The final Gunsmoke dedication ever rolls at the end of this movie, and is made to John Meston, who is widely considered to be the co-creator of Gunsmoke, along with Norman MacDonnell. Meston, who died in 1979, was the original writer for the radio version of Gunsmoke and continued in that role as principal writer when the show moved to television and starred James Arness in the Dillon role.
In this television movie, Pat Hingle portrayed Colonel Tucker, but during the run of the television series, he played the recurring character of Dr. John Chapman in a total of six episodes. While it was common for actors to play more than one character over the course of the long-running series, it is surprising that an actor who played only one character in multiple episodes would suddenly play someone else here.
Jason Lively played a character named Rusty Dover. In National Lampoon's European Vacation (1985), he played Rusty Griswold.
Pat Hingle previously played another character by the name of Colonel Tucker in the TV show MASH in the year 1980 titled "April Fools"
The film references the Pleasant Valley War which was a range war that occurred in Arizona between 1882 and 1892. As in the film, the 'war' was an explosive and bloody feud between two families - the Grahams and the Tewksburys.