Night Transmissions is a 120 minute show featuring vintage radio shows. In this show...
Murder By Experts 4/7/49, "Two Coffins To Fill". Witch's Tale 37-10/19/37, "Four Fingers and a Thumb". 2000 Plus 51-08-12, "The Skull And The Rocket". Believe It or Not 01/17/42, "Don't Rely on Doves".
Music:
The Brothers Four - The Green Leaves Of Summer (1960) Leonard Cohen - The Gypsy's Wife (1979) James Galway and Phil Coulter - Steal Away (1998)
These dates should not be taken as canonical.
Notes: This is a weekly program which began on a now defunct low power FM station (KSOW) in Cottage Grove, OR. Since there seems to be some interest in the show I have decided to continue it. In this connection I will post a new show by Tuesday or Wednesday of each week. There is also a 64 bit version.
In the main, each episode consists of four approximately 30-minute long programs (not always, as sometimes I use a longer form show, so it may be 3 or fewer) and some filler to bring them in at 120 minutes. .
Broadcast Advisories
Use these programs in any way that suits you, commercial, non-commercial (well,don't sell it). Use them on your low power FM station or your AM station. Stream it on your internet station or stream. Whatever. Edit them if you want to, however you want to! I'm easy. In a few cases commercials have been left in but in those cases there is disclaimer stating that they are there for "historical perspective" only. I have edited out any underwriter spots that once existed. There is no comment about run times ( i.e. "It's Sunday night at 10 pm and this is Night Transmissions.") Also I have edited out any mention of the town I live in. In other words I have endeavored to make make these programs as "Evergreen" and global as possible. I would even consider making (at some point) shows that are tailored to some degree for specific locations. In most cases the mp3 file runs a little longer than 120 minutes. However, in all cases the main show comes in at under 120 minutes; anything in excess of 120 minutes is just music that can safely be faded out.
As of show 21 there are 30 second musical interludes at 30,60 and 90 minutes. with the last 5 to 10 minutes or so of the show uninterrupted music that can be faded out on without too much ado, Exact times will be in the mp3 comment tag
If you do broadcast or stream these I'd really be grateful if you dropped me a note.
This episode contains the following segments..
Segment One: Is from, Murder By Experts. An anthology that ran in the United States between 1949 and 1951 on the Mutual Network. The program was at first hosted by mystery writer John Dickson Carr. Who would leave the show in 1950 to be replaced by Brett Halliday. With a catalog of 130 episodes (unfortunately only a handful are known to have survived) the show revolved around the premise that each week a guest mystery writer would select a story from another writer (as in not themselves) to be presented as that week's show. Sometimes at the end of the show (I guess as time permitted) there would be a critical postmortem of the episode, sometimes featuring well-known personalities. Murder by Experts was created by David Kogan. A man who is well remembered in old-time radio circles as the writer/creator of The Mysterious Traveler, The Strange Doctor Weird and, if not countless then at least numerous, other radio programs dotting the landscape the radio's "Golden Age".
Today's episode is from April 7th of 1949, "Two Coffins To Fill". The story opens in "Nicks place", which seems to be a rather disreputable establishment. A perfect place to carry on illicit affairs of various sorts ranging from the carnal to the extra-legal. And certainly not limited to the carrying ons of Roger and Eve.
I'm sure that it will come to you with no surprise were I to tell you that Roger is married... not to Eve of course. Eve is somewhat less than satisfied with this "arrangement" and has decided to break it off. A turn of events by which Roger is not particularly distressed.
You see, Roger is a cad. Actually he's much worse than that.
Segment Two:
Witch's Tale is credited with being the first horror themed radio show in history. This happened in 1931 when writer- director Alonzo Deen Cole somehow convinced WOR (in New York) to try a series devoted entirely to the supernatural. Not really predictably The series became the premier radio program of its day running until 1938 and is fondly remembered by it's fans to this day.
Only about three dozen episodes survive. According to Dave Siegel's book The Witch's Tale, Cole destroyed his recordings when he moved from New York to California. The three dozen or so surviving recordings exist due to the efforts of others. It was just that by 1961 Cole had come to believe that there was no commercial value to the actual radio transcriptions. He did keep bound copies of his 332 scripts which he protected by copy write. Today we have a Witch's Tale originally told on October 19th of 1937, "Four Fingers and a Thumb" . It's a story set in the 1840s about love and death; fidelity and betrayal, pride and prejudice well seasoned with revenge. It's about how things can get completely out of hand very quickly.
Segment Three:
2000+ was the first adult science-fiction drama to reach a mass audience. The first episode was broadcast by Mutual on March 15, 1950 .
It was the first but would not remain the only science fiction series for very long. On April 8, 1950 NBC would launch the much more highly regarded Dimension X.
Still, It cannot be denied that 2000+ was there first or that it would outlast Dimension X .
Dimension X would end its run on September 29, 1951. Whereas 2000+ would end on January 2, 1952.
So, by the yardstick of longevity we have to regard 2000+ as the more successful of the two programs. This is an assertion that would give rise to considerable acrimony among the fans of the later series.
What made 2000+ adult science fiction was the contrast to other early attempts at science fiction on the radio. before 2000+ that I was an occasional science-fiction themed episode on programs like suspense or escape and even some of the horror programming such as lights out. But in terms of episodic radio there had been only programs like Buck Rogers in the 25st century and Flash Gordon or Superman. These were 15 minute serials designed to appeal to juveniles.
The comparative sophistication of the plots and adult moral dilemmas posed by 2000+ definitely did take science fiction to a new level on radio.
What's clear is that 2000+ remains somewhat controversial among aficionados of science fiction with some feeling that it was a deplorable effort that pandered to an unsophisticated, somewhat juvenile audience and was no real credit to the science fiction of the era. There is a remarkable amount of disagreement surrounding the program. I am myself flip-flop between a grudging admiration for this pioneering effort and dismay that it was not better than it was.
In the year 2006, Colonel âBradâ Bradbury while flying to the rocket base in Rocket X-93, crashes and is seriously injured (I'm sure you remember it was in all the papers.) with a âcracked skull.â Taken into surgery he is outfitted with a metal plate in his skull. As Colonel Bradbury recovers he begins to hear "messages" from Mars.
The Rocket and the Skull was first broadcast broadcast on August 8, 1951.
Segment Four: In April 1930, Robert Ripley brought his "Believe It or Not" to radio. It would be the first of several series heard on NBC, CBS and the Mutual Broadcasting System and in syndication. The broadcasts varied in length from 1 minute in the 70s to 30 minutes for many of the earlier incarnations of the show.
Robert Ripley is known for several radio firsts. He was the first to broadcast nationwide on a radio network from mid-ocean, and he also participated in the first broadcast from Buenos Aires to New York. Assisted by a corps of translators, he was the first to broadcast to every nation in the world simultaneously.
This episode of episode of Believe It or Not is from January 17th of 1942, "Don't Rely on Doves".
Music:
The Brothers Four - The Green Leaves Of Summer (1960) Leonard Cohen - The Gypsy's Wife (1979) James Galway and Phil Coulter - Steal Away (1998)
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