Actor-singer-sportsman Gene Autry thought his horse, Champion, merited his own show. First on radio, then on television.
In 1955, The Adventures of Champion made the transition from radio to TV, but lasted just 1 season, airing first in primetime on CBS. The series later moved to Saturday mornings, but was long gone from the airwaves by the time I was old enough to watch TV, so there won't be a rating.
The transition made sense, since a radio show about a horse didn't seem to have much behind it, either.
PizzaFlix serves up the episode, "A Bugle For Ricky":
2 comments:
The best thing about cowboys was that their horses were as famous as their riders!
Although I don't think Trigger ever had his own show.
I do remember there were other famouse horse to grace the tube - Trigger of course on the Roy Rogers Show, Fury (with Peter Graves years before Mission Impossible) and in the 70s, there was a Saturday morning equine hero in "Thunder".
I'd heard Gene Autry was a really great guy! He also was a wise man of business. He owned most of his work - anything under the "Flying A Productions" banner.
Thunder was the last live-action horse to headline his own show. And, no, Trigger didn't get a spin-off.
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