Bonanza

- Season 5

(1963)

Hoss falls under the spell of a beautiful shady lady from San Francisco and asks her to be his wife, believing his love can change her even after she tries to seduce his brother Adam.

Famous author Charles Dickens visits the Ponderosa, and finds himself embroiled in controversy.

A drought brings a rainmaker with a very sick daughter to Virginia City.

Little Joe is attacked by outlaws, but finds that his biggest challenge is fighting his way through the secrets of a town shrouded in mystery.

Adam helps an alcoholic artist married to a lovely Piute woman to find a new way to help the Piute Indians oppressed by a powerful local rancher.

A stagecoach containing Hoss and two nuns is robbed. Later, one of the badly wounded robbers finds himself in their power.

Trouble with a capital "T" that rhymes with "C" comes to Virginia City when Little Joe brings young Calamity Jane home to the Ponderosa after rescuing her from a deadly prairie raid.

Ben finds Hoss in the barn waiting for a mare to give birth. Ben can't help but remember that's how Hoss' mother (Inger) was. He then finds an old journal wherein he wrote down their trek West. While Hoss waits, Ben reads it and recalls how their trek was arduous. And Inger was pregnant with Hoss and they had to deal with Indians and a drunken wagon master.

Little Joe struggles with his conscience, trying to believe that his friend, Seth Pruitt, did the right thing after Seth admits to the mercy-killing of his fiancée's father when the man was in agony from a broken back and begging for death.

When Frank Dayton is thrown from his horse and killed, his wife Laura tells their daughter, Peggy, that he went on a long trip, preferring to let the little girl hold onto the hope that her daddy would come home again someday. But Laura's plan to shelter Peggy from her father's death is soon challenged when Adam Cartwright comes to call and the pretty widow finds herself falling in love.

When Ben goes missing and presumed dead after being shot by a poacher he was hunting alone, his sons search for the seemingly likely suspects: three innocent ex-convicts who fear being so suspected.

Hoss scares a bear that has treed a green-clad little man, subsequently finds a buried strongbox filled with bags of gold dust and, when both the treasure and its owner disappear, unsuccessfully tries to convince his skeptical family that he'd discovered a leprechaun's hoard. But the whole town goes searching for the mythical men after a newly arrived Irish professor confirms the presence of multiple leprechauns...and their gold!

Ben Cartwright doubts his fitness to run the Ponderosa when his impatience results in a logging camp accident that causes serious injury to himself and an old friend's death.

Adam and Little Joe try to find a fair trial for a saloon girl accused of theft and murder, hiding her from a corrupt sheriff's lynch mob after she stows away in the back of their supply wagon, all while escorting a self-righteous, hard-nosed judge to Virginia City.

While Adam relies on his charm and guitar to impress a visiting senorita, Hoss and Little Joe scheme to win her heart in a more south-of-the-border way...a bull fight!

Ben's plans to wed widow Katherine Saunders are jeopardized after her son is accused of murder.

A stubborn, career army sergeant appears to be his only hope when Little Joe is arrested after being robbed and knocked unconscious by a look-a-like escaped army prisoner and is unable to convince the fort commander that he isn't the man who has been sentenced to face the firing squad.

Gullible Hoss meets a flamboyant, cutlass-brandishing drunk claiming to be none other than the notorious pirate Jean Lafitte. Believing Lafitte is who he says he is and remembering that history considered him a patriot for his aid at the Battle of New Orleans, Hoss chooses to treat Lafitte like a hero and invites him to the Ponderosa. While skeptical Ben contacts old friends in New Orleans to try to verify his identity, Lafitte is accused of murder and Hoss must try to find not only the real killer but the answer to the question: who is Jean Lafitte?

Angry with Adam Cartwright for constantly criticizing her decisions and refusing to take the next step in their romance, Laura Dayton becomes easy prey for a handsome grifter.

Joe blames himself after a ricocheting bullet from his pistol blinds a young woman and decides that the only way he can atone for the accident is to make her his wife.

Hoss finds himself smack dab in the middle of a mountain family feud when he agrees to be the best man at ornery Big Jim Leyton's wedding.

Ben's Pygmalion-like efforts to 'civilize' a young, white woman, raised by a neighboring Paiute Indian tribe, have an unintended result when, instead of choosing a husband from among the eligible young men he has rounded up for her, she falls in love with him.

When Hoss is set up to take the fall for a bank robbery in another town, the help of an eccentric gold prospector appears to be all that stands between him and the real bandit's bullet.

Certain that he is too old to stand against a notorious gang of bank robbers when news arrives that Virginia City will soon be next in a long string of successful raids, the terrified townsfolk demand Sheriff Coffee's resignation to make way for a younger lawman.

Ben gets word that his nephew Will has been murdered in nearby Pine City. As it turns out, Will has been shot and wounded while on the run from a counterfeiting gang that wants back the engraving plates Will has "appropriated" from them.

Hoss gets into a fight with a young drifter. When the sheriff breaks up the fight, the stranger introduces himself as Muley Jones, a distant cousin, and bear-hugs Hoss in friendship. The handsome, childish Muley loves to sing and does it at every opportunity. Unfortunately, his singing voice is so booming that it shatters glass with impunity and rattles ANYTHING more solid. Meanwhile, the sheriff is looking for a couple of moonshiners (Jesse White, Strother Martin) who are selling their own liquor to various drinking establishments. Though Muley is just about as dumb ...

An Army lieutenant comes to the ranch with a wounded prisoner. When Will gets the town doctor, the prisoner's gang shows up and takes them all prisoner. With the promise of a lot of gold, Will tries to delay their departure in the hopes he can save everyone's life including his relatives, Ben Cartwright and his sons.

A mix-up in his request for mail-order Chinese fireworks brings Hoss instead a feisty mail-order bride whose militant ideas ignite a workers' rebellion and threaten the completion of a Virginia City railroad project.

Mateo Ybarra travels to the Ponderosa in the hopes he can enlist the aid of his old friend, Will Cartwright. Little do either know that there are those who are after him to take him back to Mexico for trial and others who don't want to wait that long.

A famous Italian opera singer is invited to sing at the local Virginia City opera house. One snag: he may resemble on paper a runaway slave they were just notified about; and some of the townspeople want him arrested or worse.

Dev's line of work seems ordained given his past. When his quarry's wife turns out to be pregnant, he uses that to trap him, even if it might risk Little Joe's life.

Virginia City gossip and meddling Aunt Lil combine with unexpected attention from another Cartwright to complicate Laura Dayton's already fragile romance with Adam, especially when his preoccupation with Ponderosa business appears to be hiding an unwillingness to marry her.

Laura's and Adam's wedding plans begin to derail when another man's kiss puts doubt in Laura's heart. And a bad fall from the roof of the house Adam is secretly building for their new life together lands Adam in a wheelchair.

Obie is going to visit his sister. The last time he saw her was 16 years ago. While away, Obie entrusts the care of Walter to Hoss. This care includes playing music for Walter, especially the low notes.