happened. Happened. You're a lawman here. Hid himself in the grass and just waited for us to come out of that cabin. And then he yelled. So naturally we headed for cover. Who wouldn't? He just laid there and he cut loose with a shotgun. Tore up two of the boys that way. Then he stood up and he cut down Hank Smith with a six shooter. How come you got out of it, Brand? I jumped back in the cabin. Then I give up. We weren't putting up a fight. These spookers yelling like that make any man jump. Oh, I suppose you're trying to say that you wouldn't have shot him. We tried to shoot him. Who wouldn't? Any man's got a right to defend himself. Oh, well, I never heard of resisting arrest called self defense. I never heard of no marshal shooting down everybody on the landscape. Lock him up, Justin. Get going, Brad. He actually think he was killing hogs? Not man. Set up. See how come you brought the bodies back, man? Why didn't you just bury him out there? I wanted more witnesses than me to ask. Identify him, Doc. Might save trouble when Bran goes to trial. You say you were mighty lucky taking four outlaws that way, man. Yeah, and you kill three out all. Say, wait till people around here hear about this. BR's right, Doc. It's a lot of killing. An awful lot. Oh, no you don't. Don't get to thinking about it too much. Not man. It's your job. You did it. So it's over. It's over. Well, tomorrow or the next day there'll be somebody else. There's always another man to kill. Oh, no, that's not the way to look at it, man. I've never heard of you shooting anybody. You didn't have to. No, I never did. But sometimes that doesn't help much. You look tired, man. I haven't slept since I rode out of here two days ago. Well, now you get some rest and you'll feel better. Sure. Brand snug in jail. Mr. D, he don't like it much, but I told him not to try kicking his way out, that I'd be sleeping in the office. We'll both be sleeping in the office. Chester. I'm too tired to walk to my room. Take care of this wagon and what's in it, will you? You and Doc can identify those men. We'll write it out on paper in the morning. All right, you. I'll be coming to bed about midnight, but I'll be ready real quiet. Nothing could wake me. Chester. Not tonight. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers, and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busywork. Finding leads, drafting emails, and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo IO and sign up free today. Hey, I'm Dr. Z and I'm a neurosurgeon. So that means long hours, early rounds, late nights, and everything in between. And through it all, I wear figs because they're built for what I do through the chaos, through the hours, and through whatever the day throws at me. They do their job so I can do mine. They're comfortable when it counts and functional when I need them the most. So where do you wear your figs? On shift? On call? On the couch in the break room, listening to this podcast. Wherever it is. They fit right in. And now, listeners of this podcast can get 15% off their first order. Just head to WearFigs.com and use code FIGSRX at checkout. That's WearFigs.com code FIGSRX. You sure I shouldn't wake him up and tell him it can wait until morning? Just if Matt's too tired to do anything about it tonight. I guess you're right. Of course I am. Well, okay. Good night, Justin. Good night, Do. Oh. Don't go for your gun. Don't go for my. Don't do it. I tell you to leave the gun alone. No, don't make me Kill you? Don't make me kill another man. No. I'm spilling up blood. I don't want to kill you. No, no. It isn't me that you donated. Chester. There ain't nobody here. Foster, you was asleep. You've been dreaming. Oh, yeah, Yeah, I like to land. No, no, no, no, it's all right. Just. My gracious. I. I come in and I heard you talking and I thought somebody was here. That moonlight ain't too bright. I couldn't see good at first. Sure, I had to yell at you a couple of times before you woke up. You was dreaming you was in a fight, I guess. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I was dreaming. Nightmares like that, they're just terrible, ain't they? There's a bottle in the desk drawer over there, Chester. Get it for me, will you? Yes, I know for it. I used to have nightmares sometimes when I was a boy. But I don't get them much no more. Thanks, John. Good stiff drink will be good. Thanks, sister. What time is it? A little past midnight. Jack Brand awake? No, he'd be Bellerin if he was. But, Mr. Dillon, now that you're awake, there's something I ought to tell you. Oh? What? Well, me and Doc was having a drink over at the Alphaganza and a fellow come in there and started talking real loud. Talking about what? Well, sir, mostly about how he's gonna tree Dodge and how he's gonna tell you, too. How? He says he's a friend of Jack Brands and he's heard about how you caught him and all. What's his name? Stanger. Joe Stanger. Yeah, I know it. You think he'll cause trouble? Probably. But I'm not going to worry about him tonight. That's what me and Doc figured. He won't try nothing tonight. All the same, keep your gun handy, Chester. Now, let's try to get some sweet. Oh, go shut him up, Chester. It's hardly dawn. Swear. I'd like throw a bucket of water on