Season 3 on Bonanza premiered on September 24, 1961.
Episodes[]
# | Image | Title | Airdate | |
---|---|---|---|---|
01 | The Smiler | September 24, 1961 | ||
The brother of a man Hoss killed in self-defense says he understands but secretly plans revenge. | ||||
02 | Springtime | October 1, 1961 | ||
Ben's friend Jebediah Milbank is accidentally injured by the Cartwright boys' rowdy horseplay in the mud. While Milbank convalesces in their home, Ben has each of a boys attend to a piece of the recovering man's business, sending each off in a different direction. | ||||
03 | The Honor of Cochise | October 8, 1961 | ||
The Cartwrights must try to get help for Adam, seriously wounded by an Apache bullet, and find out why Cochise and his warriors have threatened to kill them all if they don't hand over an army captain taking refuge in their trail camp. | ||||
04 | The Lonely House | October 15, 1961 | ||
Joe Cartwright and the young widow of a family friend are held hostage on her isolated ranch outside Platte City by the same gang that robbed Little Joe in the town bank earlier that day. | ||||
05 | The Burma Rarity | October 22, 1961 | ||
A pair of con men try to swindle Widow Hawkins, the boarding house keeper, by selling her a "priceless" emerald known as "The Burma Rarity." Ben stages a scam to get her money back, but his plan backfires so badly that he may end up having to marry the widow to make things right. | ||||
06 | Broken Ballad | October 29, 1961 | ||
Ed Payson, a reformed gunfighter, has returned to Virginia City to tend some property he owns. When he's welcomed with resistance by some of the townspeople, Adam decides to help him, even though everyone thinks he may have killed Dave, the grocer's son. | ||||
07 | The Many Faces of Gideon Flinch | November 5, 1961 | ||
In this comedy, Bullethead Burke comes to town looking for Gideon Flinch, the mail-order swindler who took him for $5,000. The man's niece gets to Bullethead first and convinces him that Joe Cartwright is the man he's looking for. | ||||
08 | The Friendship | November 12, 1961 | ||
After chain-gang prisoner Danny Kidd saves Joe's life, the youngest Cartwright has him released into his custody. The young man with a love of horses has spent most of his life behind bars and has a tough time transitioning to freedom. | ||||
09 | The Countess | November 19, 1961 | ||
Unsettling events that could spell financial ruin for the Ponderosa mysteriously coincide with the arrival of a wealthy countess who seems determined to win the love of Ben Cartwright, the man she spurned twenty years before in New Orleans. | ||||
10 | The Horse Breaker | November 26, 1961 | ||
The Cartwrights hope that time and therapy will get bronc breaker, Johnny Lightly, back in the saddle after a bad fall. But Johnny soon faces thinly veiled hostility from the young nurse sent to help him, threats from a rancher who blames Ben Cartwright for his family's calamities, and a growing fear that he may never walk again. | ||||
11 | Day of the Dragon | December 3, 1961 | ||
His search for the two men who kidnapped his bride-to-be, Su Ling, will soon take angry Chinese warlord, General Tsung, from San Francisco to the Ponderosa where Little Joe has been challenged to explain how he won the girl in a poker game. | ||||
12 | The Frenchman | December 10, 1961 | ||
Hoss insults a feisty Frenchman who demands satisfaction with swords, unaware that the little rogue believes himself to be the reincarnation of medieval, outlaw poet Francois Villon and is destined to suffer his namesake's fate of being sentenced to death on the gallows for murder. | ||||
13 | The Tin Badge | December 17, 1961 | ||
14 | Gabrielle | December 24, 1961 | ||
The Cartwrights find a blind 11-year-old girl wandering around in the snow. Gabrielle is an orphan who's searching hopelessly for her grandfather. The family locates the old man; he's an unpleasant old hermit who doesn't like people, much less relatives. | ||||
15 | Land Grab | December 31, 1961 | ||
People start camping out on the Ponderosa. They're armed with fake property deeds and claim they've been sold parts of the ranch. The man behind the sham turns out to be one of Ben's oldest Army buddies, Colonel Bragg. | ||||
16 | The Tall Stranger | January 7, 1962 | ||
A handsome, charismatic con man sweeps Margie Owens off her feet with promises of excitement and adventure, jeopardizing Hoss Cartwright's hopes to wed the pretty rancher's daughter. | ||||
17 | The Lady from Baltimore | January 14, 1962 | ||
The wife and daughter of Ben's friend arrive at the Cartwrights for a visit. While there, the wife tries to arrange a marriage between Little Joe and her daughter. The only problem is the daughter doesn't really love Little Joe. | ||||
18 | The Ride | January 21, 1962 | ||
