Based on the Academy Award-winning 1962 film of the same name, How the West Was Won arrived on the television airwaves in an era where the popularity of the western had supposedly long since passed. And yet, when it first aired as a miniseries on ABC in 1977, viewer reaction was more than strong enough to prompt a weekly series – proving that America’s fondness for the Western had never completely faded.

The television incarnation of How the West Was Won began as a made-for-TV movie called The Mahicans, which followed the saga of an aging settler named Zeb Macahan and his quest to help his brother’s family relocate from Virginia to the Western Frontier. A number of hardships and other obstacles stood in their way, including eruption of the Civil War. With the success of this series, a sequel series of films was produced called How the West Was Won. They found an equally loyal following and ABC, sensing a hit on their hands, decided to develop a weekly series.

When Zeb’s brother and his wife are killed, the old ex-cavalry scout finds himself in the role of surrogate father to his brother’s family, teenagers Josh, Jessie, Laura and the older Luke - who was now a fugitive from the law, having deserted from the military and killed three men in self-defense. Luckily, he had a little help raising the family from the children’s Aunt Molly, which came in quite handy when Zeb’s hands were full trying to contend with all the other typical dangers that plagued families in the old west.

James Arness was certainly no stranger to the western genre when he took on the role of Zeb Macahan. He had already enjoyed a very successful run playing Marshall Dillon on the hit series Gunsmoke for 20 years (and spanning 5 decades.) Between his familiar face, the perilous story lines and the picturesque backdrop of such locales as Colorado, Utah, and Arizona, there was something for every western fan to enjoy.

After 25 episodes of the series aired, ABC chose to continue the saga further with a series of 11 two-hour made-for-TV movies that followed the Macahans as they finally settled into a ranch in the Teton Mountains to raise horses. And while no further incarnations of How the West Was Won have been created to date, reruns of the original series still air on occasion, much to the delight of the loyal fans that still fondly remember the many adventures of the Mahican clan.