Lassie - Episode #270 - "Yochim’s Christmas" - Season 8 Ep.15 - 12/24/1961

The Yochims (from the episode "Cracker Jack") leave the city to return to their kinfolk after Pa dies, and they stop by the Martin's farm hoping to see if Lassie has any puppies to get one for Billy Joe. They are invited to spend Christmas Eve and while Timmy and Billy Joe are out visting Mitchell's grave in the woods (Billy Joe's old hound who was killed in the Cracker Jack episode), they help rescue an older man from under an overturned one-horse sleigh. Billy Joe becomes convinced the man is really Santa Claus. TRIVIA: The sleigh used in this episode is a Portland Cutter, made circa 1880-90's - a classic one horse sleigh used mostly in New England. For some strange reason the props crew put a singletree on the front bar on the runners, which is ridiculous because this sleigh is designed for a set of wooden shafts which connect directly to the runners in the front of the sleigh in order to act as a steering mechanism for the sleigh to follow the horse in a straight line. At the end of the episode Paul calls Ruth over to look at a set of tracks, but the camera never shows the angle of their view, so the audience is left guessing what they are looking at - which is supposed to be the sleigh's runner marks in the snow. If that shot was ever used, it never made it into the syndication copy. Lassie and the Lassie Trademark are owned by Classic Media, which is owned by Dreamworks Animation.This episode was broadcast (over the air antenna TV) by NBC affiliate COZI TV in 2013.