Because he didn't see the gunman's face, witness Adam Cartwright can't convince his family and the sheriff of his certainty that good friend, Bill Enders, was one of the hooded men responsible for robbing a way station and killing the attendant. | ||||
19 | The Storm | January 28, 1962 | ||
While visiting the Ponderosa, Ben's old friend, sea Captain Matthew White, is forced to reveal a terrible secret after Little Joe Cartwright falls in love with and plans to wed the Captain's daughter, Laura, once a freckle-faced playmate from Joe's childhood in New Orleans, now grown into a beautiful woman. | ||||
20 | The Auld Sod | February 4, 1962 | ||
Town drunk Danny Lynch's letters written to his dear Irish mother tell her of his life as a wealthy Nevada rancher, and when the old lady comes to America to pay her son a surprise visit, Danny convinces the Cartwrights to let him pretend that he is the owner of the Ponderosa and they are the hired hands. | ||||
21 | Gift of Water | February 11, 1962 | ||
The area is in the grip of a deadly drought. The farmers hope to use the water near the Ponderosa, but the ranchers violently object to the idea. To ward off a war over water, the Cartwrights help dig a well and build a windmill to help the farmers. | ||||
22 | The Jackknife | February 18, 1962 | ||
The Cartwrights go hunting for a gang of cattle rustlers. Adam comes across an injured man, Matthew Grant, who he assumes is one of the thieves. Knowing that Ben will shoot the criminal on sight, Adam tries to convince Grant to confess to his crimes and turn himself over to the authorities. | ||||
23 | The Guilty | February 25, 1962 | ||
Ben Cartwright witnesses the shooting of Lem Partridge's son by ex-con Jack Groat. Groat had done time in the past for killing Lem's wife. Lem can not understand by his old friend Ben didn't intervene and stop this latest death of a loved one. Feeling let down by everyone, Partridge vows revenge for the killings. | ||||
24 | The Wooing of Abigail Jones | March 4, 1962 | ||
The Cartwright boys help cowhand Hank romance reluctant teacher Abigail. | ||||
25 | The Lawmaker | March 11, 1962 | ||
The Cartwrights may have to take the law into their own hands when Virginia City's temporary sheriff, rancher Asa Moran, uses his new badge as a license to kill. | ||||
26 | Look to the Stars | March 18, 1962 | ||
A young genius, Albert Michaelson, is vying for a scholarship and only needs the school teacher's approval to receive it. The blessings of strict and stern Mr. Norton will be hard to obtain, considering he'd expelled Albert and labeled him a "problem child." Adam investigates. | ||||
27 | The Gamble | April 1, 1962 | ||
Little Joe is his family's only hope when he escapes from a kangaroo court that has framed the Cartwrights for a bank robbery and sentenced them all to hang. | ||||
28 | The Crucible | April 8, 1962 | ||
Adam retreats to the wilderness for some peace following an exhausting cattle drive. There's no relaxing as he's robbed, stripped of his clothes, and left to die by a couple of outlaws. | ||||
29 | Inger, My Love | April 15, 1962 | ||
The back story behind Ben's three wives is up to Inger, Ben's second wife (and mother of Hoss). The story relates the first meeting between Ben and Inger, as Ben and a young Adam were traveling west. | ||||
30 | Blessed Are They | April 22, 1962 | ||
Ben and Virginia City's new minister try to resolve a feud that has Virginia City residents choosing sides. The Clark and Mahan families are fighting over which will get custody of two twin grandchildren. | ||||
31 | The Dowry | April 29, 1962 | ||
A stagecoach carrying Alexander Dubois, his daughter Michele and her fiancé Don Ricardo Fernandez is held up. Her dowry is stolen and Monsieur Dubois is injured trying to get it back. Little Joe brings them all to the Ponderosa where Dubois can recuperate from his wound. | ||||
32 | The Long Night | May 6, 1962 | ||
Adam has a day and a half to deliver a large bank draft. He is ambushed by an escaped convict. When he is mistaken for one of the escapees by the posse, Adam is hard pressed to prove his identity. All they want to do is hang him. | ||||
33 | The Mountain Girl | May 13, 1962 | ||
Backwoods country girl Trudy Harker is left in Joe's care after the death of the grandfather who raised her. Joe is determined to fulfill his promise to the old man: turning Trudy into a "lady" so she can live in the California mansion of her other grandfather. | ||||
34 | The Miracle Maker | May 20, 1962 | ||
Susan's father is killed in a terrible accident she feels responsible for. Her inability to walk is something that Hoss hopes he can help with if the new faith healer in town proves he is more than just a charlatan. |
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