him. Oh, shut up, Brand. I'm coming. Over here. Unlock this cage. What? Holding a gun on you. Can't you see where you get that gun? Drop it, brandon. You're not hurt. I hit the gun. I got the keys, Mr. Dillon. I'll get his gun out of there. All right, go ahead. Stand back, Bran. You like to bust my hand. You're lucky you didn't kill me, I suppose. Just like you kill everybody. Shut up. I got it, Mr. Dillon. No good anyway. Not now. Where'd you get that gun, Bren? I made it. Marshall, don't be smart. Wait a minute. Joe Stanger brought it to you. He tossed it to you right through those bars on the window. I didn't know Stanger was in town. Didn't you just get some boards and nail them over the window so nothing can get through it? I'll fix it, Mr. Dillon. Oh, wait a minute, Marshall. That's the only window in here. You can't board it up. You'll get enough here. No, but it'll be dark. I don't like it dark. Don't you? When you get it fixed we'll go to breakfast, Justin. It won't take long, Mr. Dillon. Well, it's been some time since I've been out on the plaza this early in the morning, Mr. Dylan. Oh, weren't you up gambling all night last Saturday, Chester? Oh, well, that's different. Oh, how? Well, I've been asleep all night this time. Things looks different when you had a good night's sleep. Yeah, they sure do. You didn't have no more nightmares last night, did you? No, but I didn't sleep well. You. You ought to take some time off. Go out buffalo hunting or something. Yeah, maybe I ought to take a lot of time off. Wait a minute, Justin. What? That's Joe Stanger coming there and by gol it is. What's he doing up so early? Maybe he wants to find out why Jack Brand hasn't shot his way out of jail yet. He won't throw him no more gun. It's not the way I got that place boarded up. Now get out of the way, Chester. Yes, sir. Morning, Marshall. You're up early. Stinger train leaves for Abilene in about an hour. Going to Abilene? I'll be back next week. Jack Brant will still be in jail. I heard you caught him. Good friend of yours, isn't he? Sure, but I ain't part of his gang. Never was. Yeah, I know. Of course there ain't much gang left now. No. You're a pretty rough man, Marsh. When I have to be. Don't it ever bother you, killing people the way you do, Stanger? I shot a gun out of Jack Brand's hand this morning. You come by the office later and I'll give it back to you. Now what would I want of a smashed up six shooting? It's yours, isn't it? Wearing mine. I ought to throw you in jail too. What for? They got you out of sight if nothing else. I wouldn't go to jail, Marshall. Not without a fight I wouldn't. I Ain't afraid of you. You want to try it? Go ahead. Go ahead. Go. No. What's the matter, Marshall? I thought you liked killing men. What's holding you back? You're gonna have to fight me sooner or later. Get out of here, Stanger. Go get on your train. Wait til I tell everybody about Matt Dillon. How he's lost his nerve. Get out, I said. Well, I don't want to shoot down a man that won't draw. Not today anyway. But I'll be back, Marshall, next week. Why didn't you shoot him, Mr. Dylan? He's nothing but a big bluff. Just so you go on to breakfast. I'm going back to the office. What? Why? You told me you hurt me. Well, yes, sir. Okay, Mr. Dillon. I brought you a can full of coffee, Mr. John. Thanks, Jesse. I'm. Put it right here. What you doing? Writing a letter? It's a telegram. Here, Chester. Take this down to the depot, will you? Sure. I want it to go out right away. U.S. war Department. What are you telegraphing Washington about? That's my resignation, Chester. What? I'm quitting right now. Why? You can't do that. I've done it. Oh, I don't believe it. You're funny. A man can quit a job, Chester. I've quit jobs before. I know, but this is different. What's different about it? The government doesn't own me. But think what'll happen if you ain't marshalled here. There are other men can be marshaled. Mr. Dillon. What? You ain't doing this because of. Well, what Joe Stanger said. And I've lost my nerve. No, he's wrong about that. And he's wrong about my liking to kill men too. You never killed nobody unless you had to. And now I don't have to. I'm through, Chester. I knew I was through when I didn't draw on Stanger this morning. I've killed my last man. I just don't know what they say. Mister. I've hated this job since the day I took it. I never did have a taste for killing. And now they can find somebody who has. He'll make a better marshall than I ever was. That ain't true. Go send the telegram, Chester. I'll be at Del Monico's having breakfast. And with a good appetite for a change. After breakfast I went to my room and got some of the stuff sleep I'd missed the night before. And I slept good. It was as though what was past was past and none of it bothered me now. I didn't have to face it happening over and over again. And when I woke up, I felt better than I had in years. I even felt a little cleaner somehow. It was. Wasn't going to be any more blood on my hands. Washington, as usual, was pretty slow answering my telegram. Week later, I still hadn't had an answer. But I didn't care. I'd quit. And that was that. I even began to enjoy myself for a change. Like the day I finally took Kitty fishing. Matt. Hey, Matt, look. I