Down These Mean Streets (Old Time Radio Detectives)

Don't touch that dial – the thrilling conclusion of our Superman-Batman radio team-up is coming your way. The Man of Steel and the Caped Crusader are fighting to save Robin and Jimmy Olsen in the exciting final chapters of "The Monkey Burglar," originally aired on The Adventures of Superman on the Mutual Network between February 19 and 25, 1947.

The Man of Steel and the Dynamic Duo are teaming up to keep the airwaves safe! We'll hear a serialized story from The Adventures of Superman that brings Batman and Robin to Metropolis to join forces with Superman. Bud Collyer is Superman, Matt Crowley is Batman, and Ronald Liss is Robin in "The Monkey Burglar," a story that finds Robin as a prime suspect for a series of daring robberies. We'll hea...

We're putting our little grey cells to work as Hercule Poirot solves two old time radio mysteries. Agatha Christie's brilliant Belgian detective is back on the big screen, and we'll hear two of his adventures from the airwaves. First, Maurice Tarplin is Poirot in an adaptation of Christie's "The Tragedy at Marsdon Manor," originally aired on  Murder Clinic on October 6, 1942. Then, Harold Huber st...

Need a case closed and a tune carried? Dick Powell is your man. The crooner reinvented his career when he played Philip Marlowe on screen, and he starred in a pair of radio detective shows as glib but tough private investigators. In honor of Powell's birthday, we'll hear two of his mysteries: as Richard Rogue, he solves "The Impossible Murder" from Rogue's Galley (originally aired on Mutual on May...

Herbert Marshall travels the globe as the dashing and debonair Man Called X . Dispatched on international adventures, the Man Called X is really secret agent Ken Thurston, enemy to spies, saboteurs, and insurgents wherever they may lurk. Marshall gave radio a suave super spy in one of the best espionage programs of the era. We'll hear Ken Thurston in "Japanese Underground" (originally aired on NBC...

It's alive...it's alive! It's the "Down These Mean Streets" Halloween special, presenting an old time radio chiller guaranteed to get you in the mood for trick or treating. We'll hear Herbert Marshall star in an adaptation of Mary Shelley's  Frankenstein (originally aired on  Suspense on CBS on November 3, 1952).

The game's afoot as we join Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson in three of their old time radio adventures. John Stanley is the world's most famous detective and Alfred Shirley plays his loyal companion and biographer in these original adventures that feature a locked room mystery, a ghostly menace to an old family, and a woman in fear for her life. We'll hear "The Case of the Dog that Changed Its Min...

"Are you packing?" "Yes dear, I'm putting away this liquor." William Powell and Myrna Loy are back as Dashiell Hammett's husband and wife crime solvers Nick and Nora Charles as The Lux Radio Theatre presents After the Thin Man . The sequel to the smash hit comedy mystery hit the big screen in 1936, and four years later the stars reunited to recreate the film for the airwaves. Join Mr. and Mrs. Cha...

It's another case for  Nick Carter, Master Detective  - two of them, in fact - as Lon Clark stars as "that most famous of all manhunters." Carter sprang from the pages of pulp magazines and solved crimes on radio for twelve years. Clark voiced the super sleuth for the entire run of the program, and we'll hear him in two of his adventures. Charlotte Manson co-stars as Patsy Bowen, Nick's loyal secr...

It's Broadway – "the gaudiest, the most violent, the lonesomest mile in the world." Join Detective Danny Clover as he fights crime in the Big Apple in one of the all-time great radio detective shows Broadway is My Beat . Larry Thor stars as Clover, the cop with the soul of a poet who wears his heart on his sleeve, in a show unlike any other radio crime drama. We'll hear "The Secretarial School Tri...

On September 30, 1962, the Golden Age of Radio came to a close with the final broadcasts of Suspense and Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar . The man with the action-packed expense account solved crimes right up until the end of the era as he wrapped up a thirteen-year career of radio crimefighting. For those final years, Mandel Kramer starred as America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator, and we...

Jeff Chandler trades the biology lab for the back alleys and swamps of New Orleans as Brett Halliday's "reckless, red-headed Irishman" Michael Shayne. Chandler, known to radio fans as bashful science teacher Philip Boynton in Our Miss Brooks , gave radio one of its toughest, most two-fisted private eyes in a sensational syndicated series. We'll hear Chandler as Shayne in all of his ultra-hard-boil...

