Sky King (1952)
Sky King is an American radio and television adventure series. The title character is Arizona rancher and aircraft pilot Schuyler "Sky" King. The series was likely based on a true-life personality of the 1930s, Jack Cones, the "Flying Constable" of Twentynine Palms in San Bernardino County, California, although this claim is unverified. Although the series had strong western elements, King mostly captured criminals and spies, and found lost hikers with the use of his plane, the Songbird. Though the planes used changed during the course of the series, the later model was not given a number, but was still known as the Songbird. King and his niece, Penny, lived on the Flying Crown Ranch, near the town of Grover, Arizona. Penny and Clipper were also pilots, though still relatively inexperienced and looking to their uncle for guidance and mentoring. Penny was an accomplished air racer and rated multi-engine pilot, whom Sky trusted to fly the Songbird. In the third TV episode, Penny refers to Clipper as "my brother", so they are siblings. The musical score was largely the work of Herschel Burke Gilbert.
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Episode 1 - The Wild Man
Release Date: 1958-12-28Sky and Penny try to clear a gentle, animal-loving "wildman" who has been blamed for the robbery of a logging company payroll.
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Episode 2 - Sky Robbers
Release Date: 1958-12-28Sky and Penny enter an air race, and it's soon discovered that the main office has been robbed and all of the receipts have been stolen. Sky suspects that one of the contestants in the race is the culprit and is using the race to make his getaway.
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Episode 3 - A Dog Named Barney
Release Date: 1958-12-28Sky follows the seeing-eye dog of a blind newsboy, who he believes will lead him to a holdup man living with a party of wolf hunters.
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Episode 4 - Bullet Bait
Release Date: 1958-12-28Sky is holding a wedding at the Flying Crown Ranch. The ceremony is interrupted, however, when two gangsters kidnap the groom and threaten his fiancé.
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Episode 5 - Money Has Wings
Release Date: 1959-01-04Four pilots for Wellman Air Freight Lines are injured in the first month of a contract for the company to carry s large payroll. In order to find out what's going on, Sky goes undercover as a security guard.
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Episode 6 - Frogmen
Release Date: 1959-01-04 -
Episode 7 - Terror Cruise
Release Date: 1959-02-01While Sky is training with his naval reserve unit, Penny visits friends who cruise Central America on their large sailboat. When three escaped prisoners commandeer their vessel, it's up to Sky and the U.S. Navy to rescue his niece and her friends.
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Episode 8 - Operation Urgent aka Runaway Truck
Release Date: 1959-02-01 -
Episode 9 - Bounty Hunters
Release Date: 1959-02-01When marauding coyotes begin to kill his calves, Sky hires two flying bounty hunters to kill the animals. When more dead calves are found, Sky discovers that the men he has hired are using his ranch to smuggle jewels, not kill vermin.
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Episode 10 - Dead Giveaway
Release Date: 1959-02-01 -
Episode 11 - A Mickey for Sky
Release Date: 1959-02-22Young Mickey, a distant relative of Sky's, is traveling to visit the Flying Crown Ranch while his guardian is out of the country. En route, he overhears two men discuss shooting a foreign visitor and is determined to warn the man of his peril.
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Episode 12 - Ring of Fire
Release Date: 1959-03-01Sky tries to help an old Indian chief who is very sick, but he won't go to the hospital for treatment because he would rather die on his own tribe's land.
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Episode 13 - Mickey's Birthday
Release Date: 1959-03-08While visiting an amusement park on his birthday, Mickey wins a model airplane at a shooting gallery. Unfortunately, two smugglers have hidden a valuable pearl in the airplane and will stop at nothing to get it back.