''State Trooper'' is an American

crime drama Crime film is a film belonging to the crime fiction genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and fiction. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as Drama (film and television), dr ...

set in the

American West The Western United States (also called the American West, the Western States, the Far West, the Western territories, and the West) is census regions United States Census Bureau As American settlement in the U.S. expanded westward, the mea ...

of the 1950s, starring Rod Cameron as Lt. Rod Blake, an officer and chief investigator of the Nevada Department of Public Safety. The series aired 104 episodes in syndication from 1956 to 1959.

Overview

''State Trooper'' takes place in

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

Reno Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada–California border. It is the county seat and most populous city of Washoe County, Nevada, Washoe County. Sitting in the High Eastern Sierra foothills, ...

, and

Carson City, Nevada Carson City, officially the Carson City Consolidated Municipality, is an Independent city (United States), independent city and the capital of the U.S. state of Nevada. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 58,63 ...

, but was filmed by

Revue Studios Universal Television LLC (abbreviated as UTV) is an American television production company that is a division of Universal Studio Group, a division of NBCUniversal, which, in turn, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Comcast. It serves as the networ ...

Iverson Movie Ranch A movie ranch is a ranch that is at least partially dedicated for use as a set in the creation and production of motion pictures and television shows. These were developed in the United States in southern California, because of the climate. Movi ...

in Chatsworth in

Los Angeles County Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles and sometimes abbreviated as LA County, is the most populous county in the United States, with 9,663,345 residents estimated in 2023. Its population is greater than that of 40 individua ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. Its fictional stories focus upon miners, ranchers,

dude ranch A guest ranch, also known as a dude ranch, is a type of ranch oriented towards visitors or tourism. It is considered a form of agrotourism. History Guest ranches arose in response to the romanticization of the American West that began to occur ...

es, released convicts, and murder mysteries, often with surprise endings. The series pilot entitled "Killer on a Horseback" starring Rod Cameron aired in February 1956 on an episode of the

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

anthology In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or related fiction/non-fiction excerpts by different authors. There are also thematic and g ...

series ''

Star Stage ''Star Stage'' is a half-hour American television anthology series that began on September 9, 1955, and ended on September 7, 1956. It was sponsored on alternate weeks by Chesebrough-Ponds and Campbell Soup Company and hosted by Jeffrey Lynn, ...

''. Blake carried a "Detective Special" revolver.

Cast

The series starred Rod Cameron as Lieutenant Rod Blake. Robert Armstrong appeared in 24 episodes as Sheriff Andy Anderson, who developed a good working relationship with Cameron's character, Blake.

Don Haggerty Don Haggerty (July 3, 1914 – August 19, 1988) was an American actor of film and television. Early life and education Haggerty was born in Poughkeepsie, New York. Before he began appearing in films in 1947, Haggerty was a Brown University ...

played Sheriff Elder in nine episodes in the 1956-1957 season. Paul Stader appeared five times in the 1958-1959 season as Deputy Sheriff Jim Wallace. Tom Greenway appeared in four episodes as Sheriff Bronson: "Stay Lost, Little Girl", "Dangerous Honeymoon", "Full Circle", and "Death on Wheels".

Guest stars

Claude Akins Claude Aubrey Akins (May 25, 1926 – January 27, 1994) was an American character actor. He played Sonny Pruit in '' Movin' On'', a 1974–1976 American drama series about a trucking team; Sheriff Lobo on '' The Misadventures of Sheriff Lob ...

Jack Albertson Harold "Jack" Albertson (June 16, 1907 – November 25, 1981) was an American actor, comedian, dancer and singer who also performed in vaudeville. Albertson was a Tony, Oscar, and Emmy winning actor, which ranks him among a rare stature of 24 ...

Merry Anders Merry Anders (born Mary Helen Anderson; May 22, 1934 – October 28, 2012) was an American actress who appeared in a number of television programs and films from the 1950s until her retirement from the screen in 1972. Early life Anders was born ...

* Raymond Bailey *

Barbara Bain Barbara Bain (born Mildred Fogel, September 13, 1931 See also: * ) is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Cinnamon Carter Crawford on the action television series '' Mission: Impossible'' (1966–1969), which earned her thr ...

Herschel Bernardi Herschel Bernardi (October 30, 1923 – May 9, 1986) was an American actor and singer. He is best known for his supporting role in the television detective series ''Peter Gunn'' (1958–1961) for which he was nominated for a Primetime Emm ...

Amanda Blake Amanda Blake (born Beverly Louise Neill; February 20, 1929 – August 16, 1989) was an American actress best known for the role of the red-haired saloon proprietress "Miss Kitty Russell" on the Western television series ''Gunsmoke''. Along with ...

Whitney Blake Whitney Blake (born Nancy Ann Whitney; February 20, 1926 – September 28, 2002) was an American film and television actress, director, and producer. She is known for her four seasons portraying Dorothy Baxter, the mother, on the 1960s sitco ...

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* Miriam Colon *

Mike Connors Krekor Ohanian (August 15, 1925 – January 26, 2017), known professionally as Mike Connors, was an American actor. He was best known for playing private detective Joe Mannix in the CBS television series ''Mannix'' from 1967 to 1975. This role ...

