50 free The Rifleman trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
The Rifleman ran on ABC from 1958 to 1963: 168 black-and-white half-hours about widowed rancher Lucas McCain, his son Mark and a Winchester that could empty its magazine in under six seconds. It was one of the first prime-time shows built around a single parent, it launched Sam Peckinpah, and it gave early work to Dennis Hopper, Michael Landon, James Coburn and Robert Vaughn. This quiz covers the show and the people who made it: the cast of North Fork, the rifle and how it was rigged, Peckinpah's development of the series, the pilot on Zane Grey Theatre, the guest stars, the ratings, the spin-off pilots and the toys, plus Chuck Connors' unusual pro sports career and Johnny Crawford's pop hits. It starts easy and works up to questions that will test people who have seen every episode. Every answer has been checked against the show's documented production history and cast records, so it is safe to use for a Western-themed quiz night or a family movie evening.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Who starred as rancher Lucas McCain in The Rifleman?
Chuck Connors
Connors was a former professional baseball and basketball player before acting. He got the part after catching a rifle the director suddenly threw at him.
Q 02What was the name of Lucas McCain's son in The Rifleman?
Mark
He was played by Crawford, a former Mouseketeer who was 12 when the show began.
Q 03Which child actor played Lucas McCain's son and earned an Emmy nomination at age 13?
Johnny Crawford
He was one of Disney's original 24 Mouseketeers in 1955, then cut when the troupe was trimmed to 12.
Q 04The Rifleman was set in North Fork, a fictional town in which territory?
New Mexico
The show was set in the 1880s; a plaque by the McCain house says it was rebuilt by Lucas and Mark in August 1881.
Q 05On which network did The Rifleman air from 1958 to 1963?
ABC
It ran for 168 half-hour episodes, all in black and white, produced by Dick Powell's Four Star company.
Q 06The Rifleman was one of the first primetime US series to depict what?
A single parent raising a child
Lucas McCain was a widower; his wife Margaret had died when Mark was six, before the family moved from Oklahoma.
Q 07Which rifle did Lucas McCain famously use, an anachronism for a show set in the 1880s?
Winchester Model 1892
John Browning did not design the Model 1892 until about a decade after the show's setting. It was modified for rapid fire and one-handed cocking.
Q 08What was the name of the one-handed technique McCain used to cycle his rifle's large loop lever?
Spin-cocking
The lever's set screw tripped the trigger each time the action closed, so he did not have to put his finger inside the trigger guard.
Q 09How many shots does McCain fire during The Rifleman's opening credits, on screen?
Twelve
Seven come in the first close-up and five in the second view; a 13th shot was dubbed onto the soundtrack so the firing ended in time with the theme music.
Q 10Roughly how many villains does Lucas McCain kill over the show's five-year run?
120
Despite the body count, McCain tries to solve most problems without shooting, and he almost never carries a pistol.
Q 11What was the name of North Fork's marshal, a recovering alcoholic played by Paul Fix?
Micah Torrance
McCain gives him a job on the ranch in 'The Marshal', a running theme being that people deserve a second chance. Fix played the town doctor in the very first episode.
Q 12Which actor was the original marshal of North Fork for two early episodes before Paul Fix took over?
R. G. Armstrong
Armstrong appeared in the first and fourth episodes. Eight different actors played the town doctor over the run.
Q 13Which future director of The Wild Bunch developed The Rifleman and wrote many early episodes?
Sam Peckinpah
Q 21Which of these was NOT a Rifleman guest star, according to its cast records?
Clint Eastwood
More than 500 actors appeared in over 970 credited roles; then-newcomers included Landon, Coburn, Vaughn, Dan Blocker and Harry Dean Stanton.
Q 22Which star of Bonanza guest-starred on The Rifleman while his own series was on the air?
Pernell Roberts
Landon and Blocker also appeared, but before Bonanza made them famous.
Q 23Which director of the noir classic Gun Crazy helmed 51 episodes of The Rifleman?
Joseph H. Lewis
Only one episode, 'The Assault', was directed by a woman.
He drew on his own ranch childhood, and his insistence on violent realism put him at odds with Four Star. He left to create the short-lived The Westerner.
Q 14Who created The Rifleman?
Arnold Laven
Laven's company Levy-Gardner-Laven produced the show and, decades later, released the complete restored series on DVD.
Q 15The Rifleman's pilot, 'The Sharpshooter', first aired in 1958 as an episode of which anthology series?
Zane Grey Theatre
It ran on CBS under Dick Powell's banner before ABC picked up the series and re-aired an edited version as the first episode.
Q 16Which future Easy Rider star guest-starred in The Rifleman's pilot episode?
Dennis Hopper
Hopper played the young gunman Vernon Tippert; the script came from the show's developer.
Q 17Which entertainer played former circus trick-shot artist Tip Corey in the episode 'Two Ounces of Tin'?
Sammy Davis Jr.
Corey calls McCain a hypocrite for objecting to gunplay, since McCain earned his own deadly nickname in the Indian Territory.
Q 18Where did Lucas McCain first earn the nickname 'the Rifleman'?
The Indian Territory of Oklahoma
He and Mark had come to North Fork from Oklahoma after Mark's mother died.
Q 19Lucas McCain was a Union veteran who received a battlefield commission at which battle?
Five Forks
He was a lieutenant in the 11th Indiana Infantry. Another episode contradicts this, placing him at Fort Donelson.
Q 20Which two Brooklyn Dodgers pitchers and future Hall of Famers made cameo appearances on The Rifleman?
Duke Snider and Don Drysdale
Connors had himself played for the Dodgers in 1949, which explains the baseball cameos.
Q 24Which actress directed The Rifleman episode 'The Assault'?
Ida Lupino
Lupino was the only woman directing episodic TV Westerns regularly in the era; she also directed episodes of Have Gun – Will Travel and The Untouchables.
Q 25Which star of Trackdown, and later I Spy, wrote a two-part episode of The Rifleman?
Robert Culp
Trackdown was another Four Star production. Connors also wrote several episodes himself.
Q 26The Rifleman was partly filmed in Wildwood Regional Park in which California city?
Thousand Oaks
The park's rock formations stood in for the McCain ranch country. Bonanza and Gunsmoke crews shot there too.
Q 27Which studio produced The Rifleman?
Four Star Television
Four Star, co-founded by Dick Powell, also made Trackdown, Wanted Dead or Alive and Burke's Law.
Q 28How many episodes of The Rifleman were made?
168
Season one alone had 40 episodes; the count fell each year to 26 in the fifth and final season.
Q 29Where did The Rifleman rank in the Nielsen ratings for its first season, 1958–59?
4th
It drew a 33.1 rating, behind only Gunsmoke, Wagon Train and Have Gun – Will Travel, then slid every year and fell out of the top 30 by season five.
Q 30A 1959 Rifleman episode, 'The Indian', served as the pilot for which NBC series starring Michael Ansara?
Law of the Plainsman
Ansara played Apache marshal Sam Buckhart, who returned to North Fork in the episode 'The Raid'.