got another one. Well, throw him back, Kitty. We got more than we can carry now. I will not throw him back. I kill you. Come on over here in the shade. You've done enough fishing. Okay. Hey, look at him, Matt. Isn't he a beauty? Yeah, he's bigger than any icon. Well, why don't you throw him in the sack and then sit down here, huh? Say, you're right. I didn't know we'd caught that many. Yeah. Maybe we'll have a fish fry tonight, huh? We can feed half a dodge with all those. Well, I doubt it. You ever see Chester go through a mess full of fish the last time he starved himself? A couple of days in advance. Maybe we can kind of sneak up on him tonight. Ah, no. He knows we're out here. Maybe you ought to go into the business, Matt. Oh, what business? Fishing. You could do it for a living. Well, I am going to have to find something to do for a living. I guess it won't hurt you to loaf for a while now. Yeah, I'm enjoying it. You know something, Matt? What? I think this is the first time I've ever seen you that you weren't wearing a gun. It is. And I'm enjoying that, too. Someday maybe nobody will wear guns. Yeah, maybe. You know something? I'm sleepy. You're lazy. So lazy you're probably going to see starve to death before you find a new job. I don't care. Matt, look. Somebody's coming on horseback. No. Hey, that's Chester. Oh, he's as lazy as you are. Imagine taking a horse to come this far. Oh, Chester hates walking. Besides, he looks like he's in a hurry. Maybe he couldn't wait for that fish fr. Mr. Dillon. Hello, Miss Kitty. Look in that sack, Chester. We got about 30 catfish already. Well, that's fine, Miss Gabitt. Mr. Dillon. Joe Stanger's in town. Oh, well, it doesn't matter to me, Justin. But you don't understand. Understand what? What I come to tell you, Stanger's at the Alapaganza A while ago, he had word with one of the girls there and she slapped him and he pulled out his. And he killed her. What? Who was the girl, Chester? Kate Hawkins. Oh, no, that's who. It was Miss Kitty. And then the bartender tried to stop him and Stanger shot him too. And I hear he's gonna die. I grabbed a horse off the hitch rail and come right down and tell you. You've got to stop him, Mr. Doane. I'm not marshal anymore here, Chester. I quit. No, that don't matter. It does to me. You mean you're gonna let Joe Stanger walk around dodging, Shoot everybody that gets in his way, including women? I'm throw killing. I told you that. Who's gonna stop him then? You're the only man around here that'll go up again him and you'll know it. That may be true, but I'm still not gonna do it. Wait, Mr. Dillon. Wait a minute. I've been thinking a lot about all this lately, and there's something you've been overlooking. Oh? Men like Stanger and Bran, they gotta be stopped. I'd do it if I could. But I can't. I ain't good enough. Most men ain't. But you are. It's kind of too bad for you that you are. But that's the way it is. And there's nothing you can do about it. Not now. It's too late. It's way too late. Give me your gun, Chester. Yes. Want my holster? I'll carry it in my belt. Okay. Chester will help you carry the fish. Sure, Matt. Sure. It. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busy work. Finding leads, drafting emails and even prioritizing your day. So stop paying for five different sales tools when one does it all. Visit Apollo I.O. and sign up free today. If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for auto reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant clip gloves they need at the start of their shift. And you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-granger. Click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. Sam. Gun smoke, produced and directed by john hickman and norman McDonald starred william conrad as matt dillon, u. S marshal harley bear is chester, howard mcnear is doc and georgia ellis is kitty. Music was composed and conducted by rex corey. Sound patterns by bill james, ray kemper and tom hanlon. This is george walsh speaking. Sa. This has been a presentation of otrwesterns.com and we hope you enjoyed. Please take some time to like and rate this episode within your favorite podcast application. Follow us on Facebook by going to otrwesterns.com Facebook and subscribe to our YouTube channel by going to otrwesterns.Com YouTube become one of our ranch hands and unlock some exclusive content. We want to thank our most recent ranch hands, Steve and Ron W. Who joined us recently. You too can join by going to otrwesterns.com donate send us an email podcasttrwesterns.com and you can call and leave us a voicemail 707-986-8739 this episode is copyrighted under the Attribution Non Commercial Share Like Copyright for more information go to otrwesterns.com copyright have a great day and thanks for listening. Tired of juggling sales tools or spending hours on prospecting just to book a few meetings? Meet Apollo, the go to market platform for finding leads, connecting with buyers and closing deals all in one place. Apollo gives you access to over 210 million contacts and AI that handles all your busy work finding leads, drafting emails and even prioritizing your day. 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Visit Apollo I.O. and sign up free today.