Wagon Train (TV Series)

The Gus Morgan Story (1963)

Peter Falk: Gus Morgan

Photos 

Quotes 

• Gus Morgan : Maybe you think a quitter doesn't have to defend himself.

  Ethan Morgan : I'm not a quitter, Gus.

  Gus Morgan : Well, what would you call it? Do you have a better name for it?

  Ethan Morgan : Yes. How about: common sense?

• Christopher Hale : Morgan... Morgan...

  Gus Morgan : What do you want? I can't carry you both. Don't you know that. I can't carry you both. Why don't you just...

• Ethan Morgan : I don't understand you, Gus. You never drank like that before.

  Gus Morgan : Leave me alone.

  Ethan Morgan : Look, if there's something, can't you tell me what it is.

  Gus Morgan : What could YOU do?

• Gus Morgan : [In the hotel room with unique quilts on each bed]  You don't leave a wounded animal to die and suffer a slow death. You put it out of its misery. And that's what he was. He was an animal. That's what we all were, just animals, trying to stay alive. I didn't want to the one that made the choice. But I did.

• Gus Morgan : [At the ticket office window]  Ma'am, ma'am, one for the Eastbound.

  Depot Clerk : Sorry. Too late. All sold out.

  Gus Morgan : No, no. No, you're not doing that to me again. You said come back Thursday. Now I'm back and I want my ticket.

  [She slams the shutter down] 

  Gus Morgan : I want my ticket. I WANT MY TICKET! I WANT MY TICKET!

  Depot Clerk : [She returns, cocks her gun]  You know, I can shoot you for trying to break in this here ticket office. I could say you were trying to steal the money.

  Gus Morgan : You got no right to refuse me. Now I say you gotta help me.

• Gus Morgan : Where're you going? You going into some corner to lick your wounds?

  Ethan Morgan : You think I should hit you back, don't you?

  Gus Morgan : Yes, I like it better. I think a man would.

  Ethan Morgan : Then I'm sorry to disappoint you. Maybe if you'd be around more, you could have taught me that a man is only a man when he can force other men to their knees. And watch them die without getting sick to his stomach.

• Ethan Morgan : A locomotive still just a piece of machinery. You feed it coal and water and it works for you. It runs and your railway makes money. And when a locomotive gets worn out and quits, you don't mourn it and feel guilty because you ended its life. You toss it on the scrapheap and get a new one and forget about it.

  Gus Morgan : Are you trying to stack an engine up against the lives of the men who were lost in the tunnel?

  Ethan Morgan : One of the men was Sam Benson, a friend of mine, and yours once. Before you outgrew a gang.

  Gus Morgan : You don't run a railway on sentiment.

  Ethan Morgan : All right, Gus. How much in dollars and cents do you think those 20 lives were worth? Enough to buy a locomotive?

• Christopher Hale : There are different types of men, Morgan. I think your brother's a man.

  Gus Morgan : You siding with him?

  Christopher Hale : I don't know enough about railroading to side with anybody. But I do know something about people. I haven't got any more stomach to see 20 men die than Ethan. You want to tell me I'm not a man?