The Rifleman
American Western television program / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Rifleman is an American Western television program starring Chuck Connors as rancher Lucas McCain and Johnny Crawford as his son Mark McCain. It was set in the 1880s in the fictional town of North Fork, New Mexico Territory. The show was filmed in black and white, in half-hour episodes. The Rifleman aired on ABC from September 30, 1958, to April 8, 1963, as a production of Four Star Television. It was one of the first primetime series on US television to show a single parent raising a child.
| The Rifleman | |
|---|---|
 DVD case for The Rifleman, 1958 | |
| Genre | Western |
| Created by | Sam Peckinpah (uncredited), Arnold Laven |
| Starring | |
| Composer | Herschel Burke Gilbert |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 5 |
| No. of episodes | 168 (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Producers |
|
| Running time | 25 minutes |
| Production company | Four Star Productions |
| Release | |
| Original network | ABC |
| Original release | September 30, 1958 (1958-09-30) – April 8, 1963 (1963-04-08) |
| Related | |
| Law of the Plainsman | |
The program was titled to reflect McCain's use of a Winchester Model 1892 rifle, a historical anachronism, as the show was set in the 1880s, and customized to allow repeated firing by cycling its lever action. He demonstrated this technique in the opening credits, as well as a second modification that allowed him to cycle the action with one hand using a technique known as "spin-cocking".[2]