I was taking the info from wiki. They are wrong (gee, what’s new?)
Winchester says 10 in the tube. Still enough for the 8 shot opening sequence.
Back then, we had The Season & then Reruns. Occasionally syndicated shows would be shown–but you didn’t see many of them until UHF stations proliferated. Also, homes had no videotape players or recorders.
So, what was on TV was what you saw. *Star Trek *was one of the first shows to benefit from never-ending reruns, years after its cancellation…
ETA: The Good Old Days sucked. Long live Netflix streaming!
I could be remembering this wrong, but I could have sworn “The Rifleman” was a different show than “Branded.” One being about a rancher single-father with a slick rifle and awesome skills, while the other was about a disgraced civil war soldier whose calvery sword was broke in half, and who subsequently sharpened the stub into a fearsome weapon. But it was a long time ago…
You are correct, Sir. 
I remember a Mad Magazine takeoff of The Rifleman, drawn with the face of madman Lucas McCain, in which everyone he saw he murdered.
“I’m quiet and peace-lovin’. 'Cause there’s nothing more peaceful than a dead man.” Blam Blam Blam.
It was called, “The Rifle, Man!” I seem to remember a panel where he pitched his rifle at some bad guy. (As noted above by Rick, he spent some time pitching for the Brooklyn Dodgers.)
Was he supposed to be a sharpshooter?
If so, why did he need to modify his rifle? The only reason to do that kind of mod is to get a higher volume of fire. But if he’s a crack shot, why does he need to spray the area with slugs?
And I remember a Mad treatment of “Branded.” It opened with some precursor of Gallup taking a survey in a small Western town. He asked people who the current President was, and nobody knew. He asked them who Queen Victoria was, and nobody knew. He asked them who Jason McCord was, and everybody said, “That’s the dirty mangy coward who deserted his men at Bitter Creek!”
He didn’t spray; he shot quickly and accurately, frequently killing three or four armed men in as many seconds. He made Leone’s Man With No Name look like a pussy. He would have given Chuck Norris some trouble.
Because if he didn’t, at least one of the half-dozen guys he’s mowing down might manage to get a shot off himself. 
I remember one episode where he was in a target shooting contest. He emptied a whole magazine in about three seconds, firing from the hip. When the judge examined the target (of course, every round was a bulls-eye) he said something like “You could cover that spread with a silver dollar! I think we have us a winner here, folks!”
Pretty much every cowboy star (including Roy Rogers) routinely shot 8 or 9 bullets from a 6-shooter before reloading.
Chuck Connors athletic career is interesting, but he never pitched for the Dodgers. He was in the Dodgers minor league system but had only one major league at bat. He finally asked to be traded and was, to the Cubs, where he played first base before being sent to the minors in Los Angeles. It was there he was discovered by Hollywood. Chuck also played professional basketball for many minor league teams and the Boston Celtics. He was the first NBA player to break a backboard, which he did in pre-game warmup. One of only 12 guys to play major league baseball and in the NBA.
Thank you. Good to know a few brains cells still fire in sequence.
When Connors and Crawford were on “The Rifleman” together, they would often play in pickup baseball games. When Connors came to bat, however, the games would usually come to an end, because they difficulty finding the baseball afterwards.
Yeah, “Branded” was a different, later show also starring Chuck Conners. But I don’t remember him sharpening the broken sword into a weapon. In the opening credits he picks it up and looks at it sadly after he walks out of the fort, but I don’t remember ever seeing it in an actual episode.
I recently saw an episode where Mark is taken by Mexican banditos (led by Martin Landau, no less). When McCain catches up to them when they’re in a bar, he rushes in, shoots one with the handgun he has, then grabs his rifle off a nearby table and shoots the other two (or three?) before they can get off a shot. It was definitely portrayed as quick, accurate shots, not spraying.
You are mistaken about that; he used it so frequently that it was practically his trademark in the series. He even used it as a throwing knife, which was patently ridiculous given the enormous handguard, but it made for good TV.
Lot’s of great guest stars on the show. The first episode had Dennis Hopper, and he was in at least one other. Many 50s and 60s character actors and future stars appeared on the show.
When I was a kid, we used to sing a parody of the “Branded” theme song. It was about someone stuck in the john with no toilet paper.
I can’t remember the words except the concluding couplet:
“What do you do when you’re stranded/
and you can’t find the roll?”
You got most of it.
“Stranded/Stuck on the toilet bowl/What do you do when you’re stranded/and you can’t find the roll?/Wherever you go for the rest of your life/you must prove/you’re a man/Use your hand.”