Big Sky Movie Ranch is a 10,000+ acre ranch was, and continues to be, a working cattle ranch and farm. In the 1880's, the property was leased by a company in New Mexico. During these early years, the ranch was known as Patterson Ranch. J. Paul Getty, the oil tycoon, bought the ranch in the early 1930's and renamed it The Tapo Ranch. He retained ownership of the property until 1981/82 when the Big Sky Ranch Co., a partnership managed by Watt Enterprises, bought the property. Until the partnership purchased the ranch, Newhall Land & Farm leased it (they are another movie ranch company). In 1987, the partnership put the ranch up for sale by auction, but none of the bids were high enough and the ranch remains as it has been. Movie making history at the ranch dates back at least to the middle 1950's when some exterior scenes for Gunsmoke were filmed there utilizing their 3-sided ranch house.
I had a private walk-through of the ranch with Debra Early who, along with her husband, Don, are ranch managers. She is very knowledgeable about the ranch and its history. She has been at the ranch since 1983 and is the one who deals actively with the movie companies (her husband prefers to deal with the cattle and farming end of the ranch business). I was very fortunate, because she told me when I made the appointment to see her for a walk-through that "Gambler Four" was in the process of filming at the ranch (more about it later).
I had an 8 A.M. appointment with her at Big Sky. I met her at her office where she showed me a topographical relief map of the entire ranch. The portion of the ranch which contains the majority of the standing sets is less than 600 acres--the entire ranch is about 10,000 acres.
We soon were in her pickup truck headed to the entrance of the ranch where we found a large parking area. She indicated to me that this was the crew parking area and that only production vehicles are allowed at the filming sites due to space limitations.
From the entrance, we headed up a dirt road into the hills and in less than a mile, we arrived at the first standing set location. A one-room log cabin (said to have been used in a recent Wells Fargo Bank commercial) stood within a few hundred feet of Michael Landon's little house set used in his show "Little House on the Prairie" (which includes the house, barn, chicken coop, corral, and outbuilding).
The "Little House" is a replica of the original which was moved off
the ranch by one of the stars of the sequel series.
Farther up the road and off onto a side road that we had to walk, we came to the sets used in the "Father Murphy" series. A film crew was shooting scenes in the Gold Hill Saloon for "Gambler Four", due out on NBC during the 91-92 season. It stars Kenny Rogers and Reba McEntire, along with many stars making cameo appearances. "Gambler Four" had been filming at several of the movie ranches in Southern California prior to their stay at Big Sky, and they were in the middle of a 2 week stay there.
Other standing sets in this area of the ranch which you are probably familiar with include from "Little House on the Prairie", the Jonathon Garvey house and barn, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder house and barn (her second of three houses on the show); from "Gunsmoke" the 3-sided house and barn; a house used in "The Miracle Worker", starring Patty Duke, which stands at a site with a barn and outbuilding;
and the newest permanent set at the ranch, a church which can double as a school (it was designed by Debra Early). If it still existed, from the church you could see the entire town of Walnut Grove used in "Little House on the Prairie" (Michael Landon blew them up for the finale episode).
To the north of this area of the ranch is a flat stretch of land, mainly used for farming, but also was used for the cattle drives in "Rawhide" in the 1960's. In the same area is a barn built for the "Quantum Leap" T.V. show, and a palace used in the Eddie Murphy movie "Coming to America". The area behind the palace was the site of the Drogheda estate in the miniseries "The Thorn Birds".
Some of the other shows filmed at the ranch include "Dallas", "A Call From Space", "Highway to Heaven", "Yellow Rose", "Sidekicks", "Tales of the Crypt", and many, many more, along with many commercials.
The ranch usually averages about 1 production unit a week, but recently have had more (possibly because Newhall Land & Farm have cut back greatly on the amount of land devoted to filming). They charge between $1250.00 and $2,000.00 a day for filming, depending on the type of filming (feature versus commercial). Prep and strike days run $550.00 to $650.00.
Their brochure sums up best what their ranch is like:
"...Big Sky Movie Ranch, one of the last great working motion pictures ranches in Southern California. Big Sky Movie Ranch consists of 9000+ acres, with beautiful rolling hills, great vistas, secluded canyons, undulating valleys, the scope of this property is as broad as one's imagination can conjure."
The 1994 Northridge earthquake damaged many of the buildings on the property, while others had to be demolished.
