Young Pioneers' Christmas (1976)

Young Pioneers' Christmas is a 1976 American made-for-television Western drama film which was broadcast by ABC in December 1976 as a Christmas special starring Linda Purl and Roger Kern. It was a sequel to the made-for-television movie Young Pioneers which aired earlier in March 1976 and was produced using the same creative team of Ed Friendly (producer), Blanche Hanalis (screenwriter), and Michael O'Herlihy (director). The movie is loosely based on the 1933 novel Let the Hurricane Roar by Rose Wilder Lane, which was reissued by Bantam Books in 1976 using the same title of Young Pioneers for the paperback book. This was a second attempt to interest ABC in a TV series after Young Pioneers was not picked up by the network. There were hopes this pilot would succeed but it ranked only 37th in the Nielsen ratings. Although not initially picked up by ABC, it was revived as a short-lived television series, The Young Pioneers, which was broadcast in April 1978 on ABC and canceled after three episodes.