Father Murphy
TV ShowEnded

Father Murphy

8.3 / 10
1981
2 seasons
35 episodes
WesternDrama

A good-hearted frontiersman poses as a priest to start an orphanage for a group of kids whose homes have been destroyed by an evil mining manager.

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Cast

Seasons

  • Ep 1

    1.Pilot (1)

    03-11-198160m

    In the late 1800s, John Murphy wanders into a wild mining town controlled by a local tycoon. Instant enmity is born, but the gritty Murphy joins a local miner and a homeless waif t...

  • Ep 2

    2.Pilot (2)

    03-11-198160m
  • Ep 3

    3.Eggs, Milk and a Dry Bed

    10-11-198160m

    A handsome but ineffectual priest joins the school and provides comic opposition to Murphy and a pair of brothers in the orphanage, one of whom has a bed-wetting problem.

  • Ep 4

    4.Establish Thou the Work of Our Hands

    17-11-198160m

    Murphy befriends an embittered black boy and teaches him a useful trade—wagon driving. But a wagon wreck causes the boy to lose the use of his hand, and Murphy must help him cope...

  • Ep 5

    5.A Horse from Heaven

    24-11-198160m

    Father Parker mistakenly trades some of the stock for a fast, beautiful horse... that no one can ride. He'd hoped to race it in the territorial fair to win the $1000 purse, but he'...

  • Ep 6

    6.By the Bear That Bit Me (1)

    01-12-198160m

    A mountain man deposits a young boy at the orphanage. The boy soon turns out to be a young girl, attracting the amorous attentions of young Ephram. When he feels rejected by her, E...

  • Ep 7

    7.By the Bear That Bit Me (2)

    08-12-198160m

    Murphy and Eli must finally wade in to con the authorities into releasing the kids from the workhouse.

  • Ep 8

    8.False Blessings

    15-12-198160m

    Falling on hard times again, the school is seduced by an offer of ""state aid"" by a local official. Mae accepts the aid, only to learn that by doing so she has unwittingly agreed...

  • Ep 9

    9.The Ghost of Gold Hill

    22-12-198160m

    Comic episode in which the son of the original owner of Gold Hill Mine comes back to reclaim the school. Mae and Murphy are worried until they discover he's harmless, loveable... a...

  • Ep 10

    10.Graduation

    05-01-198260m

    Claiming he's an orphan because his parents are dead, an old man joins the school to achieve a lifelong ambition... to learn to read and write. Comical conflict arises with Rodman...

  • Ep 11

    11.Will's Surprise

    12-01-198260m

    When Will happens upon a large gold nugget, his drunk father shows up in town and kidnaps him, convinced the boys know where there's more. Will is locked in a dank root cellar and...

  • Ep 12

    12.Eighty-Eight Keys to Happiness

    19-01-198260m

    Moses discovers that music is the key to reaching a withdrawn blind girl. But the only way the school can afford a piano is by letting a local entrepreneur use the saloon building...

  • Ep 13

    13.Knights of the White Camelia

    02-02-198260m

    A runaway Southern boy, formerly a bugler in the rebel army, comes to the school and has trouble accepting Moses' status there. Simultaneously, undesirables in the area are forming...

  • Ep 14

    14.The Parable of Amanda

    09-02-198260m

    Amanda, a pretty accomplice to a bank robbery, is in a stage wreck near Gold Hill while escaping from her crime. She dons the habit of a nun who died in the wreck to avoid capture,...

  • Ep 15

    15.The Spy

    16-02-198260m

    When Rodman's unruly son is kicked out of boarding school, Rodman enrolls him at Gold Hill making him pose as an orphan in order to spy on the school, and he learns the secret of M...

  • Ep 16

    16.The Heir Apparent

    23-02-198260m

    A wealthy widow with a railroad fortune comes to Gold Hill hoping to adopt a son to take over the family business. She's very taken with Will, who would rather stay with Murphy, bu...

  • Ep 17

    17.In God's Arms

    02-03-198260m

    The death of an abandoned child drives Father Parker to forsake the priesthood. He moves to Jackson where the only job he can find is cleaning out the saloon. In his secular advent...

  • Ep 18

    18.The Dream Day

    14-03-198260m

    The orphanage stages an Open House for potential adopting parents, and this all-kid show examines the reactions of many of the children to finding new homes. Several of the kids fi...

  • Ep 19

    19.Laddie

    21-03-198260m

    Lizette's heart is broken when Father Parker sells Laddie, an aging horse. When the kids learn the horse is bound for slaughter, Will leads them on an expedition to get her back, n...

  • Ep 20

    20.Matthew & Elizabeth

    28-03-198260m

    Richard Garrett, the infamous twin of the villain from the pilot show, comes to Jackson to take over his late brother's empire. He doesn't reckon on resistance from Murphy when he...

  • Ep 21

    21.The First Miracle (1)

    04-04-198260m

    When a teenage girl falls in love with Murphy, it forces him to examine his own feelings for Mae and he proposes marriage. At the same time, Father Parker's attempts to build a ch...

  • Ep 22

    22.The First Miracle (2)

    11-04-198260m

    Emma feels rejected and in her upset state she divulges the secret of ""Father"" Murphy's identity to Rodman, causing the church to reverse its support for the new parish.

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