Did You Know?

During the first season of the show, the guest stars were paid far more than the stars of the show because the producers didn't think that the stars were well-known enough to pull in viewers.

When Pernell Roberts left the show, his character Adam was written off by having him move to Australia.

The character 'Ben Cartwright' was ranked #2 in TV Guide's list of the "50 Greatest TV Dads of All Time" (20 June 2004 issue).

Although it got off to a rough start, by 1961 it was the #1 show on TV.

According to the 1973 book "Marilyn Beck's Hollywood", when Pernell Roberts told Lorne Greene he was leaving the series because he wanted to challenge himself as an actor, Greene told him to stick to it as he would be so rich by the end of the run he could hire Tennessee Williams himself to write a play for him. Roberts' career went into a tailspin that lasted over a decade after he left the show. Co-star Michael Landon later said of Roberts' departure that they simply took a leaf out of the dining room table and split the money three rather than four ways. While the post "Bonanza" Roberts struggled (until later catching on with Trapper John, M.D., Greene, Landon and Dan Blocker became very wealthy from their income from the show, which all three wisely invested.

This was the first US Western television show to have all its episodes filmed in color.

During the filming of one episode, Lorne Greene was required to jump off a small ledge into a lake five feet below. Michael Landon later recalled that when Greene did the stunt, he jumped into the water feet first and went completely under, but his hair piece came off and floated on the surface of the lake. Landon and the rest of the crew watched to see what would happen. After a short while, Greene's hand shot up out of the water, grabbed the hairpiece, and pulled it down. Greene emerged from the lake, wearing his hairpiece slightly askew. He walked nonchalantly past the snickering crew, and went into his trailer without saying a word.

The last 14 episodes of Season One and the first 17 episodes of Season Two have fallen into the public domain. These 31 episodes have been released by many different companies in many different configurations, usually with the familiar theme music replaced with generic music. Starting with episode 1.19, the 31 episodes in order are: The Gunmen, The Fear Merchants, The Spanish Grant, Blood on the Land, Desert Justice, The Stranger, Escape to Ponderosa, The Avenger, The Last Trophy, San Francisco Holiday (aka San Francisco), Bitter Water, Feet of Clay, Dark Star, Death at Dawn, Showdown, The Mission, Badge Without Honor, The Mill, The Hopefuls, Denver McKee, Day of Reckoning, The Abduction, Breed of Violence, The Last Viking, The Trail Gang, The Savage, Silent Thunder, The Ape, The Blood Line, The Courtship, and The Spitfire.

For most of its 430 episode run, the main sponsor of Bonanza was Chevrolet and the stars occasionally appeared in commercials endorsing Chevrolet automobiles.

A recurring situation (which also occurs in the TV western The Big Valley), was that every time one of the Cartwrights became seriously involved with a woman, she died from a malady, was slain, or left with someone else.

According to David Dortort, 'Michael Landon' himself grew difficult during the last five seasons the show ran, "Nearly every line, every scene, every set up... everything would halt for endless story conferences on the set... it got increasingly bitter toward the end."

Saturday night ratings were dismal and Bonanza was soon targeted for cancellation. Given one last chance, it was moved to Sunday nights at 9:00 p.m. The new time slot caused the series to soar, and it eventually reached number one by the mid-'60s.

CBS/Paramount announced on June 1, 2009 that the first season of Bonanza would be released to DVD on September 1 of the same year. This will be one of the first pre-1973 NBC shows to be distributed on DVD, by CBS and Paramount. Episodes of the "Bell Telephone Hour", broadcast in color by NBC between 1959 and 1968, have already been released on DVD.

Dan Blocker owned a chain of restaurants called "Bonanza". They were steakhouses similar to the "Golden Corral" chain. When the ownership later changed, all of the restaurants were later renamed "Ponderosa".

Guy Williams appeared in five episodes towards the end of the fifth season as Ben's brother, Will. Pernell Roberts wanted to leave the show and Williams was set to become a full time cast member in the sixth season. A storyline was written in which Adam Cartwright was to get married and leave the ranch. However, Roberts decided late in the season to stay for one more year so Will was written out of the show. The three other lead actors were unhappy with the Will storyline and would have rather continued without a fourth lead. When Roberts left after the sixth season, the series did continue with just the three leads.