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Yours Truly, Johnny
Dollar |
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" the man with the action-packed expense
account America's fabulous freelance insurance
investigator Yours truly, Johnny Dollar! " Yours Truly, Johnny
Dollar was a radio drama about a
freelance insurance investigator that aired on CBS Radio from February 11,
1949 to September 30, 1962. However with a 30 minute
standalone one-episode-per-week format the series went into hiatus in
September 1954. But in October 1955 CBS
Radio revived Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar with a new leading man, a new director, and a new format. The
program changed to a five-nights-a-week serial produced and directed by radio
veteran Jack Johnstone. The new and most successful Johnny Dollar was Bob
Bailey and with 75 minutes of air
time, it became possible to develop more complex story lines with interesting
characters. The serials are especially engrossing because the action is
hardly ever interrupted. Almost all of the Johnny Dollar serials were
presented by CBS Radio on a sustaining basis (un-sponsored, with no
commercials); only two of the 55 serials take time out for a sponsor's
message (see below) Bob Bailey was exceptionally good in this format, making
Johnny more sensitive and thoughtful in addition to his other attributes. It
is agreed by many that this 13-month run of five-part stories constitutes
some of the greatest drama in vintage radio. The serial scripts were usually written by Jack Johnstone (or his
pseudonym, John Dawson), Les Crutchfield, or Robert Ryf, and always produced
and directed by Johnstone. The show featured an excellent stock company of
supporting actors, including Virginia Gregg, Harry Bartell, Vic Perrin,
Parley Baer, Howard McNear, John Dehner, Lillian Buyeff, Tony Barrett, Don
Diamond, and Forrest Lewis. Movie character actors appeared occasionally,
including Jay Novello, Hans Conried, Frank Nelson, Leon Belasco, William
Conrad, and Billy Halop. Each story started with a
phone call from an insurance agent, calling on Johnny to investigate an
unusual claim. Each story required Johnny to travel to some distant locale,
usually within the United States but sometimes abroad, where he was almost
always threatened with personal danger in the course of his investigations.
Johnny's file on each case was usually referenced as a "matter," as
in "The Silver Blue Matter" or "The Forbes Matter." Each
story was recounted in flashback, as Johnny listed each line item from his
expense account. Most of the items related to transportation and lodging, but
no incidental expense was too small for Johnny to itemize, as in "Item
nine, 10 cents. Aspirin. I needed them". The episodes generally finished
with Johnny tallying up his account, making final remarks on the report, and
travelling back to Hartford, Connecticut, where he was based In late 1956 CBS Radio
retooled the show, which reverted to a weekly half-hour drama. The scripts
were obviously tighter than the daily serials had been, with much less
recapitulation. Yet most fans prefer the serials to the half-hours, because
the cliffhanger format was more suspenseful and the characterizations were
more detailed. Interestingly, the final
episodes of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar (and Suspense), airing on CBS, are
often cited as the end of the Golden Age of Radio. The last episode of Johnny
Dollar ended at 6:40 p.m. Eastern Time on September 30, 1962. Now to what has survived,
what is contained here and (importantly) the interesting format which I have
adopted for presentation: I
confined my attention the Bob Bailey's 5 nights a week 15 minute serials. Of
the 55 serials produced, 4 had missing episodes and as such are not included
here. For
the remaining 51, I have chosen to edit together each of the serial
adventures - repeated intros,
wind-ups, "whats on tomorrow" etc have been deleted - each
adventure plays continuously and uninterrupted for about 63 minutes. Additionally each (and every)
adventure his been digitally restored to a perfect two channel audio
production. I must stress here that no part of the
narrative flow of any adventure has been deleted - each is a complete (and
very satisfying) adventure. As
an example, why not download the following 63 minute adventure and check it
out for yourself - just right button click on the link below and chose "Download
Linked File" (or words to that
effect) - but please note that the file size is 43Mb YTJD_1956-07-23
The Open Town Matter.mp3 Worthy
of further note is that two adventures were "afflicted" with sponsors
messages - these "interludes" have been deleted and as such The
Amy Bradshaw Matter (1955-11-21)
runs 48 minutes while The Henderson Matter (1955-11-28 ) wraps in 57 minutes. Additionally,
there were two adventures that ran for more than five 15 minute episodes: The
Kranesburg Matter (1956-08-24) and The
Phantom Chase Matter (1956-10-15)
have edited durations of 76 minutes and 113 minutes respectively. These
4 MP3 Discs contain the complete adventures of these radio shows: Bob Bailey's Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar
Compilations 1.
