Tonto: Tales of the Lone Ranger

Originally Aired: May 4, 1938
The Lone Ranger #822, "Bart Colt Gang,"
The masked rider of the plains and his faithful companion Tonto pursue the notorious Bart Colt gang after the outlaws raid the ranch of old Zach Andrews, making off with a thousand dollars in cash and two thousand dollars worth of cattle. But Colt has an even more ambitious scheme in mind. The cunning outlaw deliberately lets Dave Sanders, foreman at the Andrews ranch, overhear false information about a planned bank robbery in Silver Springs. Colt knows that Dave will rush to warn his brother Andy, the county sheriff, sending a posse out of town chasing shadows.
With the lawmen racing toward Silver Springs, Bart Colt plans to double back and raid the now-defenseless town, looting the bank, stores, and supplies. His scheme goes deeper still: by making it appear that Dave deliberately misdirected the posse, Colt aims to destroy the reputations of both Sanders brothers and get the ineffective deputy Lem Moody appointed as the new sheriff. As Sheriff Andy Sanders organizes his posse despite Moody's suspicious objections, the Lone Ranger and Tonto close in, determined to bring the outlaws to justice before Colt's elaborate trap can spring shut.

Originally Aired: May 2, 1938
The Lone Ranger #821, "Mine Claim Scheme," a suspicious land deal in the mining town of Bixby threatens to defraud honest prospectors of their fortunes. When miner Lem Purvis celebrates selling his supposedly worthless claim to eastern businessman Carter Dodson for two hundred dollars, the disguised Lone Ranger recognizes something is amiss. Assay clerk Tom Gordon suddenly announces he made a terrible mistake, revealing that Purvis's mine is actually worth twenty-five dollars a ton while another miner's claim is worthless. An enraged Purvis nearly shoots Gordon before the Lone Ranger intervenes, but suspicions run deep that Gordon deliberately switched the samples to benefit Dodson.
Following Gordon to Dodson's quarters, the Lone Ranger and Tonto overhear a conversation that confirms their suspicions of a systematic scheme targeting the town's miners. With Gordon manipulating assay reports and Dodson swooping in to purchase valuable claims at bargain prices, the masked rider must expose this elaborate fraud before more honest prospectors lose their livelihoods to the unscrupulous pair.

Originally Aired: April 29, 1938
The Lone Ranger #820, "Train Wreck Plot," danger comes to the quiet railroad town of Broken Bow when the sinister outlaw Snake Laughlin puts a deadly scheme into motion. Mike Murphy, the engineer of a westbound train stopped overnight in town, finds himself confronted at gunpoint by Snake and his gang. The outlaws demand that Mike pull his train west on the single track before the eastbound arrives in the morning, ensuring a catastrophic collision in the desert. To force his cooperation, they claim to have kidnapped Betty Calkins, the daughter of the town's telegraph operator and the woman Mike hopes to marry.
The Lone Ranger and Tonto, already suspicious of Snake's presence in town, witness the confrontation and spring into action. While Tonto follows Snake and his captive engineer to locate their camp and search for the missing girl, the Lone Ranger rides to the Calkins home to determine if Betty has truly been abducted. With only hours until the eastbound train arrives and innocent lives hang in the balance, the masked rider must unravel Snake's plot and rescue Betty before Mike is forced to make an impossible choice.

Originally Aired: April 27, 1938
The Lone Ranger #819, "Trap For A Gambler," the masked rider arrives in Mud Flat, a lawless town controlled by crooked gamblers and criminals. The central conflict ignites when fifteen-year-old Tommy Goodwin falls victim to gambler Harve Riggs, who cunningly lures the boy into his establishment and swindles him out of fifty dollars—money desperately needed to pay the family's store bill. When Tommy's father Bart confronts Riggs to recover the stolen money, the situation escalates into violence, with Riggs prepared to kill Goodwin over the confrontation about his marked cards.
The Lone Ranger intervenes just in time, shooting the gun from Riggs' hand and preventing murder. Recognizing that one confrontation won't clean up the corrupt town, the masked man sends Tonto to fetch Henry Parker, a reformed gambler from Dodge City who might hold the key to exposing the criminal element controlling Mud Flat. As the Goodwin family contemplates leaving town in despair, the Lone Ranger listens outside their window, planning his next move to bring justice to this desperate community.

Originally Aired: April 25, 1938
The Lone Ranger #818, "Toll In Cattle A,"
When rancher Clem Peabody arrives at Eagle Pass with his herd of two thousand longhorns, he discovers that notorious outlaw Big Bill Lawson has taken over Pop Carter's general store and erected bars across the pass. The elderly Pop Carter explains he was forced to sell his land or face death, and now Lawson demands an outrageous toll: two bits per head of cattle, or one quarter of each rancher's herd. With no other route to market, Peabody has no choice but to sign a note for five hundred dollars, fuming at the legal robbery. At the Longhorn Cafe, Peabody shares his predicament with fellow cattlemen, who realize that every rancher in the valley faces the same extortion.
The Lone Ranger and Tonto overhear Peabody's story in the crowded cafe. The masked rider, disguised without his mask, listens carefully as the cattlemen discuss their dilemma. The Lone Ranger recognizes a crucial weakness in Lawson's scheme: the outlaw wants cash, not cattle, because his criminal reputation would make selling branded livestock nearly impossible. As the episode continues, a plan begins to form.

