Rawhide

- Season 1

(1959)

After a marshal and deputy are wounded and killed, Gil and Rowdy volunteer to finish the delivery of the prison wagon with seven dangerous prisoners to Ft Craig for trial, while the outlaw husband of one prisoner is in pursuit to free her.

The drovers stop to fill water barrels at a mission where Rowdy finds his close friend from the Army is getting married. The drovers are invited to the wedding feast that evening but the bride's stepbrother's arrival causes complications.

The drovers rescue the passengers in a stagecoach that overturns. They learn a gunman known as "The Executioner" was following the coach. Now he is following them while they are with the drovers and no one knows who his target is.

The drovers party in a small town but with big consequences. One drover is killed over a crooked roulette wheel and Rowdy quits the drive to help a woman. Rowdy may pay with his life because the woman is the wife of the Marshal.

The drive is trapped by high water and is approached by a Colonel and a lady looking for men to join his Confederacy of Panama. Fearing his men will leave, Favor tries to cross, losing a man. The men leave not realizing what the Colonel's plans are.

Needing water and grass for the herd Favor has the okay from a rancher until he befriends a Comanche boy with candy. The rancher wants the Comanche lands so he is willing to start an Indian war and sacrifice his only son who he despises.

Trying to push a herd through late in the season is just one of the hurdles facing Gil. A hand who insists on covering his face and a visitor who says his horse came up lame are two others. When he uncovers the truth it may be too late.

A dead steer leads Favor to four women sharpshooters with a broken wheel who join the drive to the next town. Their leader finds Favor a man to her liking but a conflict with a wagon train of hides at a river crossing creates problems.

Rowdy and two cattle are stricken with a disease similar to deadly anthrax. Some drivers and the nearby townsfolk are frightened, allowing no traffic to the drover camp or out in the direction of town. But one fearless nurse is undeterred.

Gil hires on an unusual drover - a preacher run off by his gold-crazed parishioners. Gil's steer-men constantly try to wheedle the location of the gold-strike from Brother Bent, whose preaching against the worship of Mammon cost him his pulpit. Gil's much more concerned with a gang of cowboys following the herd, but staying out of sight.

A band of Mexican bandits send a spy to join the cattle drive and poison the drovers with coyote weed so they can swoop in and steal the herd.

In need of more hands to help get the herd through a dangerous plateau, Gil goes to the nearest town but may not be too happy with the pickins. To top it off he hires an "educated" man who may be hiding something worse than any chubasco.

Favor and Rowdy go after strays but find a deserted town with two women being hostage by a man and his son who killed their stagecoach driver and want a ransom. It runs into a cat and mouse game between them with one woman changing sides.

Favor is forced to hire several drovers of questionable character. The men question his choices. The herd is facing a dry plain with limited water access. Favor has to decide on the route and his personnel decisions backfire on him.

On a long cattle drive, the crew pick up a girl who's parents had just died. Her seeming innocence has both Rowdy and Favor fooled until they get near Silver Springs where all the men are to pick up their pay.

Mr. Favor's found some dead Indians in front of a house of a woman, who is so shocked, that she can't say a thing.

Pete is injured, so Favor and Rowdy into a nearby town for a doctor. Because the town lynched a man the day before, the residents along with Favor and Rowdy are held hostage until the Sheriff and the man who led the lynching are also hung.

Favor and crew drive the herd into an area populated by farmers who have previously waged a range war against cattlemen. A group of farmers warns Favor to keep his men and cattle off farmland, but a thunderstorm causes some of the horses to stampede and a farmer is killed. The man's death threatens to start a war between the farmers and the drovers.

Facing a drought, Favor is being pressured by a corrupt and revengeful acquaintance Jess Hode for first half and then all of his herd for access to water. However, when Hode's son comes to realize the truth about his dad, he tries to help.

A local wolver Gil hires to kill a pack besieging the Rawhiders' cattle is more dangerous than Canis lupus. Smirking Brad Morgan promised three well-set women to run off with him. Convienently, one just rebuffed the scout Pete's plea to get back together. The wolf-man sets up Pete to take the fall for murdering saloon owner Nora Sage. While Gil waits for a river up ahead to subside, Morgan lays metal traps for the canyon's gray wolves.

Prisoners break out of prison and try to steal the drovers' horses.

A crazed man following the drovers comes into camp for help followed by Rowdy finding three hungry women and a boy alone. A mirror slipped to Rowdy by them causes the people at a trading post to think the drovers are Comancheros.