"THE RIFLEMAN" IN "THE WILD, WILD WEST" (OR VICE VERSA)

Whenever Lucas McCain had to ride out of town to conduct business of some sort in Willow Springs, he probably had no idea that about a decade earlier two Secret Service agents rode into that same town and became embroiled in a mysterious case.....

'THE WILD, WILD WEST'
"The Night Of The Sudden Plague"
Jim and Artie arrive in Willow Springs and finds a band of thieves have struck, somehow managing to paralyze everyone in the town.
From A "Wild Wild West Episode Guide"

Just thought you'd like to know. Unfortunately for me, Dr. Loveless was not involved in that case.......

BCnU!

"THE RIFLEMAN" - A COUPLE OF CHUBBIES

'THE RIFLEMAN'
"The Horse-Traders"
Lucas and Mark travel to North Fork after they hear a horse trader is in town, and Mark learns a few things about horse trading.

"The Spoiler"
A good friend of Mark’s is murdered by an escaped murderer. Mark discovers the man at the home of an elderly couple and is forced to keep the secret from his father.
From "The Rifleman Episode Guide List"

These two episodes were broadcast one after the other in succeeding weeks, and unsung character actor Chubby Johnson appeared in both. However in the first episode he was known as Kansas Sawyer, but by next week he was Mr. Avery.


I think this should be a simple splainin - he and his wife had moved around the West several times to escape their past as the parents of a murderous scum named Brud Evans. Once he and his wife moved into the North Fork area as Mr. and Mrs. Avery, he must have let it slip one night in Sweeney's saloon that his name was Kansas Sawyer (a name he probably used in the last town where they lived.) He laughed it off then and claimed that was his gunfighter's name; perhaps he even told them that his full name was Avery Sawyer and that Kansas was his nickname. (If I remember correctly we never do learn what the Averys' first names were.)

That should work fine when it comes to the names. Where the trick lies in in the fact that Chubby Johnson's wife in the first episode was played by Fern Berry, but she was played by Ellen Corby in the second one.

I can only assume that some form of frontier plastic surgery was performed on her to improve her looks. Or she was just tired and run down with iron poor blood when first we met her.

Or maybe a neighboring witch cast a spell to change her appearance (as was done to Gladys Kravitz and Darrin Stephens in 'Bewitched!)

BCnU!

"BONANZA" BLOOPERS

And keeping on the Ponderosa.....

BCnU!

"BONANZA" BAZOOMS!

To lift us out of the rather somber mood posed by the Mark Twain episode of 'The Rifleman', here's a quick bit of fun from 'Bonanza'.....

BCnU!

ANNIE OAKLEY AND CANADA... DRY

"The Mild Mild West", an episode of 'The Murdoch Mysteries', took place in Canada.

And speaking of Annie Oakley and Canada.....

I make no apologies.

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ANNIE OAKLEY!

ANNIE OAKLEY

AS SEEN IN:
'The Murdoch Mysteries'

AS PLAYED BY:
Sarah Strange

From Wikipedia:
Annie Oakley (August 13, 1860 – November 3, 1926), born Phoebe Ann Mosey, was an American sharpshooter and exhibition shooter. Oakley's amazing talent and timely rise to fame led to a starring role in Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, which propelled her to become the first American female superstar.

Oakley's most famous trick is perhaps being able to repeatedly split a playing card, edge-on, and put several more holes in it before it could touch the ground, while using a .22 caliber rifle, at 90 feet.

Today would have been her 151st birthday......

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: "PRESIDENT TEDDY ROOSEVELT"

"PRESIDENT THEODORE ROOSEVELT"

AS SEEN IN:
"The Gambler IV: Luck Of The Draw"

AS PLAYED BY:
Claude Akins

TV DIMENSION:
Earth Prime-Time

STATUS:
Impostor*

I have no problem with the notion that Teddy Roosevelt could have sneaked into San Francisco under cover of "National Security" to take a seat at a high-stakes poker game. I've looked into his personal timeline and nothing of import is listed after the marriage of his daughter Alice in February of 1906 and his signing of the National Monuments Act in June of that year.

