61 Years Ago, This Main ‘Gunsmoke’ Character Abruptly Left the Iconic Western Series and Never Returned

For the first nine seasons of Gunsmoke, James Arness‘ Marshal Matt Dillon was joined on the job by the lovable (albeit simple) Chester Goode, played remarkably by Dennis Weaver. A faithful and occasionally competent sidekick to Dillon, Chester never quite overshadowed the show’s main hero, and that was always part of his Midwestern-y charm. Yet, he was still a semi-permanent fixture in the series, one who stuck around for nearly a decade before calling it quits. But why did Weaver eventually leave the show? Well, simply speaking, he had greater aspirations beyond what Dodge itself could offer.

Dennis Weaver Played Chester Goode for Nearly Nine Seasons on ‘Gunsmoke’

Most know that before Gunsmoke was a television series, it was a radio program first. It’s no wonder then that Chester originated in the broadcast drama, played by Parley Baer and named “Chester Proudfoot.” Though the Chester of the radio show was most certainly meant to be an older character (and wasn’t actually a deputy), the television adaptation changed all that. Instead, Dennis Weaver played a bit younger version of the character, one with a clear Midwestern accent, a limp in his step, and a love for coffee that surpasses, well, almost everything else. Renamed Chester Goode, Gunsmoke made Matt Dillon’s sidekick an official deputy, and gave Weaver — who was over six-foot himself but still looked quite short compared to James Arness — more material as the years went on. While Chester was rarely the focus, several episodes put him in the spotlight.

Over the span of 290 episodes, Dennis Weaver turned Chester into not only a Dodge City staple, but a consistent and integral member of the community. Alongside Milburn Stone‘s Doc Adams, Amanda Blake‘s Miss Kitty, and eventually Burt Reynolds‘ Quint Asper, Chester was a character that folks came to expect would always be around so long as Marshal Matt Dillon was stationed in the Old West. After all, Weaver had stuck with the program throughout its transition from a half-hour format to an hour-long one, and had been with the show for nearly a decade. Featured in far more episodes than most television characters ever see these days, Dennis Weaver made a name for himself as Chester Goode, but he didn’t want to be limited by the character either.

Thus, Weaver left the program midway through its ninth season, with his very last episode being “Bently,” a Chester-centric hour that focused on the deputy as he uncovered the secrets behind one murderer’s deathbed confession. It’s a fine episode, and with his final on-screen words (“Well, maybe I’ll… I’ll take you down to the station”), the Western deputy remains a good man until the end. Tragically, no explanation is ever given for Chester’s absence from the rest of the series. Although fans undoubtedly knew that Weaver had left the program, neither Matt nor the rest of the cast acknowledged that Chester was no longer there, despite his place among Dodge City’s finest. One could, perhaps, assume that, given his final moments, he left town with the widow Clara Wright (Jan Clayton), but this is never confirmed.

After ‘Gunsmoke,’ Dennis Weaver Wanted To Try New Things

Following “Bently,” Weaver returned to television on the short-lived NBC drama Kentucky Jones, which lasted only a single season of 26 episodes. After that, Weaver would star in the feature film Gentle Ben, which would spawn a television continuation that lasted 56 episodes on CBS. In that time, Weaver also found himself guest-starring on various programs and being featured in a handful of films as well, but nothing as popular as his time as Chester on one of televisions most classic Westerns. So, why did the TV star move on from the program? Well, he had his reasons.

In 2002, Weaver spoke to the Television Academy about that very thing. It was no secret that the star felt that he had exhausted every creative possibility with the Chester character, a deputy who was often quite one-note even at his finest. “I’d got into the business to play a leading man and have more say-so about whether the show’s a success or not,” Weaver admitted to the Television Academy. “I just felt it was time to move on.” Of course, it was the way that Weaver left Gunsmoke that — much like the way the show ended in its 20th season — rubbed audiences the wrong way as there was no real goodbye to the character. Chester is simply gone, and Ken Curtis‘ Festus (who had been introduced the season prior) simply takes his place as Dodge’s foremost deputy. Weaver eventually did break from the Gunsmoke mold to play a traditional Western hero of his own making.

After ‘Gunsmoke,’ Dennis Weaver Starred in ‘McCloud’

Image via NBC

While Festus took over deputy duties on Gunsmoke, ensuring that Matt Dillon would always have a quirky sidekick, Weaver sought career opportunities that he wouldn’t have had still pigeonholed into the Chester type. Having broken free from that mold and proven himself valuable in a variety of other acting capacities, NBC took a chance on Weaver by casting him in the starring role of a new Herman Miller police drama simply titled McCloud.

A part of the network’s NBC Mystery Movie wheel series of rotating television programs (which also included Columbo and Hec Ramsey at different times), the series followed New Mexican Deputy Marshal Sam McCloud as he was thrust into the Big Apple, where his small-town Western sensibilities are forced to compete with the hustle and bustle of New York City. For seven years, the hour-long drama captivated modern audiences in a post-rural purge television landscape while still drawing in that aging audience from Weaver’s Gunsmoke days.

But looking back on it, Dennis Weaver never regretted getting out of Dodge. “I have no regrets about leaving Gunsmoke,” he told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch TV Magazine in 1970. “I’m [finally] doing what I wanted to do when I left that show. It took me six years to get here.” After all, Weaver always wanted to be a leading star, and he was never going to graduate into that on a show like Gunsmoke. Instead, McCloud was the program that put him on the map as a leading star who could bring his Western charm to the modernity of New York. As it turned out, everything worked out for Chester — err, Weaver — in the end, even if we never got a proper Gunsmoke farewell.

Gunsmoke

Release Date

1955 – 1974

Directors

Andrew V. McLaglen, Harry Harris, Ted Post, Bernard McEveety, Vincent McEveety

Writers

John Meston, Charles Marquis Warren, Paul Savage

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  James Arness

  Marshal Matt Dillon

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