If you head down to Pier 19 at the San Francisco waterfront, you'll find  Pat Novak For Hire  renting boats and doing anything else to keep a few steps ahead in one of radio's best noir detective dramas. Featuring duplicitous dames, gun-toting toughs, and dialogue right out of a pulp novel, the series packed a punch then and now. Jack Webb stars as Novak in a pair of episodes: "Father Leahy" and "...

It's a birthday bash for Shane star Alan Ladd as we spotlight three of the legendary actor's old time radio performances. First, he recreates one of his movie roles in Dashiell Hammett's The Glass Key for The Screen Guild Theatre (originally aired on CBS on July 22, 1946). Then, Ladd stars as mystery writer and amateur sleuth Dan Holiday in two syndicated episodes of Box 13 - "Hot Box" and "The Be...

Heaven help evildoers when The Saint is on the case. Simon Templar – "the Robin Hood of modern crime" – came to the airwaves after thrilling audiences in stories by Leslie Charteris and in big screen outings starring George Sanders. The most celebrated radio Saint was Vincent Price, the future horror legend of the movies, who voiced Templar from 1947 until 1951. We'll hear Price in a pair of Saint...

It takes a thief to catch a thief (or con man or killer), and  Boston Blackie is on the case! The reformed safecracker turned detective uses his intimate knowledge of the underworld to track down dangerous criminals and to clear his name with the irascible Inspector Farraday. We'll hear Chester Morris as Blackie in "The Jonathan Diamond" (originally aired on NBC on June 23, 1944). Then, Richard Ko...

Frank Sinatra trades crooning for crime solving as  Rocky Fortune . For a single season, Old Blue Eyes starred as Rocky, a footloose, fancy-free, and frequently unemployed young man whose weekly search for a job results in full-time employment with dangerous adventure. It was Sinatra's only regular dramatic role on radio, and the Chairman of the Board is in fine form in three radio mysteries: "Mes...

"Down These Mean Streets" presents our annual birthday salute to the master of big screen mystery and suspense – Alfred Hitchcock. The legendary director saw several of his classic films recreated for the airwaves during the Golden Age of Radio. In this bonus episode, we'll hear one of those star-studded adaptations as The Lux Radio Theatre presents "Notorious" (originally aired on CBS on January...

Get ready for fast-paced mystery and excitement with Casey, Crime Photographer – the ace cameraman who covers the news at the same time he makes headlines. Along with reporter Ann Williams and Captain Logan of the police, Casey gets the facts of the stories behind his pictures and always manages to catch the guilty party in time to make the next edition of the paper. We'll hear Staats Cotsworth as...

In this special bonus episode, we salute the late June Foray - the titan of voice acting who passed away July 26th just shy of her 100th birthday. From Rocky Squirrel to Witch Hazel to Cindy Lou Who, chances are you've heard and enjoyed her work from a career that stretched over eighty years. Among her many radio credits is  The Stan Freberg Show , one of the absolute best comedies radio ever prod...

Sam Spade -  Dashiell Hammett's San Francisco shamus of The Maltese Falcon  -  was a hit with audiences when he came to radio in July 1946. The mix of tongue in cheek comedy with hard-boiled mystery, combined with the memorable performance of Howard Duff in the title role, made for a series that still holds up today and stands as one of the very best the era had to offer. We'll hear Duff as Spade...

Planning to break the law in Texas? You'd better make other plans, because Joel McCrea is fighting crime on foot and on horseback in  Tales of the Texas Rangers . As Ranger Jayce Pearson, McCrea stars in dramatizations of actual Ranger cases, presenting a combination of old west manhunting and twentieth century forensic science to bring in the guilty. We'll hear Pearson patrol the Lone Star State...

Perhaps the only radio detective star to have actually worked as a real-life private eye, William Gargan played several gumshoes on the air, as well as the big and small screens. He was most famous on radio as  Barrie Craig, Confidential Investigator but he gave voice to other hard-boiled private eyes with wry senses of humor. Today, William Gargan stars as two of those old time radio crime-solver...

Pack your bags - this week, we're joining Steve Mitchell on another Dangerous Assignment . Brian Donlevy stars as Mitchell, the two-fisted spy dispatched all around the world on thrilling adventures and top secret missions. In this pair of international mysteries, Steve Mitchell is on the trail of a pair of missing scientists (in an episode originally aired on NBC on April 24, 1950); and he heads...

S.S. Van Dine's Philo Vance – perhaps the quintessential gentleman detective – was a hit in print and on the big screen where he was played by Basil Rathbone and William Powell, among others. He eventually came to radio in several incarnations, each making the snobbish sleuth more down to earth and likable. We'll hear Jose Ferrer as Vance in "The Case of the Girl Who Came Back" (a rebroadcast from...