Wagon Train (TV Series) The Ruth Owens Story (1957) User Reviews

The past catches up

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 26 January 2018]

Shelley Winters does one of her infrequent acting jobs in this Wagon Train episode playing a woman going west with her new husband Kent Smith and her daughter from a previous marriage. The first husband had been killed in the Civil War.

Her younger brother Dean Stockwell makes the first of several Wagon Train episodes he appears in. He had heard she was with the Seth Adams Wagon Train and has followed from St.Louis. He has the misfortune to mention the place where he heard she worked, a notorious saloon pleasure palace. When someone questions his sister's honor he hits him. The other party draws a knife and Stockwell draws his gun and kills him.

Winters has a most troubled past, an alcoholic and abusive father is why she ran away from home and left Stockwell there. She also had to do a lot just to survive including being a 'fancy woman'. Not good for mixing with those pioneer wives.

In this early Wagon Train we also see Frank McGrath with only the scraggle of a beard and Terry Wilson not yet an official regular acting as one of the lynch mob. Certainly not Bill Hawks type behavior. Then again he had a wife in a few early episodes who was gradually forgotten.

Ward Bond shows in this story why he became for many such an authority figure the way he stops a lynch mob. It was a big reason for Wagon Train's popularity and why his sudden demise was such a news story around the 1960 elections. He was a father figure to many as Major Seth Adams.

A good ensemble performance by a carefully chosen ensemble for this Wagon Train episode.

All My Sins Remembered... And Forgiven

[GaryPeterson67 · 8/10 · 13 June 2015]

Another strong entry in the annals of this iconic Western series, which even this early in its run was on a roll with outstanding guest stars and stories.

This story illustrates how one can run but can't hide from her past, how it must be confronted and resolution made. Ruth is a young widow with an eight-year-old daughter named Sarah. She has recently married Paul, a teacher who has welcomed both Ruth and Sarah into his heart. Together they're trekking west from St. Louis to Oregon.

But the past catches up to Ruth in an unexpected way. Her kid brother Jimmy appears unexpectedly looking for her. When Jimmy describes to Lank, a man of rough-hewn manners, Ruth and the wonderful palace in which she worked as a waitress, with its chandeliers and red velvet, Lank laughingly tells Jimmy his sister was no waitress, but a whore. Push comes to shove and suddenly Jimmy has gunned down the knife-wielding Lank.

Lank's hot-tempered brother Ralph is soon on the scene, and once their aging father learns of his son's death he demands an eye for an eye. In moments, the wagon train is galvanized and ready to hang hapless Jimmy. Only Major Adams' arrival saves the lad from a lynching. But for how long? A trial is scheduled for the next evening.

Family honor is a prevailing theme here, with Pa Carr believing his family has suffered dishonor at Jimmy's hand. Jimmy, who learns the sordid truth from his sister, is distraught over the shame Ruth has brought upon their family. Each believes death is the only solution, with a grieving Pa and Ralph Carr seeking blood vengeance, and disillusioned Jimmy convinced he has nothing left to live for and welcoming death. Into this delicate situation steps Major Adams, who dispenses sage-like counsel coupled with diplomacy, keeping the powder keg from exploding and ensuring justice is served.

When at the trial the mob rallies to string up Jimmy, Ruth delivers an impassioned speech, laying bare her past sins, all but asking he who is without sin to cast the first stone. And if her persuasive words didn't pacify the mob, a smoking gun emerges--the blood-stained knife with which Lank attacked Jimmy, hidden by a father who knew his son was guilty yet would stand by and allow an innocent man to hang. Justice is blind--literally!--as blind Uncle Foster Carr speaks up and testifies that he heard Lank vow to cut up Jimmy. Case closed. In time, when cooler heads prevail, Pa and Ralph will perhaps realize it was Uncle Foster who truly preserved the family honor by acting with integrity and keeping its hands free from innocent blood.

Ward Bond enjoys this story's spotlight, serving as a mediator between Jimmy and Ruth, and between Jimmy and the noose. Robert Horton as Flint barely appears in this episode, dispatched at the beginning to locate a creek where they hope to find water in the midst of the drought plaguing this wagon train's trek across the plains.