And that "Gambler" movie has to take place in 1906, and it has to end on April 18 by 5:15 AM because in the last few moments of the two-part TV movie, the Great San Francisco Earthquake began at 5:12 AM.

I can't see the President high-tailing it back to Washington after the earthquake hit without making his presence known in the Bay area. He would have been out there touring the sections hardest hit by the tremors; pledging disaster relief; comforting survivors (even if only for a phot op, although that doesn't sound like Teddy's style. he would have even been pitching in to help clean up.

No I think the Teddy Roosevelt at the poker game was an impostor, and since he was played by Claude Akins, then why couldn't he be Lucas McCain's old friend Tom Benton, the Old West Secret Agent?

Why did the subterfuge take place? Well, I once wrote a bit o' fanfic (Shhhh! Don't tell Lee G!) in which Artemus Gordon impersonated Roosevelt after the President left the game and was then murdered by Dr. Miguelito Loveless (who had people thinking he also perished in the quake.)

I'd revise it now, so that Tom Benton impersonates Roosevelt from the get-go because of "chatter" regarding a threat against TR. Teddy would have wanted to play but the risk was too great. So Tom Benton sat in on the game disguised as the President in hopes to draw out Dr. Loveless. But the earthquake would bring about a major change in plans.

Who knows? Maybe Dr. Loveless even engineered that earthquake, using a new and improved model of Dr. Orkney Cadwallader's earthquake machine.

When the others in the security detail came in, they may have been bringing the "President" the tragic news that Secret Service Agent Artemus Gordon had been killed.

(I still would have killed off Artemus Gordon in the new story, despite the fact he's one of my favorite TV characters, because I'd want to bring closure to such a great character. (And it seemed only right that he would die with his boots on, as it were.) Since there was no representation for 'The Wild, Wild West' otherwise in "Gambler IV: Luck Of The Draw", I saw the TV movie as the perfect showcase for Artemus Gordon's "Last Bow".....)

By the way - disguised as President Roosevelt, Tom Benton must have had an eerie resemblance to him, because Claude Akins actually is Teddy Roosevelt in an alternate TV dimension in which Sherlock Holmes looks like Christopher Lee.

BCnU!

*It's not the first time an impostor was featured in the ASOTV showcase and passed off as the real thing. The Gugliamo Marconi as seen in "Sherlock Holmes And The Incident At Victoria Falls" was an impostor... which shouldn't have been surprising since his appearance happened on the First of April.....

But fear not, Team Toobworld!  The "real" Teddy Roosevelt out West will be running in the coming weeks....

"THE RIFLEMAN" - "MEETING AT MIDNIGHT"

'THE RIFLEMAN'"Meeting At Midnight"
Lucas helps an old friend, now an undercover federal agents keep his secret plan to find stolen money supposedly hidden.
From "The Rifleman Episode Guide List"

'The Rifleman' had one spin-off ('Law Of The Plainsman' starring Michael Ansara) but this could have been another. As government agent Tom Benton, Claude Akins could have beaten 'The Wild, Wild West' to broadcast by about five years. (Although it probably would not be as outrageous in tone.)

The series could have traveled all over the West - and go to the Nation's Capital as well. And it would have been a nice showcase for noted guest stars as each week's bad guys.

As a government agent working undercover, Tom Benton could theoretically have shown up in other TV Westerns as other characters played by Claude Akins. They could even be "bad" guys (acting bad to establish "street cred") - so long as they don't kill anybody or get killed themselves.

I wouldn't want these alt-named Tom Benton characters to be killed off because I do have a Claude Akins character from 1906 on the Toobworld timeline who could be a likely candidate to be Tom Benton in disguise.

And that revelation will be coming up later in today's "As Seen On TV" showcase......

BCnU!

"THE RIFLEMAN" - ELAM EVERLASTING

Character actor Jack Elam was right at home in 'The Rifleman', at home in fact in every TV Western and cowboy movie that he ever made during his career, both dramatic and comedic.

With our showcase series this year, Elam appeared in five episodes - and all as different characters.

"Duel Of Honor"

"Tension"

"Knight Errant"

"Shotgun Man"

"The Shattered Idol"

Sim Groder, Gavin Martin, Gates, Gus Smith, and Russell..... It would be hard to believe that the townsfolk of North Fork, New Mexico, never noticed the intense similarities between these five men, especially with those popping lazy eyes they all sported. And yet that seems to be the case, so maybe it was because the people of North Fork, only human (for the most part), couldn't see the resemblance as the audience of the Trueniverse could.