Originally Aired: April 22, 1938
The Lone Ranger #817, "Murder Of Pony Express Rider," finds the masked rider investigating a brutal outlaw gang terrorizing the town of Greenville from their hideout in the nearby hills. Colonel Dawson, commander of the cavalry garrison, faces mounting anger from townspeople and his own daughter Sally after yet another deadly raid claims multiple lives. Despite the pleas of Sheriff and citizens alike, the Colonel insists he cannot act without official orders from Washington. The outlaws continue their attacks with impunity, but their success isn't just luck - their leader Wolf reveals he has spies feeding him inside information.
When Wolf learns that authorization for Colonel Dawson to attack has finally been sent from Washington via Pony Express, he dispatches men to ambush the rider and steal the crucial orders. The Lone Ranger and Tonto, investigating the gang's activities in the area, hear gunshots near the trail and rush to investigate. They discover the aftermath of Wolf's deadly plan to keep the cavalry from ever receiving permission to clean out the outlaw hideout, leaving Greenville's fate hanging in the balance.

Originally Aired: April 20, 1938
The Lone Ranger #816, "The Price Of Wool," tensions boil over between cattlemen and sheep herders fighting for control of precious rangeland. At the center of the conflict stands Maggie Morton, a tough-minded woman who leads the sheep herders with an iron hand and keeps the fragile peace from erupting into open warfare. When cattleman Pete Prindle visits her ranch, Maggie runs him off before he can speak his mind, though her foreman Jim Potter notices him leaving and suspects the cattlemen are plotting something dangerous.
Potter's concerns prove well-founded when he learns that Prindle has called a secret meeting of all the local cattlemen that very night. Meanwhile, the Lone Ranger rides into the territory after hearing about the brewing trouble between the two factions. As he investigates, he overhears conversations on both sides of the dispute and learns that Prindle has devised a mysterious scheme involving money that he claims will solve the cattlemen's problem once and for all. With emotions running high and both groups organized for potential conflict, the masked rider must work quickly to prevent bloodshed on the range.

Originally Aired: April 18, 1938
The Lone Ranger #815, "King Of The Country," finds the masked rider heading to San Cruz County, where Zeke Parsons has consolidated power as sheriff, postmaster, and storekeeper. Zeke discovers a legal loophole allowing him to force able-bodied citizens to work on county roads without pay in lieu of taxes. What begins as legitimate government work quickly transforms into something far more corrupt. Zeke grows overconfident and begins using the conscripted labor to improve his private property, building roads on his own land while threatening resisters with jail time or worse.
When townspeople like Lige Cummins and Sam begin protesting the illegal arrangement, Zeke uses his position as sheriff and his deputy Ben to intimidate them into submission. The jail fills with those who refuse to work, and Zeke denies food to prisoners who cannot pay. As tensions escalate and Zeke's threats grow more menacing, the stage is set for the Lone Ranger's intervention to restore justice to San Cruz County and end Zeke Parsons' tyrannical reign.

Originally Aired: April 13, 1938
The Lone Ranger #813, "Reward Money," finds longtime partners Jake Caldwell and Lim Purdy facing a midnight intruder who steals their life savings and wounds Lim in the struggle. The wily Lim had anticipated the robbery that's been plaguing the area, cleverly spreading flour on their porch to capture a clear footprint. The distinctive boot print, unusually large, points to only two or three men in town who could wear such a size. Sheriff arrives to investigate and suspects Big Wally Burke, a lazy but good-natured man known more for drinking than honest work.
The tension escalates when the scene shifts to Wally's home, where his surprised wife Mary watches him count a substantial pile of cash. Wally claims it's reward money for helping catch five killers over Pecos Way, given to him by a masked man at Flat Rock the previous night. Just as Wally prepares to take the money to the bank and promises his wife he's a changed man, the Sheriff arrives at their door. The evidence seems damning, but questions linger about Wally's story and whether the footprint will match his boots.

Originally Aired: April 11, 1938
The Lone Ranger #812, "The Raiders," a mysterious band of outlaws terrorizes the Southwest, burning ranches, stealing cattle, and leaving no survivors. When the Lone Ranger and Tonto spot flames rising from the Box X Ranch, they race to the scene and discover two badly wounded men: ranch owner Tom Holstead and Sheriff Burns. The lawmen are shocked to see a masked man and an Indian, fearing at first they're part of the outlaw gang, but the Lone Ranger quickly proves his intentions are noble. As he tends to their wounds, he reveals a disturbing pattern: this gang has struck multiple ranches at three-week intervals, moving systematically westward, and no one has ever found their trail or recovered the stolen cattle.
The next day, the Lone Ranger shares his theory with Sheriff Burns after Tonto tracks the cattle trail to the railroad tracks. Using a sharp stone to diagram the attacks, the masked man demonstrates how the outlaws have been using trains to transport stolen livestock, explaining why they've remained undetected. With this knowledge, he predicts the next target will be the Bard Cummins Ranch. The sheriff is convinced but worried they lack enough men to fight the heavily armed outlaw army.