The Story of Loner Lucas McCain

There were a lot of westerns on television in 1958, but none like The Rifleman. At the time it was considered the most violent show on TV, right alongside 'The Untouchables' which also aired in 1958.
'The Rifleman' was the story of loner Lucas McCain (former Brooklyn Dodger Chuck Connors) and his son Mark (Johnny Crawford) who live on the outskirts of North Fork, New Mexico. Lucas invented a new rapid-cocking rifle that enabled him to fire at a furious pace, giving him the advantage of having (sorta kinda) the world's first semiautomatic weapon. .

We used to love watching the show just to see him cock that rifle - you know, the looping underhand action Chuck Connors would use to load a round into the .44-.40 chamber. Man, he'd cock that rifle and all the bad guys would know they were messin' with one bad hombre.

The marshall of the town was recovering alcoholic Micah Torrance who just couldn't keep things in North Fork under control. He was forever calling on Lucas to come to town with that gun of his and set things right. Meanwhile, the booze soaked Marshall would be found in Sweeney's bar when things weren't going well or if he had some stressful task to perform. Several times, bad guys would ride into town and force liquor on Micah to gain control of that depressing, muddy, one-road town.