Custer, also known as The Legend of Custer, is a 17-episode military

Military

A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...

-western

Western (genre)

The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...

 television series which ran on ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

 from September 6 to December 27, 1967, with Wayne Maunder

Wayne Maunder

Wayne E. Maunder is a retired actor, originally from Canada, who starred in three American television series between 1967 and 1974.-Three television series:...

 in the starring role of then Lieutenant Colonel

Lieutenant colonel

Lieutenant colonel is a rank of commissioned officer in the armies and most marine forces and some air forces of the world, typically ranking above a major and below a colonel. The rank of lieutenant colonel is often shortened to simply "colonel" in conversation and in unofficial correspondence...

 George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. Raised in Michigan and Ohio, Custer was admitted to West Point in 1858, where he graduated last in his class...

. During the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

, Custer had risen to the rank of major general

Major General

Major general or major-general is a military rank used in many countries. It is derived from the older rank of sergeant major general. A major general is a high-ranking officer, normally subordinate to the rank of lieutenant general and senior to the ranks of brigadier and brigadier general...

, the youngest in the Union Army

Union Army

The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...

. He was demoted after the war during force reductions to the rank of Captain, but was reinstated in 1866 as a Lieutenant Colonel in command of the Seventh Cavalry, stationed at Fort Riley

Fort Riley

Fort Riley is a United States Army installation located in Northeast Kansas, on the Kansas River, between Junction City and Manhattan. The Fort Riley Military Reservation covers 100,656 acres in Geary and Riley counties and includes two census-designated places: Fort Riley North and Fort...

, Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

. Many of the soldiers in the regiment were derelicts, former Confederates

Confederate States of America

The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...

, or even criminals. The series was cancelled before the script timeline would have reached the Little Big Horn River of southeastern Montana

Montana

Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...

, where all perished on June 25, 1876, in a Sioux

Sioux

The Sioux are Native American and First Nations people in North America. The term can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or any of the nation's many language dialects...

 Indian

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

 ambush,

Robert F. Simon

Robert F. Simon

Robert F. Simon was an American character actor, often portraying military or authority figure roles. Though his face was recognized by audiences, he was mostly unknown by name...

 played Custer's commanding officer, U.S. General

General

A general officer is an officer of high military rank, usually in the army, and in some nations, the air force. The term is widely used by many nations of the world, and when a country uses a different term, there is an equivalent title given....

 Alfred H. Terry, who disapproved of Custer's long hair and much of his methodology of fighting Indians. Slim Pickens

Slim Pickens

Louis Burton Lindley, Jr. , better known by the stage name Slim Pickens, was an American rodeo performer and film and television actor who epitomized the profane, tough, sardonic cowboy, but who is best remembered for his comic roles, notably in Dr...

 starred as a scout

Reconnaissance

Reconnaissance is the military term for exploring beyond the area occupied by friendly forces to gain information about enemy forces or features of the environment....

 named California Joe Milner. Michael Dante

Michael Dante

Michael Dante is an American award winning actor of television, films and stage and a former professional minor league baseball player....

 appeared as Sioux Chief Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse was a Native American war leader of the Oglala Lakota. He took up arms against the U.S...

. Peter Palmer

Peter Palmer (actor)

Peter Palmer is an American actor best known for his portrayal of Li'l Abner, both on Broadway and on film....

 played Sergeant

Sergeant

Sergeant is a rank used in some form by most militaries, police forces, and other uniformed organizations around the world. Its origins are the Latin serviens, "one who serves", through the French term Sergent....

 James Bustard, a former Confederate soldier. Grant Woods appeared as Captain Myles Keogh

Myles Keogh

Myles Walter Keogh was an Irishman who fought in Italy during the 1860 Papal War before volunteering for the Union side in the American Civil War . During the war years, he was promoted from the rank of Captain to that of Major, finally being awarded the brevet rank of Lieutenant Colonel...

