On a nice day 1878 the sisters Lisa and Rose and their cousin Inger Cartwright saw someone coming upon their yard of the Ponderosa ranch. The man threw harsh a pup on the ground.
“Stay here damn pup!”, the man snapped where after he rode away quickly.
The girls came to the pup and kneeled down by him. The pup softly cried but by the stroking by Lisa he became calm.
“Would we be allowed to keep him?”, asked Rose.
“Maybe as a watch dog just like Cody is. Cody is very old though”, said Lisa.
Inger stroke him too and said, “He is very sweet.”
Already the three of them were fond of the Labrador and he was that too of them. He licked the girls.
“We ask Mitch and Pam to help”, said Lisa.
The twins had helped the younger Cartwrights already often when they wanted something eagerly. The children got up and walked to the porch. The pup followed them automatically.
Rose saw that and said, “He walks a bit difficult.”
Lisa looked and answered, “He walks a bit like Mitch.”
The girls didn’t have to ask the twins for support because their grandpa, Ponderosa ranch owner Ben Cartwright, saw his granddaughters and the pup coming.
He kneeled down on the porch and said, “I think that you want to keep this pup.”
“May we grandpa? Then Cody and Lucky have a little one too to look after. We do that too, together with the twins”, Lisa said hopeful and begging.
She told how the pup had come on the yard.
“Then he stays here. But the pup must have a name though”, said the rancher.
Inger said, “He walks just like Mitch.”
“He is called Skip because he limps a bit when walking”, said Lisa.
“Well Skip, welcome to the Ponderosa”, Ben said to the pup who licked the hand of the rancher.
Inside the other Cartwrights got acquainted with Skip. Even Lucky, the white cat, accepted him right away. Cody, the old shepherd dog, licked Skip and took care of the pup.
A week after Skip had come to the ranch the eldest Cartwright boy, Adam, came home from a business trip. He had taken his 2 oldest children, the twins Mitch and Pam, taken along.
“I wonder if anything has happened during our absence”, Adam said while he hitched his horse Sport.
“How can that be when we were with you?”, asked Pam.
“But your uncles were at home so then a whole lot can happen” , reacted her father.
Mitch said dry, “Your brothers already came into trouble before we were born. I even dare to bet before daddy met mama.”
“Uncle Joe has invited the comprehension ‘getting into trouble’”, said Adam.
They went inside laughing where Skip walked up to them curiously.
“Mitch, Skip walks just like you do”, said Lisa.
“Very funny Lisa. But at least now I am not the only one in the house who is crippled”, her brother reacted.
He, Pam and Adam too directly made friends with the pup.
Despite his bad start Skip had found a good home anyway.