"Courage the Cowardly Dog" follows Courage (Marty Grabstein), a kind yet easily frightened dog. He was abandoned as a puppy after his parents were forcibly sent into outer space by a crazed veterinarian. Soon after, he was found in an alleyway by Muriel Bagge (Thea White), a friendly, sweet-natured Scottish woman, who decided to take Courage in as her own, and was inspired by the nature of this first meeting to give him his name. In the present, he lives with the now elderly Muriel and her also elderly husband Eustace Bagge (Lionel Wilson episodes 1–33, Arthur Anderson episodes 34–52), a grumpy, selfish and greedy farmer who regularly mistreats Courage out of jealousy and refers to him as "stupid dog". The entire family lives in a two floor, isolated farmhouse in what consists of a large, desert-like area in the middle of Kansas: the nearest town to the farmhouse is a fictional town with the literal name of Nowhere.