Robinson Crusoe on Mars 1964

Commander Christopher “Kit” Draper, [Paul Mantee], USN, and Colonel Dan McReady, [Adam West], USAF, reach Mars in their ship, Mars Gravity Probe 1. When a looming orbiting meteoroid forces them to shed their remaining fuel, they descend in separate one-man lifeboat pods, becoming the first humans on the red planet, but the journey leaves them separated and stranded on opposite sides of the world they’ve just discovered.

Draper finds a sheltering cave and begins to learn survival on this desolate world. He discovers that heating coal-like rocks not only provides warmth but also releases oxygen, allowing him to refill his air tanks with a hand pump and to move more freely in the thin Martian atmosphere. During a long trek, he encounters McReady’s crashed pod and confirms the commander’s death through the wreckage. He also stumbles upon Mona, their monkey, alive [The Woolly Monkey], and his curiosity about her behavior grows as she continually disappears and shows little interest in the dwindling supplies. To keep up her spirits, he offers a salty cracker, though water remains scarce. When Mona thirsts, he releases her, and she leads him to a hidden cave where a large pool of water holds edible plant “sausages,” a crucial turn in his dwindling food supply.

As months pass, Draper’s isolation begins to take a toll. He clings to the hope of rescue while his own lifeline—the main spaceship he calls a “supermarket”—cycles overhead, unable to land due to the lack of fuel. One day, he encounters a dark rock slab standing nearly upright and digs around it, unearthing a skeletal hand adorned with a black bracelet. He reveals a full humanoid skeleton, deducing murder, with a skull scarred by a burn. In a bid to hide his discovery, he orders his ship to self-destruct, a desperate act to erase any trace of what he has learned.

Not long after, a spaceship descends beyond the horizon. Draper approaches the landing site with cautious optimism, only to witness alien craft and human-looking slaves toiling in mining suits. A slave escapes and runs into Draper; an alien ship blasts the area as they flee. The escaped man bears the same black bracelets, linking him somehow to the earlier discovery. Draper rescues him and brings him back to the cave, where the aliens’ bombardment drives them deeper into hiding. Later, Draper and the stranger—whom Draper names “Friday,” after Robinson Crusoe—investigate the mining zone and find the dead bodies of the other slaves.

The initial bond between Draper and Friday deepens into trust and friendship as Draper teaches him English. A meteor shower tears overhead, coating the landscape in thick black ash. Draper is buried under the ash, but Friday saves him and shares his “air pills,” providing precious oxygen that sustains them.

With the aliens returning and apparently tracking Friday by his bracelets, Draper attempts to remove them with a wire saw. The aliens strike their hiding place, forcing Draper, Friday, and Mona to flee north through underground Martian canals. They surface near the polar icecap, exhausted, freezing, and nearly out of air pills. They craft a snow shelter, and Draper finally manages to sever Friday’s bracelets just as a meteoroid crashes into the ice cap. The ensuing explosion and fire melt the ice and snow, saving them from freezing to death.

A new signal comes: an approaching spaceship. Draper fears further alien danger, but his portable radio reveals an English-speaking voice. A capsule descends, and the story ends with Mars receding in the distance as they brace for whatever comes next.