"Escort to Santa Fe" (19 December 1960)
What is the fictional date of "Escort to Santa Fe" broadcast on 19 December 1960?
That's an easy question, because there is a day calendar in the marshal's office in El Paso, Texas, showing that the first day is April 14, 1865, and the next day is April 15, 1865. And a telegram arrives at the end saying that President Lincoln was shot yesterday, which was April 14, 1865 in real history.
But some persons would ask why everyone in April 14, 1865 assumed that the Civil War was over.
After the Battle of Five Forks, April 1, 1865, and the Third Battle of Petersburg on 2 April 1865 General Lee and his army abandoned the Rebel capital of Richmond on the night of April 2-3. Lee surrendered what was left of his Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox on April 9, 1865, the same day that a much smaller rebel force surrendered at Fort Blakely, Alabama.
More Rebel surrenders totaling hundreds of thousands of men continued until June 23, 1865, and the commerce raider Shenandoah surrendered November 6 1865.
Fort Harmony is a fictional fort 2 day's ride from El Paso, Texas.
It seems very improbably that in 1865 El Paso would have a telegraphic line connected to Western Union's transcontinental telegraph line.
"The Sooners", 3 March 1858, begins shortly before the Oklahoma Land Rush on April 22, 1889, as Hardie says in his opening narration. "Sooners" were criminals who sneaked into the land rush zone ahead of time, thus literally "jumping the gun", and thus had an unfair advantage to stake their claims to be best land ahead of everyone else.
Later in the episode a calendar showing the month of December is glimpsed, so "The Sooners" could last from April to December of 1889.
In any case "The Sooners" begins 24 years after "Escort to Santa Fe", making it amazing how little Jim Hardie seemed to age between the two episodes.