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I Love a Mystery |
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Many
have called the I Love a Mystery
radio series: the greatest radio show of all time. It told of three
adventurers who travelled the world in search of action, thrills and mystery.
From the ghost towns of wind-swept Nevada to the jungles of vampire-infested
Nicaragua, these three pillars of strength righted wrongs, rescued women in
distress, did battles with evils of nature and supernatural origins and
explored the most unlikely terrain ever dreamt up (by its creator, the
legendary Carlton Morse). Jack
Packard, Doc Long and Reggie
Yorke were the three musketeers of
the airwaves: all for one, and one for all. They met during China's war with
Japan and returned to California to form the A-1 Detective Agency, just off Hollywood Boulevard. Unfortunately,
the majority of episodes during the 1939 - 1944 run were lost and since the
fifteen minute episodes were a continuing serial, any hope of a meaningful
appreciation of the show is considerably diminished. In
1949 with production moved to New York (from Hollywood) and
with a new cast and original scripts from the earlier run, new episodes were
recorded. Considerably more episodes from this series have survived - three
complete 15 episode adventures are in existence with only one episode (out of
the 45) missing Russell
Thorsen played Jack Packard, Jim
Boles played Doc Long with Tony "The Odd Couple" Randall as Reggie
in the New York production. I Love Adventure I
Love Adventure was Carlton Morse's bridge between the Hollywood and New York runs of I
Love a Mystery. Unlike I Love a Mystery's 15 minute
continuing serial stories, I Love Adventure were 30 minute stand-alone adventures. Michael
Raffetto, recreating his Jack
Packard role from the West Coast
production, carried the show on his own with occasional appearances from Tom
Collins (from the movies' The
Falcon) as Reggie Yorke. Like
Raffetto, Barton Yarborough
recreated his Doc Long role from
the East Coast run of I Love a Mystery for a number of episodes. Only
13 episodes of I Love Adventure
were made but the series is significant in that it allows one to appreciate,
at least in part, the original cast of the Hollywood edition of I Love a
Mystery playing the same roles. Fortunately, all 13 episodes of I Love
Adventure have survived The Adventures by Morse Casting
back a little further, Carlton Morse also wrote and directed The
Adventures by Morse radio show. If
you like high adventure, come with me If
you like the stealth of intrigue, come with me If
you like blood and thunder, come with me Produced
in 1944, after the finish of the Hollywood run of I Love a Mystery, it bore a
close resemblance to its predecessor in that it told of the exploits of Capt.
Bart Friday and his side-kick Skip
Turner - both soundalikes for Jack
Packard and Doc Long. Bart
Friday was actually played by Russell Thorsen, although not in all
adventures. Both Elliott "Mr Radio" Lewis & David Ellis played Friday in several adventures. Skip Turner
was played by was played by Jack Edwards for the entire run (using his best
Texas talking tang!). Told
in either 10 episode or 3 episode stories, Adventures by Morse were wonderfully macabre and at times supernatural
but more than anything: great adventure tales. Want
to check out some episodes of one of the I Love a Mystery radio serial? What
about an episode of Adventures by Morse? Why
not "taste & try"? Below
are the first three 15 minute episodes of the I Love a Mystery serial: The
Thing That Cries in the Night -
fabulous! Also,
below is the first 30 minute episode of the Adventures by Morse serial: The
City of the Dead - excellent! And
if you'd like to investigate further, how about the Carlton Morse
Interview in which he discusses all
of the above adventure projects? These
can be freely downloaded to your computer - just right button click on any
link below and chose "Download Linked File" (or words to that
effect). The Thing
That Cries in the Night: ILAMTCN_1949-10-31
Episode No.1.mp3 ILAMTCN_1949-11-01
Episode No.2.mp3 ILAMTCN_1949-11-02
Episode No.3.mp3 The City of the
Dead: ABMCOD_1944-01-08
EpisodeNo.1.mp3 Carlton Morse
Interview: ILAM_Carlton
E Morse Interview.mp3 These MP3 Discs contains 3 complete (well
almost) adventures of the New York run of I
Love a Mystery as well as the complete run of the I Love Adventure and the complete run of the Adventures by
Morse series. Also included is a 30 minute Interview with
Carlton Morse A. A
30 minute Interview with Carlton E. Morse B. ILAM:
The Thing That Cries in the Night (15 episodes, each of 15 minutes duration) C. ILAM:
Bury Your Dead, Arizona (15 episodes, each of 15 minutes duration) D. ILAM:
The Million Dollar Curse (14 episodes, each of 15 minutes duration) -
Episode No. 10 is missing E. I
Love Adventure (all 13 episodes, each of 30 minutes duration): 1.
ILA_1948-04-25_No.1
The China Coast Incident.mp3 2.
ILA_1948-05-02_No.2
The Great Airmail Robbery.mp3 3.
ILA_1948-05-09_No.3
The Devils Sanctuary.mp3 4.
ILA_1948-05-16_No.4
The Pearl of Great Price.mp3 5.
ILA_1948-05-23_No.5
The Hundred Million Dollar Manhunt.mp3 6.
ILA_1948-05-30_No.6
The Finishing School Kidnapping.mp3 7.
ILA_1948-06-06_No.7
But Grandma What Big Teeth You Have.mp3 8.
ILA_1948-06-13_No.8
The Man with the Third Green Eye.mp3 9.
ILA_1948-06-20_No.9
The Girl in the Street.mp3 10.
ILA_1948-06-27_No.10
The Kwan Moon Dagger.mp3 11.
ILA_1948-07-04_No.11
Assignment with a Displaced Person.mp3 12.
ILA_1948-07-11_No.12
Hearse on the Highway.mp3 13.
ILA_1948-07-18_No.13
The Ambassador Ricardo Santos Affair.mp3 F.
Adventures by
Morse (all 52 episodes, each of 30 minutes duration): 1.
The City of the Dead
(10 episodes) 2.
A Coffin for the Lady
(3 episodes) 3.
The Cobra King Strikes
Back (10 episodes) 4.
The Girl on Shipwreck
Island (3 episodes) 5.
Dead Men Prowl (10
episodes) 6.
You'll be Dead in a
Week (3 episodes) 7.
The Land of the Living
Dead (10 episodes) 8.
It's Dismal to Die (3
episodes) |