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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Snarky Oracle!" data-source="post: 441086" data-attributes="member: 57984">Even when it was in its 20th season, the first half of the year saw GUNSMOKE appear in the Top 5 for the week occasionally, the ratings drooping in the last half of the season when Leonard Katzman left midway through, and show's tone changed... When it was cancelled in 1975, James Arness attributed it to "demographic horsefeathers" (i.e., the audience was getting grey around the temples). So the team went over to ABC and did HOW THE WEST WAS WON, which was a hit... GUNSMOKE could have run another 5 years.When it ended, it was the longest-running live-action scripted series in American primetime history. And when that record was tied or surpassed decades later, it was in an era where you needed only one-tenth the audience to be regarded as "a hit" and be easily renewed.</blockquote>