Runaway Kid

Runaway Kid
Season 1 > • < Episode 6 >
Air Date	November 7, 1960
Cast	Andy Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor Don Knotts as Deputy Barney Fife Ron Howard as Opie Taylor Frances Bavier as Aunt Bee Taylor Pat Rosson as George "Tex" Foley Dennis Holmes as Tommy Donald Losby as Steve
Director(s)	Don Weis
Writer(s)	Arthur Stander
Previous	Irresistible Andy
Next	Andy the Matchmaker
Summary	Andy teaches Opie about how important it is to keep a promise, only to have that lesson conflict with his need to help Opie's friend who ran away from home.
Sequential Episode	6

Summary

Andy teaches Opie about how important it is to keep a promise, only to have that lesson conflict with his need to help Opie's friend who ran away from home.

Plot

A practical joke by Opie and a couple of his friends leads to a lesson on the value of keeping your promises. Despite promising to keep quiet,

Andy Gets a Ticket

Opie decides to turn honest and tell Andy that he and his friends were the ones who pushed the squad car in front of a fire hydrant. This leads to a classic confrontation between Barney and Andy. Although Andy appreciates Opie being honest, he explains to Opie that it's more important to keep one's word. This seemingly good life lesson quickly turns the tables on Andy. When Opie befriends a runaway boy, Opie, having promised not to reveal the boy's real name (he calls himself Tex) or the town he comes from, refuses to give up this information to Andy because he really took the earlier lesson to heart. Rather than contradict his own words, Andy gives up trying to find out. When Andy receives word of the runaway from local police, he is able to convince Tex to let him call his parents back home. By saying that he might have to carry a few hundred sandwiches. Andy then explains to Opie that keeping one's promises is certainly important, but there are times when a greater good and using a little common sense requires one to bend the rules.

Notes/Trivia

• This is the last episode where any references are made about Andy and Barney being cousins.
• Barney is said to own an automobile in this episode. This bit of information causes a discrepancy with the premise of the storyline in episode Barney's First Car, which occurred two years later.
• This is the first appearance of a fire hydrant being in front of the Courthouse. It is referred to several more times throughout The Andy Griffith Show run.

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