Death on Sun Mountain in Bonanza

To handle this year's digital TV conversion, I had to purchase our local basic cable service. Fortunately, it hasn't been a total loss. Now I can watch old episodes of Hawaii Five-0, Get Smart, Star Trek: The Next Generation, the British spy series MI-5, and...Bonanza.

The second episode ever of Bonanza, the famed TV Western, tells a Native-themed story. Here are a couple of synopses:

Death on Sun MountainBen Cartwright finds out that Mark Burdette (Barry Sullivan) and Early Thorne (Leo Gordon) have been illegally slaughtering the antelope on the Paiute Indians' property, then selling the meat to the miners at an exorbitant price. To thwart the two poachers and protect the Indians' food supply, Ben offers to sell his own meat at a much lower price. Burdette and Thorne then hatch a scheme to foment a war between the Paiutes and the Cartwrights. First telecast on September 19, 1959, "The Sun Mountain Herd" (aka "Death on Sun Mountain") was written by Gene L. Coon and David Dortort, who based their teleplay on a true story. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide"Bonanza" Death on Sun Mountain (1959)Burdette and Thorne are selling native antelope meat to the "diggers of Sun Mountain" (the miners) at outrageous prices. The lack of their native food causes the Paiutes to steal Ponderosa beef. The Cartwrights decide to sell their beef directly to the miners, hoping to ease the tensions with the Paiutes and keep their herd from being rustled. This interferes with Burdette's business plan and he tells Thorne to stop the beef from arriving in Virginia City. Thorne and his men accomplish this by dressing up as Indians and killing all but one miner. Harris is left alive to tell everyone it was the Paiutes that ambushed them. Thorne then dresses a miner and kills Tukwa, one of the Cartwright ranch hands. An Indian war is imminent unless the Cartwrights can get to the bottom of this. They go to speak to Harris only to discover that he is too dazed to identify anyone and the only other person who knows Burdette is guilty, a saloon girl named Glory, has been kidnapped. They track Burdette and Thorne and their captive to the desert where a gunfight breaks out.When it comes to the Native aspects, Death on Sun Mountain is mostly successful. The Paiutes are a real tribe living in the Lake Tahoe area and Winnemucca was their actual chief. Because it was based on a true story, the Paiutes' dilemma is realistically non-savage. If the white man kills all their game, they'll have to rustle a few distressed cows or starve.

The Paiutes are dressed in regular clothes and Apache-style headbands, not "leathers and feathers." They speak good English, only slightly stilted, not Tonto talk. Bonanza occasionally shows them, along with Chinese "coolies," as background characters in town.

Another casting failure

The only real problem is the casting of non-Natives as Paiutes. Harry Bartell is Winnemucca and Ron Soble (Wyatt Earp in ST:TOS) is Tukwa. They and the other "Paiutes" don't look much like Indians.

It's interesting to see how Hollywood operated (and still operates?). Because these actors had vaguely "ethnic" looks, they got to play outlaws or Indians. Heaven forbid that a show might have starred someone who didn't look classically Anglo-American. That would've put pretty boys like Michael Landon out of work.

As you can see below, Winnemucca is an order of magnitude more "ethnic" than Bartell or Soble. It's clear he comes from an entirely different race. Casting someone who looked like Winnemucca would've been much more challenging to American viewers the the comfortingly familiar Bartell.

Bleeding-heart cowboys

One thing I didn't remember about Bonanza is what bleeding-heart liberals the Cartwrights were. Ben Cartwright worries that the Paiutes won't be able to continue living in harmony with nature. By selling meat directly to the miners, he's willing to forgo something like half his profits.

In another episode, when a mine collapses, Adam Cartwright doesn't care about the cost involved to safeguard the men. He cares only about the safety of the workers.

For more on the subject, see TV Shows Featuring Indians.

P.S. Gene L. Coon went on to write for Star Trek, of course. I wonder if this episode led to the casting of Ron Soble as Wyatt Earp.

Below:  Chief Winnemucca; Harry Bartell and Ron Soble in non-Paiute roles.