. Read Morgan

Read Morgan

Read Morgan is a former American actor whose longest-running role was as a United States Army cavalry officer in the 1960-1961 season of The Deputy, a western television series on NBC created by Norman Lear. Morgan appeared in thirty episodes as the one-eyed Sergeant Hapgood Tasker, recognized by...

, formerly a cavalry officer on NBC's The Deputy

The Deputy (TV series)

The Deputy is a 1959-1961 half-hour NBC western series featuring Henry Fonda as Chief Marshal Simon Fry of the Arizona Territory and Allen Case as Deputy Clay McCord, a storekeeper who tried to avoid using a gun.-Production:...

, appeared in the episode "Spirit Woman" in the role of a medicine man

Medicine man

"Medicine man" or "Medicine woman" are English terms used to describe traditional healers and spiritual leaders among Native American and other indigenous or aboriginal peoples...

.

A 20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...

 Production, Custer was created by Samuel A. Peeples

Samuel A. Peeples

Samuel Anthony Peeples was an American writer. He published several novels in the Western genre, often under the pen name Brad Ward, before moving into series television after being given a script assignment by Frank Gruber...

 and David Weisbart

David Weisbart

David M. Weisbart was an American film editor and producer.A native of Los Angeles, California, Weisbart began working in the film industry in 1942 as an editor...

. Leo Penn

Leo Penn

Leo Z. Penn was an American actor and director, and father of musician Michael Penn and actors Sean Penn and Chris Penn.-Early life:...

, the father of Sean Penn

Sean Penn

Sean Justin Penn is an American actor, screenwriter and film director, also known for his political and social activism...

, directed

Film director

A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...

 some episodes.

Guest stars included Lloyd Bochner

Lloyd Bochner

Lloyd Wolfe Bochner was a Canadian actor, usually playing the role of suave, rich leading men.- Career :...

, Rory Calhoun

Rory Calhoun

Rory Calhoun was an American television and film actor, screenwriter and producer, best known for his roles in Westerns.-Early life:...

, Philip Carey

Philip Carey

-Biography:He was born as Eugene Joseph Carey in Hackensack, New Jersey. A former U.S. Marine, Carey was wounded as part of the ship's detachment of the USS Franklin during World War II and served again in the Korean War....

, James Daly, Burr DeBenning

Burr DeBenning

Burr DeBenning was an American character actor, who has done work in both film and television. DeBenning appeared in nearly 100 films and TV shows during his career. His credits include the television films The House on Greenapple Road, Wolfen, The Incredible Melting Man, A Nightmare on Elm...

, Yvonne De Carlo

Yvonne De Carlo

Yvonne De Carlo was a Canadian-born American actress of film and television. During her six-decade career, her most frequent appearances in film came in the 1940s and 1950s and included her best-known film roles, such as of Anna Marie in Salome Where She Danced ; Anna in Criss Cross ; Sephora the...

, Gene Evans

Gene Evans

Gene Evans was an American actor.He was born in Holbrook, Arizona, but reared in Colton, California. His acting career began while he was serving in World War II. He performed with a theatrical troupe of GIs in Europe. Evans made his film debut in 1947 and appeared in dozens of movies and...

, Arthur Franz

Arthur Franz

Arthur Franz was a B-movie actor whose most notable role was as Lieutenant, Junior Grade H. Paynter, Jr. in The Caine Mutiny. He also appeared in Roseanna McCoy , Invaders from Mars , Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man and The Unholy Wife , among others...

, Billy Gray

Billy Gray (actor)

William Thomas "Billy" Gray , is a former American actor known primarily for his role as James "Bud" Anderson, Jr., in 193 episodes of the NBC and CBS situation comedy, Father Knows Best, which aired between 1954 and 1960. Gray's fellow cast members were Robert Young, Jane Wyatt, Elinor Donahue,...

