Hopalong Cassidy
Tricky Fingers
TV Flash files “Tricky Fingers” as a desk essential hour — Hopalong Cassidy (1949–1954) on NBC/Syndication, season 2, episode 26, aired 1954-04-02, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S02E26: listed hour 52 of 52 in the Hopalong Cassidy guide, last listed hour of season 2. It aired 1954-04-02 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “The Emerald Saint” (S02E25). No later hour is listed in this guide.
Essential hour: “Tricky Fingers”. Tricky Fingers closes this five-hour pack: last titled trail, the lunchbox western packing away after proving toys could out-earn a network.
Viewer FAQ
Where does Tricky Fingers sit in the Hopalong Cassidy guide?
S02E26 is listed hour 52 of 52 — last listed hour of season 2, season 2 episode 26.
When did Hopalong Cassidy S02E26 air?
Tricky Fingers aired 1954-04-02 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Where should I start?
Start with Boyd's Hoppy in the black hat and white-hat morals. Recycled films and new TV episodes are the same brand; the lunchbox is the extra legend.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Hopalong Cassidy is William Boyd's white-hat Hoppy, and the lunchbox that taught Hollywood how television merchandising works. Old B-westerns plus shrewd rights buys became a gold mine. Watch it now as the kids'-western phenomenon that invented the toy aisle as a second network — hero branding before anyone called it IP.
The silhouette is wrong on purpose: black outfit, white-hat soul, silver hair you could see from the toy aisle. Hopalong Cassidy (roughly 1949–1954 via NBC and syndication of films plus new episodes) is William Boyd's Hoppy, and the lunchbox that taught Hollywood how television merchandising works. Kids in 1950 knew that hat anywhere. Boyd shrewdly controlled the rights and built an empire — including the first character lunchbox boom. Edgar Buchanan's Red Connors rode shotgun on the merch-and-morals brand.…
Filed against
- William Boyd as Hopalong Cassidy
William Boyd’s Hopalong Cassidy taught Hollywood how television merchandising works — white-hat Hoppy, a lunchbox that became a gold mine, old B-westerns plus shrewd rights buys. Kids’-western phenomenon that invented the toy aisle as a…
- Edgar Buchanan as Red Connors
Edgar Buchanan’s Red Connors kept Hopalong Cassidy in tobacco-and-advice weather — 1950s catalog kids’-western merch machine, then Petticoat Junction stretching the drawl into Uncle Joe on a hotel porch. TV Flash files him as the sidekick…