The Oregon Trail is a 14-episode NBC western television series starring Rod Taylor as the widower Evan Thorpe, who leaves his Illinois farm in 1842 to take the Oregon Trail to the Pacific Northwest. The show also starred Andrew Stevens, Tony Becker, and Gina Marie Smika as Thorpe's children. Darleen Carr starred as Margaret Devlin, one of the passengers on the wagon train, and Charles Napier portrayed Luther Sprague, a frontier scout recruited by Thorpe. The series was filmed in the Flagstaff, Arizona area.
The Oregon Trail (Season 1)
Hard Ride Home (Episode 1)
Writer: Michael Gleason
Air date: 1977-09-21
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: We meet the Wagon train . They are heading to the west coast to start a better life for themselves. Character and plot descriptions revealed.
The Last Game (Episode 2)
Air date: 1977-09-21
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: We meet the Wagon train . They are heading to the west coast to start a better life for themselves. Character and plot descriptions revealed. This one picked up where last week's left off.
The Waterhole (Episode 3)
Air date: 1977-09-28
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: After hours in the desert, the Wagon Train comes upon a watering hole in the desert. After everyone drinks the water, they fall ill. IT takes some smart thinking to figure out what caused the sickness - and to save the people on the Wagon Train.
Trapper's Rendezvous (Episode 4)
Air date: 1977-10-12
Runtime: 60 min
The Army Deserter (Episode 5)
Air date: 1977-10-19
Runtime: 60 min
Hannah's Girls (Episode 6)
Air date: 1977-10-26
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Hannah Morgan (Stella Stevens) is the leader of a group of mail-order brides (who actually are a group of ""showgirls"") who join the wagon train. Romance percolates, but mutual respect arises instead as Hannah helps nurse Evan's daughter back from a bout of cholera.
Return From Death (Episode 7)
Writer: Robert Pirosh
Air date: 1977-11-02
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: Evan Thorpe serves as defense attorney for a mysterious man suspected of killing a member of the wagon train. Frontier justice was never so just.
The Scarlet Ribbon (Episode 8)
Air date: 1977-11-09
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: A bullet-ridden wagon reveals that gun-runners are supplying rifles to the Redskins and Evan is detemined to run them to earth whatever the risk.
The Gold Dust Queen (Episode 9)
Air date: 1977-11-16
Runtime: 60 min
The Return of the Baby (Episode 10)
Air date: 1977-11-23
Runtime: 60 min
Overview: An Indian woman gives birth to a baby after her village is destroyed.
Evan's Vendetta (Episode 11)
Air date: 1977-11-30
Runtime: 60 min
Suffer the Little Children (Episode 12)
Air date: 1977-12-07
Runtime: 60 min
Wagon Race (Episode 13)
Air date: 1977-12-14
Runtime: 60 min