, Barbara Hale

Barbara Hale

Barbara Hale is an American actress best known for her role as legal secretary Della Street on more than 250 episodes of the long-running Perry Mason television series and later reprising the role in dozens of made-for-TV movies....

, Stacy Harris

Stacy Harris (actor)

Stacy Harris was an American actor with hundreds of film and television appearances.Harris was best known for his role as agent Jim Taylor on ABC Radio's This is Your FBI and, later, for playing varied characters, often villains, on shows produced by Jack Webb's Mark VII Limited, such as Dragnet,...

, Earl Holliman

Earl Holliman

-Early life:Earl Holliman was born at Delhi in Richland Parish of northeastern Louisiana. Holliman’s biological father died before he was born, and his biological mother, living in poverty with several other children, gave him up for adoption at birth...

, Robert Loggia

Robert Loggia

Robert Loggia is an American film and television actor and director.- Early life :Loggia, an Italian American, was born on Staten Island, the son of Elena Blandino, a homemaker, and Benjamin Loggia, a shoemaker, both of whom were born in Sicily, Italy...

, Darren McGavin

Darren McGavin

Darren McGavin was an American actor best known for playing the title role in the television horror series Kolchak: The Night Stalker and his portrayal in the film A Christmas Story of the grumpy father given to bursts of profanity that he never realizes his son overhears...

, Ralph Meeker

Ralph Meeker

Ralph Meeker was an American stage and film actor best-known for starring in the 1953 Broadway production of Picnic, and in the 1955 film noir cult classic Kiss Me Deadly.-Career:...

, Mary Ann Mobley

Mary Ann Mobley

Mary Ann Mobley is a former Miss America, actress, and television personality.-Career:After serving her reign as Miss America 1959, Mobley embarked on a career in both film and television...

, Agnes Moorehead

Agnes Moorehead

Agnes Robertson Moorehead was an American actress. Although she began with the Mercury Theatre, appeared in more than seventy films beginning with Citizen Kane and on dozens of television shows during a career that spanned more than thirty years, Moorehead is most widely known to modern audiences...

 (as Watoma), Edward Mulhare

Edward Mulhare

Edward Mulhare was a popular television actor whose career spanned four decades.Born at 22 Quaker Road, Cork City, County Cork, Ireland, and educated by the Irish Christian Brothers, Mulhare intended to study medicine, but was sidetracked by a growing interest in acting...

, Kathleen Nolan

Kathleen Nolan

Kathleen Nolan is an American actress. She is sometimes confused with actress Jeanette Nolan. From 1957 to 1962, she played the role of Kate McCoy, a housewife in her late twenties, in the Walter Brennan series The Real McCoys....

, Larry Pennell

Larry Pennell

Larry "Bud" Pennell , aka Alessandro Pennelli, is an American television and film actor.Born in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, he is mainly a supporting actor, best known for his role as "Dash Riprock," the conceited, image-conscious, and macho Hollywood movie star courting "Elly May Clampett" in the...

, Paul Petersen

Paul Petersen

William Paul Petersen is an American movie actor, singer, novelist, and activist. Primarily known for his character-type roles in the 1960s and 1970s, as an adult Petersen established the organization A Minor Consideration to support child stars and other child laborers through legislation,...

, Donnelly Rhodes

Donnelly Rhodes

Donnelly Rhodes is a Canadian actor. He recently starred as Doctor Cottle on the Sci Fi Channel television program Battlestar Galactica. Before Battlestar Galactica he was probably best known to American audiences as the lovestruck, hapless escaped convict "Dutch Leitner" on the 1970s soap-opera...

 (as War Cloud), Chris Robinson

Chris Robinson (actor)

Chris Robinson is an actor who played Rick Webber #2 on General Hospital...

, Ned Romero

Ned Romero

Ned Romero is an American actor and opera singer who has appeared in television and film.Romero was born in Franklin, the seat of St. Mary Parish in South Louisiana, the son of Anna and Sidney Romero. His ancestry is Chitimacha Native American, as well as Spanish and French...

