Rags-to-riches tale of an Irish immigrant in late 1800s based on the novel by Taylor Caldwell.
Captains and the Kings (Season 1)
Chapter I (Episode 1)
Air date: 1976-09-30
Runtime: 120 min
Overview: Joseph Francis Xavier Armagh and his two younger siblings Sean and Mary escape a ship on the harbor of New York. The situation ashore is problematic, jobs are scarce and food equally scarce. Aboard the ship their mother has died from disease, but they have a hope; their father is in Philadelphia awaiting them. The siblings run away, and discovers their father to be dead to, and young teenager Joseph places his siblings in an Orphanage while he himself goes to make money, become rich and get them out of poverty. The first episode follows Joseph for a few years through a series of struggles, and how he starts earning his first dollars and setting off into speculation in oil, together with his new-won friend, the Lebanese Haroun Al-Zieff (later: Harry Seff). The beginnings of a true rags-to-riches-story.
Chapter II (Episode 2)
Air date: 1976-10-07
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: A few years of successful gun running and Joseph Armagh becomes a partner in the oil company of Ed Healey.
Chapter III (Episode 3)
Air date: 1976-10-14
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Joseph Armagh rejects the love of Elizabeth Healey, learns of the dying Katherine Hennessey's unrequited love, promising to wed her daughter Bernadette before Katherine's jealous husband goes too far in a salacious attack on Joseph.
Chapter IV (Episode 4)
Air date: 1976-10-28
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Tensions escalate between the labor unions and the railroad, as Joseph Armagh fathers four children with Bernadette even as he seeks to avenge himself on her father for depriving him of the two great loves of his life.
Chapter V (Episode 5)
Air date: 1976-11-04
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Joseph Armagh's attempted blackmail of an upstanding senator results in suicide and a lasting curse.
Chapter VI (Episode 6)
Air date: 1976-11-11
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Rory Armagh romances Marjorie Chisholm while his sister Anne-Marie's relationship with Courtney Wickersham crashes and burns through no fault of their own.
Chapter VII (Episode 7)
Air date: 1976-11-18
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: While his son Rory searches for brother Kevin with Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Riders in the jungles of Cuba, Joseph Armagh quietly orchestrates the annulment of Rory's marriage to Marjorie Chisholm.
Chapter VIII (Episode 8)
Air date: 1976-11-25
Runtime: 120 min
Overview: Rory Armagh seeks the Democratic nomination for President over Woodrow Wilson, while his father ponders a lifetime without love.
