Tales of Wells Fargo

Tales of Wells Fargo was a successful TV western series that ran from 1957 to 1962. It starred Dale Robertson as special agent Jim Hardie, noted at the time as "the left-handed gun". Jack Nicholson starred in the episode "The Washburn Girl" that aired on February 2, 1961. The series was produced by Revue Productions. The TV show also spawned a number of publications for young readers, including the hardcover book "Danger at Dry Creek" (Golden Press, 1959), a series of Dell comics, and Little Golden Books. For its first two years, the show was also in the top ten Nielsen Ratings. During the 1957-1958 season, it was ranked #3 [http://www.classictvhits.com/tvratings/1957.htm] , and during the 1958-1959 season, it was ranked #7 [http://www.classictvhits.com/tvratings/1958.htm] .

"Wells Fargo" was a half-hour program until its final season, when it expanded to an hour. In the 1960-1961 season it was opposite ABC's detective series "Surfside 6" and CBS's new sitcom "Bringing Up Buddy", starring Frank Aletter. "Wells Fargo" and "Surfide 6" survived another year, but "Bringing Up Buddy" was cancelled. "Wells Fargo" was the lead-in that year to a new NBC Western, "Klondike", but that series, set in the Alaskan gold rush town of Skagway, survived only seventeen episodes.