The Petrified Forest – Producers’ Showcase – Aired on May 30th 1955
An early television adaptation of a famous film from 1936. I loved it.
Natalie Schafer does an amazing job in a supporting role, and Henry Fonda, quite incredibly enough, manages to outshine Humphrey Bogart. You might see it all as a bit overwrought, and you might be right, but I’d watch it again anyway.
I’m not sure exactly where the action takes place, though there’s a mighty clue in the title. Beyond that, these essential real places get a mention:
The Gila Cliff Dwellings
Hillsboro, NM
Buckhorn, NM (“on route 11”, apparently before there was a US 180)
and Winslow too.
Per the big wiki:
“NM 11 was one of the original numbered routes during the formation of the New Mexico State Highway System in 1912, running from NM 4 in Deming north to NM 43 and NM 12 in Mogollon via Silver City.”
So in 1936 there definitely was an 11 and it would have run right through Buckhorn, too. (Today the remnant runs south from Deming to the frontera.)
There’s still no way to know where the diner or ‘Black Mesa’ would have been exactly, but maybe twentyish miles from either Concho or Holbrook, right along the blessed route I’ll be taking again soon.