Gunsmoke
Quint's Trail
TV Flash files “Quint's Trail” as hour 312 of 635 in the TV Flash guide — Gunsmoke (1955–1975) on CBS, season 9, episode 7, aired 1963-11-09, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S09E07: listed hour 312 of 635 in the Gunsmoke guide, hour 7 of 36 in season 9. It aired 1963-11-09 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “My Sister's Keeper” (S09E06). Next is “Carter Caper” (S09E08). Broadcast log — titles and dates, not a plot bible.
Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
Quint is hired to escort a family on the first leg of their journey to Oregon. On the way, he learns the reason for their going, a motive that could have repercussions for Quint.
Viewer FAQ
Where does Quint's Trail sit in the Gunsmoke guide?
S09E07 is listed hour 312 of 635 — hour 7 of 36 in season 9, season 9 episode 7.
When did Gunsmoke S09E07 air?
Quint's Trail aired 1963-11-09 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Where should I start?
Start with the 1955 opener, where the marshal is not invincible. Then sample a later guest-star hour rather than marching through hundreds of titles in order.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Twenty seasons of Dodge as a civic appointment: a marshal who can lose, a chorus instead of gadgets, and adult-western hours that treat a gunfight as a verdict. Longevity here was weather, not catalog padding — weekly public work with dust still on the boots.
September 1955, CBS: a marshal takes a bullet in the first hour and the adult western stops being a kid’s hat commercial. Gunsmoke had already lived on radio, with a different voice in the badge. Television wanted a face the lens could trust. The lore still pours like bar whiskey — John Wayne pointing at James Arness, William Conrad left on the airwaves, a casting fight that was really a medium fight. Radio-to-TV is never a reprint. It is a negotiation about whose body gets to mean the law.
Filed against
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- Milburn Stone as Doc Adams
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- Dennis Weaver as Chester Goode
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- Ken Curtis as Festus Haggen
Ken Curtis’s Festus Haggen is Gunsmoke’s later chorus — Dodge City as a weekly moral court, a marshal who can lose, adult-western hours that treat a gunfight as a verdict. Twenty seasons of civic work with dust on the boots. On TV Flash…