Drought, travel to a new land, and a widow named Ruth with a faithful, new husband may stir up memories of the biblical account of Ruth. The Bible is oft-quoted and frequently alluded to in this episode (though the Bard also gets his "pound of flesh"). Ruth Owen actually has more in common with Rahab, the harlot in Jericho who aided the Hebrew spies and was spared along with her family. Rahab found redemption, as does Ruth Owens. And like Ruth of the Bible who finds a redeemer in Boaz, Ruth Owen finds a redeemer in Paul, who loves her unconditionally and with no regard given to her past. Paul's welcoming Jimmy into the family fold at the conclusion of the episode was a testimony to love, forgiveness, and fresh starts.

Fans of the 1950 John Ford film WAGON MASTER, which inspired WAGON TRAIN, will enjoy seeing Ward Bond and Russell Simpson reunited. In the film, Simpson and Bond were Mormons, with the dour Simpson frequently chastising recent convert Bond for his profanity-enhanced outbursts. Here Simpson plays Pa Carr as a man devastated to lose his land and now a son. Simpson, who was 80 years old, had a sad, wide-eyed face that evokes pathos in an audience. Ross Elliott, a few years away from a recurring role as Sheriff Mark Abbott on THE VIRGINIAN, plays Ralph Carr as a man eager for the catharsis he believes will come by hanging Jimmy, even though he knew all along about the knife. Dean Stockwell shines brightly as Jimmy, bringing a lot of feeling to a role that required he run the gamut of emotions. Shelley Winters as Ruth Owens is good, though almost a secondary character, overshadowed by Bond and Stockwell. Kent Smith was perfectly cast as the level-headed and loving Professor Paul Owens.

"The Ruth Owens Story" is about redemption and reconciling with the past. I especially liked what Ruth said about how all of them on the wagon train were leaving something behind and looking ahead to a new start in the West. And I'm confident she found it.

Traveling West with the Wagon train

[schappe1 · 8/10 · 11 February 2024]

I've decided to watch the entire runs of two somewhat similar shows from the classic era of TV westerns: Wagon train, (1957-65) and Rawhide 1959-66). Unfortunately, the Wagon Train DVDs I've sent for don't include seasons.5 & 6. I'm going to alternate watching a DVD of episodes from one series and a DVD of episodes from the other. I'll be traveling north from Texas to Missouri on the cattle drive and west from Missouri to California. To make sure my text is of the required length, I will review the entire DVD each time.

The most noticeable thing about Wagon Train is that it attracted performers who were major movie stars at the time. Ernest Borgnine had received a Best Actor Oscar just the previous year when he starred in the premiere, "The Willie Moran Story". Shelly Winters had been in many top films in the 50's, including 1956's "The Night of the Hunter" and here she is on Wagon Train. It was obviously a 'prestige' show from the moment it began.

I think the actual first episode off the show was the second one shown, the "The Jean LeBec Story" . You'll notice that, in the first scene, Flint McCullough rides in to St. Joseph's Missouri saying he's two days late and Major Adams is trying to buy all the provisions they will need for their journey. In the actual premiere episode, "The Willy Moran Story", McCullough is already in St. Joseph's and saves Moran from a drunken shooting contest. Major Adams is ready to leave and by the end of the show, they are on the trail.

But the best of the first DVD and the first really great episode of this great series.is "The John Cameron Story" with Michael Rennie as the besotted husband of the coquettish Carolyn Jones, who finds him boring. When three brothers, led by Claude Akins, come up the train, they like her company and she likes them. They seem to John Cameron to have abducted her but Clint McCullough knows better and accompanies Cameron to try to reason with him and keep him out of trouble. But Jones has already got the brothers fighting each other.

Cameron gets wounded and feverish and Jones has to help him survive and decides she loves him after all. But he's now come to realize that he's been a fool. At that moment, Akins shows up and orders her to leave with him. She refuses and distracts Akins while Rennie reaches for a gun. The script has her maneuvering back into the line of fire when there was no reason for her to have done so and so she suffers the fate of femme fatales in that era. I didn't care for that but still found the episode quite powerful, above the level of most episodic TV. I can see why the movies stars wanted to be a part of this new show.

Excellent treatment of serious themes

[Nat-21 · 10/10 · 2 February 2023]

Shelley Winters shines in this moving story early in this excellent series. A young man is held for murder when he kills a man while defending the honor of his sister, whom he hasn't seen in a long time. He claims self defense but after his sister reveals her sordid past, he becomes bitter and loses his will to defend himself. Meanwhile, a drought has put the travelers on edge and the dead man's father demands a hanging. The episode touches on many serious themes, including revenge, morality, justice, desperation, forgiveness and redemption. Ward Bond's authoritative presence as the wagon master is on full display and the ending may even elicit a tear or two.