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First aired September 1965
Last aired May 1969
Episodes 112
Network ABC
Format/Color / 60 Minutes
Barbara Stanwyck as Victoria Barkley
Richard Long as Jarrod Barkley
Peter Breck as Nick Barkley
Lee Majors as Heath Barkley
Linda Evans as Audra Barkley
Napoleon Whiting as Silas
Charles Briles as Eugene Barkley
The Big Valley was a
television Western which ran on ABC from 1965 to 1969. It was created by A.I.
Bezzerides and Louis F. Edelman. The producer was Levy-Gardner-Laven. Associate producer Lou Morheim performed the same function on the 1960 film The Magnificent Seven. The stirring theme was composed by George Duning. Paul Henreid, of Casablanca fame, directed a number of episodes. Four Star Television produced the series.
It starred Barbara Stanwyck as Victoria Barkley, the widowed matriarch of the wealthy, influential Barkley family
living in 19th century Stockton in California's central valley. Richard Long played Jarrod Thomas Barkley, her eldest son and a respected attorney. Hot-tempered younger son Nick Barkley, who managed the family ranch, was portrayed by Peter Breck. Linda Evans played Audra, Victoria's only daughter. In the first episode, Lee Majors was introduced as Heath, the third, and illegitimate son of Victoria's late husband; Heath gradually gained acceptance from the rest of the Barkley clan. The
youngest Barkley son was Eugene (Charles Briles), a medical student studying at Berkeley. He was seen sporadically in only five first season episodes and then written out. Only once was his name ever mentioned again. The regular cast was rounded out by Napoleon Whiting, as Silas, the Barkley's' majordomo.
(The Character of Eugene Barkley left the series after the first season due to an order from the president of the U.S. He wanted to serve in the U.S. Army. Thanks Charles Briles aka Eugene Barkley.)
Like Bonanza, in every episode in which one of the Barkley sons got seriously involved with a woman, as soon as he got married, she was killed off or died gruesomely in the same episode. As with other shows of the time, the male characters had love interests, but usually the storylines lasted only for one episode, after which the woman was never seen again.
Dell Comics published a short-lived comic book for six issues in 1966-69.
(the last issue reprinted the first, and came out two years after issue #5). All
issues had photo covers.
This show marks the debut of new actors Lee Majors and Linda Evans, who both went on to fame on other shows. Majors, went on to have a successful acting career: Owen Marshall: Counselor at Law, The Six Million Dollar Man and The Fall Guy. Evans went on to work on the popular 1980s soap opera, Dynasty.
Many viewers associate the show with the city of Stockton, which is located in California's central valley and was founded in the 1850s. The Barkley's are purely fictional, however, and anyone familiar with the real Stockton knows that the steep canyons and chaparral countryside featured in the show's exterior shots don't exist in the region but are in fact a result of filming in Southern California.
Wilfred M. Cline, A.S.C., Technicolor Associate Cinematographer on Gone With the Wind (1939), was director of photography of several Big Valley episodes, together with Chas E. Burke, A.S.C.
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