I will admit up front that I am kind of old as I saw this series when it first aired. Considering that it was done in the late 50's it is excellent.
After the "War of Northern Aggression against The South" the nation is recovering from the trauma of the war and the doubly traumatic assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. While President Lincoln's plans were to forgive and forget and let's get back to work and re-build the country.
I was trying to explain this show to my wife last night. It seems that given the character and his backstory, the producers could have gone two ways: they could have played Yancy very dark, much like Richard Boone did the Paladin character on "Have Gun Will Travel".
The writing is very fine, especially for the period. The Native American, Asian and African American characters are all well rounded, well spoken and treated with the respect they deserve without going over-board.
In reference to the review by edalweber: Henry Russell never worked with Herschel Burke Gilbert on music for the Rifleman. Not that Mr.
Like several other reviewers, I also was a youngster in the heyday of the TV western, which ran from about 1955 to the late 60's. Although the monster shows like "Gunsmoke" and "Bonanza" ran well into the 70's, they were the exceptions, because by the late 60's the police/private detective shows and sitcoms were taking the place of almost all the cowboy shows of the previous 10-12 years.
I also loved this show as a kid. For some reason I thought about the show a few weeks ago and searched my dish network grid and found that a local Chicago channel was showing it at 4 am.
I loved this series when I was a kid. The main thing I remember was that it had an espionage component, and Yancy was always undercover.
From what I remember of the monochrome series, Yancey and his partner were the original "Miami Vice"-coolness embodied. Similar partnerships were seen in TV, such as Robert Urich and his partner "Hawk" as the PI.