YTJD_1955-10-03 The
McCormack Matter.mp3 2.
YTJD_1955-10-10 The
Molly K Matter.mp3 3.
YTJD_1955-10-17 The
Chesapeake Fraud Matter.mp3 4.
YTJD_1955-10-24 The
Alvin Summers Matter.mp3 5.
YTJD_1955-10-31 The
Valentine Matter.mp3 6.
YTJD_1955-11-07 The
Lorcoe Diamonds Matter.mp3 7.
YTJD_1955-11-14 The
Broderick Matter.mp3 8.
YTJD_1955-11-21 The
Amy Bradshaw Matter.mp3 9.
YTJD_1955-11-28 The
Henderson Matter.mp3 10.
YTJD_1955-12-05 The
Cronin Matter.mp3 11.
YTJD_1955-12-12 The
Lansing Fraud.mp3 12.
YTJD_1955-12-19 The Nick
Shurn Matter.mp3 13.
YTJD_1955-12-26 The
Forbes Matter.mp3 14.
YTJD_1956-01-02 The
CaylinMatter.mp3 15.
YTJD_1956-01-09 The
Todd Matter.mp3 16.
YTJD_1956-01-16 The
Ricardo Amerigo Matter.mp3 17.
YTJD_1956-01-23 The
Duke Red Matter.mp3 18.
YTJD_1956-01-30 The
Flight Six Matter.mp3 19.
YTJD_1956-02-13 The
Cui Bono Matter.mp3 20.
YTJD_1956-02-20 The
Bennett Matter.mp3 21.
YTJD_1956-02-27 The
Fathom Five Matter.mp3 22.
YTJD_1956-03-05 The
Plantagent Matter.mp3 23.
YTJD_1956-03-12 The
Clinton Matter.mp3 24.
YTJD_1956-03-19 The
Jolly Roger Fraud.mp3 25.
YTJD_1956-03-26 The
Lamar Matter.mp3 26.
YTJD_1956-04-09 The
Laird Douglas-Douglas of Heatherscote Matter.mp3 27.
YTJD_1956-04-16 The
Shepherd Matter.mp3 28.
YTJD_1956-04-30 The
Callicles Matter.mp3 29.
YTJD_1956-05-07 The
Silver Blue Matter.mp3 30.
YTJD_1956-05-14 The
Matter of Medium-Well Done.mp3 31.
YTJD_1956-05-21 The
Tears of Night Matter.mp3 32.
YTJD_1956-05-28 The
Matter of Reasonable Doubt.mp3 33.
YTJD_1956-06-04 The
Indestructable Mike Matter.mp3 34.
YTJD_1956-06-11 The
Laughing Matter.mp3 35.
YTJD_1956-06-18 The
Pearling Matter.mp3 36.
YTJD_1956-06-25 The
Long Shot Matter.mp3 37.
YTJD_1956-07-02 The
Mida Touch Matter.mp3 38.
YTJD_1956-07-09 The
Shady Lane Matter.mp3 39.
YTJD_1956-07-16 The
Star of Capetown Matter.mp3 40.
YTJD_1956-07-23 The
Open Town Matter.mp3 41.
YTJD_1956-07-30 The
Sea Legs Matter.mp3 42.
YTJD_1956-08-06 The
Alder Matter.mp3 43.
YTJD_1956-08-13 The
Crystal Lake Matter.mp3 44.
YTJD_1956-08-24 The
Kranesburg Matter.mp3 45.
YTJD_1956-09-03 The
Curse of Kamashek Matter.mp3 46.
YTJD_1956-09-10 The
Confidential Matter.mp3 47.
YTJD_1956-09-24 The
Megs Palace Matter.mp3 48.
YTJD_1956-10-01 The
Picture Postcard Matter.mp3 49.
YTJD_1956-10-08 The
Primrose Matter.mp3 50.
YTJD_1956-10-15 The
Phantom Chase Matter.mp3 51.
YTJD_1956-10-29 The
Silent Queen Matter.mp3 |