I think they all looked alike because they were all the same "man", and a little deterrent like two of them getting shot to death doesn't detract from the theory.

No, I'm not succumbing to the temptation to use the 'Quantum Leap' time traveler theory with this guy. Not for him, anyhoo. I'm drawing my temptation from shows like 'Millenium', 'Supernatural', and 'Buffy, The Vampire Slayer'.

I mean - look at the face of Gavin Martin from the episode "Tension". How could such bestial rage emanate from a mere human?

The great thing about each of Jack Elam's appearances on 'The Rifleman', he played a character who seemed to have a vested interest in leading other characters into temptation.

Sim Groder of "Duel Of Honor" - He tried to goad the Italian count into a fight, but when Count di Montova proposed using his personal dueling pistols, Sim Groder turned yeller and skedaddled.

I would have thought a demon wouldn't have feared being killed by a normal human being. So I googled "How to kill a demon" and found this:

Depending on the Demon being a pure-blood or a mixed breed says a lot about how hard or easy they are to kill. A mixed breed with low rank and genes from a weak supernatural being is easy to kill ,while a mixed breed with genes from a strong creature can be almost unstoppable.

The Demons that are most difficult to kill however are pure-blooded, with inheritance from the fallen Angels. So far no one has managed to kill a fallen Archangel, although God once sent an army of Angels to defeat Lucifer. This was a mistake and God never tried it again, since Lucifer – the Devil – obliterated the army with the help of only three other Demons – all of them former Archangels.

A higher Demon can only be killed by the blade of a blessed sword – an Archangel's sword. Either the Demon's head has to be chopped off or its heart pierced.
[Click here for similar information.]

So I'm thinking this wild-eyed demon realized that the Count's bullets were melted down from an Archangel's sword; perhaps he could sniff that out. And then he might have realized that Count di Montova wasn't some ordinary human either.......

It's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that the Count was a vampire on the hunt through the American Southwest for demons. (How could a vampire survive in the harsh sunlight of the American Southwest? By keeping in contact with the dirt from his own grave in his shoes.)

Or even better, perhaps he was a fallen Archangel....

Gavin Martin of "Tension" (see above) - This is one of the two Jack Elam characters to die on 'The Rifleman'. I think that - unbeknownst to his father, Ezra Martin - the real Gavin Martin was already dead back where they lived. The demon probably goaded him into taking his own life. Ezra Martin would most likely find the decomposing body hanging from the rafter in the barn once he got home - if he didn't die from fright on the trail once the demon "rose" from the dead after being impaled on a pitchfork.

Gates of "Knight Errant" - As the "esquire" to Don Chimera Del Laredo, the demon tried to entice a fellow named Scoobo into fixing a chess match so that it would escalate into a duel in which someone would surely die. (With a name like that, Scoobo may have been a demon as well, and both of them were working opposite sides of the board.)

But eventually, the demon got so caught up in the epic match that he cheated as well to make sure his human would win.

Gus Smith of "Shotgun Man" - Demons aren't always successful when coaxing a human to stray into sin.  In trying to goad Mr. Beaumont, Smith ended up eating lead at the hands of the old and nearly blind shotgun man.

He needn't have bothered with the old man - Johnny Beau was already on his own road to Hell.

More than likely the demon's body was then carted off to the undertaker's, where - when it was dark, - "Gus Smith" got up and left the funeral home. That must have caused quite a stir in North Fork - but which remains unseen by the TV Audience.

Russell of "The Shattered Idol" - Deep in his melancholic madness over the death of his son, even though it happened ten years before, I think Mark Twain was able to see Russell for who he really was. I don't know if it was ever mentioned in 'Quantum Leap' that a genius would be among the few who could see through the aura guise of a leaper, but they could see through the falsehood of psychic paper on 'Doctor Who'.)

But instead of being afraid, the author faced down not only this demon in a game of billiards, but his own personal demons as well. Years later the experience may have been the inspiration for a story called "The Mysterious Stranger", a novel which Twain was never able to finish. (The demon probably saw to that.....)

