Compiled and annotated by Keith Scott as of June 26, 2020
(c) 2020 by Keith Scott; permission to use with full academic attribution is granted
Keith may be contacted by email using ClassicsOfOTR@gmail.com
My lifelong profession is as a voice actor and impressionist. I came to appreciate the professionals involved in US radio performances early in my career. I studied their techniques and their voices, and some were also as career role models. Being based in Australia, I was blessed to find US collectors who could assist me in my endeavors. My admiration for ESCAPE and the other West Coast programs of the 1946-59 era can be traced to two vintage collectors of impeccable reputation, Skip Craig and Ken Greenwald, who were my first sources of the great shows of the past, starting in 1973. Thanks, too, to Ron Wolf and Marty Halperin of the old PACIFIC PIONEER BROADCASTERS in the halcyon days when it was a place to visit and salivate, located in the basement of what was once the NBC Studios on Sunset and Vine in Hollywood. Others who assisted over many years with my collecting and historical mania were Don Aston, John & Larry Gassman and SPERDVAC, the late Chris Lembesis and a reliable band of analog-era collectors like Ron Barnett, Bob Burnham, Dick Judge, and George Fowler. I shifted my focus to the area of primary research in 1992 when I made my first visit to the excellent Thousand Oaks Library which had begun housing the vast CBS script collection. My sincerest gratitude is offered to research staffers Brad Miller and Jeanette Berard and also Cynthia Thomas, who has assisted me in recent years. References consulted include radio history articles by two splendid researchers, Karl Schadow and the late Stewart Wright. For spelling of actor, author, and character names I examined the original scripts, various volumes of National Radio Artists Directory, and The AFRA Guide. I would like to thank Dr Joe Webb for his skillful assistance at formatting my bare-bones data, and for our highly enjoyable and abiding exchange of information on the great topic of radio history. He has also been patiently educating me in the intricacies of the brave new world of digital era radio collecting. -- Sincerely, KS
Click on the season you'd like to review
Season 2: 10-1-47 (#8) to 9-19-48 (#66) (famous episodes A Shipment of Mute Fate, Leiningen versus the Ants, and Evening Primrose)
Season 5: 10-8-49 (#91) to 8-25-50 (#137) (famous episodes Three Skeleton Key, The Outer Limit, The Man Who Stole the Bible, Mars is Heaven, and Poison)
Season 6: 10-1-50 (#138) to 2-18-51 (#155) (famous episodes The Earth Abides (in two parts), Wild Jack Rhett (an inspiration for the series Gunsmoke), and The Cave.
Season 8: 10-12-52 (#164) to 10-11-53 (#216) (famous episode Zero Hour)
Season 9: 3-11-54 (#217) to 9-25-54 (#240, final) (famous episode The Boiling Sea)
194 initial productions
46 re-performance broadcasts: two scripts were produced four times, eight scripts were produced three times, and twenty-six scripts were produced twice
Norman Macdonnell: 105 shows
William N. Robson: 79 shows
Antony Ellis: 40 shows
Morton Fine & David Friedkin: 10 shows
Richard Sanville: 4 shows
Gordon T. Hughes: 2 shows
Les Crutchfield: 52 shows
John Dunkel: 25 shows
William N. Robson: 17 shows
Antony Ellis: 5 shows
Others: 61
Cy Feuer: 41 shows
Wilbur Hatch: 19 shows
Del Castillo: 33 shows
Ivan Ditmars: 57 shows
Leith Stevens: 87 shows
Lucien Morawek: 1 show
Sandy Courage: 1 show (better known as Alexander Courage, composer of the Star Trek theme)
Rex Koury: 1 show
Recordings of the following episodes are missing, but there are adaptations on other CBS programs using similar production crews and actors, and also modern recreations by fans of the program. Please let us know at classicsofOTR@gmail.com if there are any recreations at conventions or other venues that we have not noted.
10/08/1947 – The Run of the Yellow Mail (read the original short story [click here])
10/08/1949 - The Primitive
10/29/1949 - The Blue Wall (read the original short story [click here])
06/09/1950 - The Big Sponge
11/23/1952 - Transport to Terror (was performed on Romance 1955-07-16)
11/30/1952 – Pagosa ( another inspiration for the Gunsmoke series; was also performed on Romance on 1951-08-06)
12/28/1952 - Nightmare in the Sun
01/04/1953 - Dangerous Man
05/24/1953 - The Blue Hotel (1977 recreation - begins at approximately 5 minutes into the recording [click here])
06/28/1953 - One-Eighth Apache (recreation by American Radio Theater [click here])