, Barbara Rush

Barbara Rush

Barbara Rush is an American stage, film, and television actress.-Career:A student at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Barbara Rush performed on stage at the Pasadena Playhouse before signing with Paramount Pictures...

, Albert Salmi

Albert Salmi

Albert Salmi was an American actor.-Biography:Albert Salmi was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Finnish immigrant parents, and following a stint in the Army, took up acting as a career, studying Method acting with Lee Strasberg. In 1955, Salmi starred in Bus Stop on Broadway...

, William Smith

William Smith (actor)

William Smith is an American actor who has appeared in almost 300 feature films and television productions.Smith began his acting career at the age of 8 in 1942...

 (as Chief Tall Knife), Dub Taylor

Dub Taylor

Walter Clarence Taylor, Jr. , better known as Dub Taylor, was an American actor who worked extensively in Westerns, but also in comedy from the 1940s into the 1990s.-Early life:...

, Ray Walston

Ray Walston

Ray Walston was an American stage, television and film actor best known as the title character on the 1960s situation comedy My Favorite Martian. In addition, he is also remembered for his roles as Luther Billis in South Pacific , Mr. Applegate in Damn Yankees , J.J...

, James Whitmore

James Whitmore

James Allen Whitmore, Jr. was an American film and stage actor.-Early life:Born in White Plains, New York, to Florence Belle and James Allen Whitmore, Sr., a park commission official, Whitmore attended Amherst Central High School in Snyder, New York, before graduating from The Choate School in...

, and William Windom

William Windom (actor)

William Windom is an American actor. He is perhaps best known for his work on television, including several episodes of The Twilight Zone; playing the character of Glen Morley, a congressman from Minnesota like his own great-grandfather and namesake in The Farmer's Daughter; the character of John...

. In the last episode entitled "The Raiders", Custer enlists the aid of Kiowa

Kiowa

The Kiowa are a nation of American Indians and indigenous people of the Great Plains. They migrated from the northern plains to the southern plains in the late 17th century. In 1867, the Kiowa moved to a reservation in southwestern Oklahoma...

 Indians to help him to locate the parties responsible for a series of wagon train

Wagon train

A wagon train is a group of wagons traveling together. In the American West, individuals traveling across the plains in covered wagons banded together for mutual assistance, as is reflected in numerous films and television programs about the region, such as Audie Murphy's Tumbleweed and Ward Bond...

 raids.

Custer faced competition from NBC's long-running 90-minute western The Virginian

The Virginian (TV series)

The Virginian is an American Western television series starring James Drury and Doug McClure, which aired on NBC from 1962 to 1971 for a total of 249 episodes. Filmed in color, The Virginian became television's first 90-minute western series...

starring James Drury

James Drury

James Child Drury, Jr. is an American actor probably best known for his success in playing the title role in the 90-minute weekly Western television series The Virginian, broadcast on NBC from 1962-1971...

 and Doug McClure

Doug McClure

Douglas Osborne "Doug" McClure was an American actor whose career in film and television extended from the 1950s to the 1990s...

 and CBS

CBS

CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...

's Lost in Space

Lost in Space

Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen, filmed by 20th Century Fox Television, and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965, and March 6, 1968...

starring Guy Williams, June Lockhart

June Lockhart

June Lockhart is an American actress, primarily in 1950s and 1960s television, but with memorable performances on stage and in film too. She is remembered as the mother in two TV series, Lassie and Lost in Space. She also portrayed Dr...

, and Mark Goddard

Mark Goddard

Mark Goddard is an American film actor who has starred in a number of television programs. He portrayed Major Don West, the space adversary of Dr. Zachary Smith in the cult 1960s CBS series, Lost in Space, and Detective Sgt...

.

Maunder was twenty-eight when he was cast as the 28-year-old Custer. The show was canceled due to wide protest of Native American

Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...

tribes throughout the United States.