Having connected all of these Jack Elam characters together as one, the temptation is to go on to several other TV Westerns and make the same claim for the characters played by Elam on those shows. However, I don't want to dilute this 'Rifleman' showcase - and besides, I just don't have the time to do the research.

But at least one of his TV Western character roles in those other shows, one that died within the span of an episode, was likely the corpse used by one of the Dr. Frankensteins to be found in the TV Universe. Dr. Frankenstein used that corpse to recreate a human life... which became the caretaker of a Maine property in the sitcom "Struck By Lightning".

Having presented my theory that all of Jack Elam's characters in 'The Rifleman' were the same demon, can the case be then made for that same demon to be from some other TV series that naturally contained demons? I think not. I think Elam's demon has to be a TV character found only here in Inner Toob, skating just shy of fanfic.

So who would this demon be; what was his name?

There have been some interesting names for demons in other TV shows over the years. In my favorite 'Millenium" episode, the four old guys in the donut shop were all demons in disguise named Abum, Blurk, Greb, and Toby (my favorite of the bunch for some reason.....)

And then there's Clem from 'Buffy The Vampire Slayer'. Like the Jack Elam character, Clem has since assumed human form and is living in a cul de sac in West Gulfport, Florida, by the name of Tom.

I gave it a little thought (Some might say, based on my past record for research, "very little".), and decided that the name of this demon would be the perfect opportunity to pay tribute to this wonderful character actor who is sorely missed in this day and age.

Why not name him Elam?

The Hebrew meaning of the name Elam is "Forever". The root is 'alam III, which gives us the word olam, meaning forever, ever, everlasting. According to HAW Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, twenty instances of this word's more than three hundred occurrences in the Bible denote a very long but not limitless past.

Thus it's an apt name for this particular demon......

(I think the demon Elam looks upset about the fine print in that contract for a soul....)

BCnU!

"THE RIFLEMAN" - REPEAT "OFFENDERS"

You may not remember - Hell! You may not even be reading this now! - but I confessed that I could only hold out for so long before I invoked 'Quantum Leap' technology as a splainin for why some particular actor kept appearing on 'The Rifleman' again and again and again.

Well, it will happen, but I'm hoping to use it for only one actor, not for all of those who were, shall we say, repeat offenders. For those others, I hope I can provide other splainins.

For example:

Jack Elam - Hooked on demonics!

Glenn Strange - Despite being addressed by different names on several occasions, all of his stagecoach drivers were the same guy.

Dabbs Greer - Dabbs was one of my all-time favorite character actors and so I decided that if anybody was going to get the 'Quantum Leap' treatment, it should be him.

Peter Whitney - Here was a great character actor who - through make-up and talent - made it unlikely any of his characters could be related, let alone the same man by another name.

Lawrence Dobkin - Here's another example in which the use of make-up makes his characters distinct from each other.

John Anderson - I've got a spiffy theory of relateeveety which will connect just about all of characters believably.

John Milford - An alien race from 'Doctor Who' is responsible for all of his characters being the same man - even those who got killed off. (And that was pretty much all of them.)

Richard Devon - This one has me stumped. I can combine a few of them into one person, but beyond that, I don't think I could make the case that they were even related to each other. Despite his very distinct features, this may be a case where the Richard Devon characters were distinct individuals with no connection to each other.

Richard Anderson - This is another problematic one. I can't claim they were all the same person, because some of them were good guys while others were not. Some got killed in their episodes. But the biggest Zonk is - Lucas McCain knew several of them in the past..... How come he never noticed the resemblance between them?

Joe E. Benson - This would be a challenge! Mr. Benson appeared in the most episodes of 'The Rifleman' - at least 21! Some of them might be the same townsperson, while others were definitely unconnected individuals, like the "angel" of "Baranca". But the others? Maybe they were all the same guardian angel, always being present for Mark McCain. (As all of the Mike Lally characters on 'Columbo' were the Lieutenant's guardian angel.)

Hopefully all of these will work out. Let's see - I'll definitely be writing up reports on the characters played by Greer, Strange, Elam, Milford, and Anderson. Stay tuned.....

BCnU!