Russ Conway Russ Conway, DSM (born Trevor Herbert Stanford; 2 September 1925 – 16 November 2000) was an English popular music pianist and composer. Conway had 20 piano instrumentals in the UK Singles Chart between 1957 and 1963, including two number ...

Dabbs Greer Robert William "Dabbs" Greer (April 2, 1917 – April 28, 2007) was an American character actor in film and television for over 60 years. Greer appeared in nearly 100 film roles and in nearly 600 television episodes of various series. He pl ...

Frank De Vol Frank Denny De Vol (September 20, 1911 – October 27, 1999) was an American bandleader, arranger, composer and actor. As a composer, he was nominated for four Academy Awards. Early life De Vol was born in Moundsville in Marshall County in no ...

Angie Dickinson Angie Dickinson (born Angeline Brown; September 30, 1931) is an American retired actress. She began her career on television, appearing in many Anthology series#Television, anthology series during the 1950s, before gaining her breakthrough rol ...

Mason Alan Dinehart Mason Alan Dinehart (born 1936) is an American business consultant and retired actor best known for his role as a youthful Bat Masterson in 34 episodes between 1955 and 1959 of the ABC/ Desilu television series '' The Life and Legend of Wyat ...

Richard Farnsworth Richard William Farnsworth (September 1, 1920 – October 6, 2000) was an American actor and stuntman. He was twice nominated for an Academy Award: in 1978 for Best Supporting Actor for '' Comes a Horseman,'' and in 2000 for Best Actor in ' ...

Frank Ferguson Frank S. Ferguson (December 25, 1899 – September 12, 1978) was an American character actor with hundreds of appearances in both film and television. Background Ferguson was born in Ferndale, California, the younger of two children of W. Tho ...

Constance Ford Constance Ford (born Cornelia M. Ford; July 1, 1923 – February 26, 1993) was an American actress and Model (person), model. She portrayed Ada Lucas Hobson on the long-running daytime soap opera ''Another World (TV series), Another World'', f ...

Beverly Garland Beverly Lucy Garland (née Fessenden; October 17, 1926 – December 5, 2008) was an American actress. Her work in feature films primarily consisted of small parts in a few major productions or leads in low-budget action and science-fiction movi ...

Vivi Janiss Vivi Janis (born Vivian Audrey Jamison; May 29, 1911 – September 7, 1988) was an American actress, known for such films as ''The Phantom from 10,000 Leagues'' (1955), ''Man on the Prowl (film), Man on the Prowl'' (1957), and ''First, You Cry'' ...

Carolyn Jones Carolyn Sue Jones (April 28, 1930 – August 3, 1983) was an American actress of television and film. She began her film career in the early 1950s, and by the end of the decade had achieved recognition with a nomination for an Academy Awa ...

DeForest Kelley Jackson DeForest Kelley (January 20, 1920 – June 11, 1999) was an American actor, screenwriter, poet, and singer. He was known for his roles in film and television Western (genre), Westerns and achieved international fame as Dr. Leonard McCoy ...

* Jack Kelly * Wright King *

Michael Landon Michael Landon Sr. (born Eugene Maurice Orowitz; October 31, 1936 – July 1, 1991) was an American actor and filmmaker. He is known for his roles as Little Joe Cartwright in ''Bonanza'' (1959–1973), Charles Ingalls in ''Little House on th ...

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* Denver Pyle * Gloria Saunders *

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* Robert F. Simon *

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* Craig Stevens *

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* Nita Talbot * Constance Towers *

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* John Vivyan

Episodes

Production

Originally conceived to compete with ''

Highway Patrol A highway patrol is a police unit, detail, or law enforcement agency created primarily for the purpose of overseeing and enforcing traffic safety compliance on roads and highways within a jurisdiction. They are also referred to in many countri ...

'', the show pilot was an episode of the anthology series ''

,'' released in February 1956 and titled "Killer on Horseback". ''State Trooper'' was filmed on location in Virginia City, Nevada to give it an authentic feel. Las Vegas was also used for location filming.

Release

Broadcast

After the pilot release on ''Star Stage'', the series failed to make the network schedule for 1956 and ''State Trooper'' was released as a syndicated show being sold directly to local stations.

Home media

Timeless Media Group Shout! Factory, LLC, doing business as Shout! Studios (formerly doing business as Shout! Factory, its current legal name), is an American home video and music distributor founded in 2002 as Retropolis Entertainment. Its video releases, issued i ...

released the complete first season on DVD in Region 1 on December 14, 2010. The complete second and third seasons were released together in a six-disc set on December 13, 2011. On September 23, 2014, Timeless Media Group released ''State Trooper - The Complete Series'' on DVD in Region 1.TMG Announces 'The Complete Series' 11-DVD Set
The 11-disc set contains all 104 episodes of the series.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:State Trooper (Tv Series) 1956 American television series debuts 1959 American television series endings 1950s American crime drama television series Television series set in the 1950s Black-and-white American television shows American English-language television shows First-run syndicated television programs in the United States Television shows set in Nevada Television series by Universal Television 1950s Western (genre) television series