"Rawhide" had an eight season run on the CBS television network, scheduled in various time slots from January, 1959 to January 1966. That period was pretty much a Golden Age for TV Westerns, with an upper tier of shows that included "Gunsmoke", "The Rifleman", "Wanted:Dead or Alive" and "Cheyenne". "Rawhide" lasted longer than most except for "Gunsmoke", and managed to do it with a backdrop that didn't change much from show to show and season to season. I just completed watching the entire first season, and the point was made repeatedly that Gil Favor's (Eric Fleming) cowhands were bringing a herd of cattle from San Antonio, Texas to the railhead in Sedalia, Kansas, a distance of three thousand miles and taking a number of months in the old West of the 1880's.
Gil Favor was a no nonsense trail boss, and throughout the first season, there was never an instance in which his crew didn't refer to him as Mr. Favor. That included his right hand man Rowdy Yates, an early career defining role for Clint Eastwood. That didn't mean the men would always see eye to eye, in fact, Rowdy challenged his boss to a fight in episode #1.4, 'Incident of the Widowed Dove'. It occurred over Rowdy's infatuation for a saloon gal who happened to be married to a town marshal. It wouldn't do for Mr. Favor to come out on the wrong side of this disagreement, and he put down Rowdy handily. But he never let these grudges get in the way of running the herd, and always patched things up with his men while gaining renewed respect.
A hallmark of these early Westerns for me is seeing who shows up as a guest star, and "Rawhide" certainly had it's share. Character actors like Myron Healey, Royal Dano, Jay C. Flippen, Marie Windsor and Gloria Talbot all made appearances in the show, and often more than once. Among those who later became major stars in their own right included Jack Lord and DeForest Kelley, and in the episode 'Below the Brazos', you'll catch both Martin Landau and Leslie Nielsen. Of course Eastwood went on to become the biggest star of all, probably the only regular cast member with name recognition to the present day.
The show opened and closed with rousing lyrics from the Rawhide theme song sung by Frankie Laine. A cool trivia item related to the show has to do with series regular Sheb Wooley, a real life cowboy who went to Hollywood seeking notoriety as a singing cowboy himself. He wrote a song that was initially rejected by MGM Records, but when an acetate of the recording was repeatedly played by the staff there, the company reconsidered it's decision and went on to release it. In 1958, "Purple People Eater" made number one on the Billboard pop charts!
Gil Favor was a no nonsense trail boss, and throughout the first season, there was never an instance in which his crew didn't refer to him as Mr. Favor. That included his right hand man Rowdy Yates, an early career defining role for Clint Eastwood. That didn't mean the men would always see eye to eye, in fact, Rowdy challenged his boss to a fight in episode #1.4, 'Incident of the Widowed Dove'. It occurred over Rowdy's infatuation for a saloon gal who happened to be married to a town marshal. It wouldn't do for Mr. Favor to come out on the wrong side of this disagreement, and he put down Rowdy handily. But he never let these grudges get in the way of running the herd, and always patched things up with his men while gaining renewed respect.
A hallmark of these early Westerns for me is seeing who shows up as a guest star, and "Rawhide" certainly had it's share. Character actors like Myron Healey, Royal Dano, Jay C. Flippen, Marie Windsor and Gloria Talbot all made appearances in the show, and often more than once. Among those who later became major stars in their own right included Jack Lord and DeForest Kelley, and in the episode 'Below the Brazos', you'll catch both Martin Landau and Leslie Nielsen. Of course Eastwood went on to become the biggest star of all, probably the only regular cast member with name recognition to the present day.
The show opened and closed with rousing lyrics from the Rawhide theme song sung by Frankie Laine. A cool trivia item related to the show has to do with series regular Sheb Wooley, a real life cowboy who went to Hollywood seeking notoriety as a singing cowboy himself. He wrote a song that was initially rejected by MGM Records, but when an acetate of the recording was repeatedly played by the staff there, the company reconsidered it's decision and went on to release it. In 1958, "Purple People Eater" made number one on the Billboard pop charts!