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''Wagon Train'' is an American Western series that ran on NBC 1957–62 and then on ABC 1962–65, although the network also aired daytime repeats, as ''Major Adams, Trailmaster'' and ''Trailmaster'' (post-1961 episodes without original series lead Ward Bond), from January 1963 to September 1965. The show debuted at #15 in the Nielsen ratings, rose to #2 in the next three seasons, and peaked at #1 in the 1961–62 television season. After moving to ABC in the autumn of 1962, the ratings began to decline, and ''Wagon Train'' did not again make the Top 20 listing. The series initially starred veteran movie supporting actor Ward Bond as the wagon master, later replaced upon his death by John McIntire, and Robert Horton as the scout, subsequently replaced by Robert Fuller a year after Horton had decided to leave the series. The series was inspired by the 1950 film ''Wagon Master'' directed by John Ford and starring Ben Johnson, Harry Carey Jr. and Ward Bond, and harkens back to the early widescreen wagon train epic ''The Big Trail'' (1930) starring John Wayne and featuring Bond in his first major screen appearance playing a supporting role. Horton's buckskin outfit as the scout in the first season of the television series resembles Wayne's, who also played the wagon train's scout in the earlier film. ==Synopsis== The show chronicles the adventures of a wagon train as it makes its way from Missouri to California. There were 284 episodes in 8 seasons: the first aired on September 18, 1957, and the final segment was broadcast on May 2, 1965. Some of the actors appearing on ''Wagon Train'' included Ward Bond as wagon master Major Seth Adams (seasons 1–4), Robert Horton as scout Flint McCullough (seasons 1–5), John McIntire as wagon master Christopher Hale (seasons 4–8), Robert Fuller as scout Cooper Smith (seasons 7–8), Denny Scott Miller as Duke Shannon (seasons 5–7), Michael Burns as Barnaby West (seasons 4–8), Frank McGrath as Charlie Wooster (cook, seasons 1–8), and Terry Wilson as Bill Hawks (seasons 1-8). McIntire replaced Bond as wagon master upon Bond's death at age 57, and Fuller replaced Horton as scout a season after Horton opted to depart, an obvious choice since Fuller had already played a lead in another western series (''Laramie'' on NBC) and physically resembled Horton. Horton and Fuller even shared the same birthday, albeit nine years apart. While Horton's character generally wore a black hat onscreen, Fuller wore a white one. Ward Bond was billed above Robert Horton in the opening credits, but Horton was later billed above relative newcomer John McIntire, and McIntire and Fuller rotated top billing from episode to episode when Fuller joined the series in the seventh season. During the sixth season, Horton had left and Fuller had not yet replaced him, so McIntire carried the show with the supporting cast. Neither Bond nor McIntire, both veterans of dozens of supporting roles in movies, routinely played the lead in theatrical films, although Bond did in at least one B-picture. Rivals Bond and Horton frequently quarreled on the set, an extensively publicized development at the time, lending an element of verisimilitude to their disputes within the episodes themselves. The series aired for most of its run in black-and-white. That briefly changed during the show's fifth season (1961–62) on NBC, to help promote the sales of parent company RCA's color television sets. These five episodes were aired in color: * October 4, 1961: "The Kitty Albright Story" (with Polly Bergen as Albright) * November 1, 1961: "The Jenna Douglas Story" (with Carolyn Jones) * December 6, 1961: "The Lizbeth Ann Calhoun Story" (with Dana Wynter) * February 7, 1962: "The Lonnie Fallon Story" (with Gary Clarke) * March 14, 1962: "The Amos Billings Story" (with Paul Fix) The series returned to its original black-and-white format for the remainder of its run on ABC, damaging the ratings, until its final season in 1964, when it again began to telecast its episodes in color. (ABC did not begin broadcasting in color until 1964.) The series used the cut-down, shortened wagons common to television series budgets, as opposed to the full-length oxen-drawn Conestoga wagons prominent in a forerunner of the show, the 1930 wagon train film ''The Big Trail'', which features 27-year-old Ward Bond supporting 23-year-old John Wayne. Occasionally film clips from Hollywood movies, depicting a train of Conestogas, were edited into the episodes. In several episodes of the first season Major Adams says the line "That'll be the day!" which was a tag line said by John Wayne in the 1956 film ''The Searchers'' in which Bond also appeared. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wagon Train」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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