# Old-time radio **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 6, 2000, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397 "2000-03-06T08:09:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/1 "2000-03-06T08:09:00Z")
I’m willing to bet there’s a defunct thread on the topic somewhere, but damn if I’m gonna try to find it with my rather clunky browser (the search ran so much faster on my work computer). So who likes old-time radio? What’s your favorite show? Anyone do re-enactments? ---
**Author:** ![pricciar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@pricciar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pricciar)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/2 "2000-03-06T08:26:00Z")
I love old-time radio. I listen to it on the web, and also the 1070 KMX a LA station plays it every night at 9 oclock. I think there schedule changes every few months, the only consistent thing I have noticed is that they play Jack Benny every Saturday night. I like all kinds of shows, they each have their own quirks and fun to them. The Adventures of Harry Lime is an interesting show because it stars an older Orson Welles, he was just doing it to make some money between movies, so its kind of fun to hear the difference between this Welles and the younger Welles who became famous for the Shadow and his Martian broadcast. I enjoy Dimension X and X-Minus One for its great Sci-Fi stories, some are serious, others are fun quirky things. But, they are all based on some of the best writers of the day. Asimov, Vonnegut, Bradbury, and other authors I can’t think of at the moment. The Jack Benny show is great because you can hear Mel Blanc do Polar Bears before Bugs Bunny was even thought of. Of course, alot of the jokes fall flat because they are based on pop culture icons, that have been buried for decades, but enough of it is still funny for me to look forward to hearing new programs. Dragnet is fun because its so damn cheesy. Jack Webb picked up that style of program early on and never let go. Gunsmoke, I enjoy this show because they got far more violent and edgey than other shows on at the same time. They certainly are tame by today’s standards, but when you compare a Gunsmoke to some of the other programs it definitley had a hard edge, which added to the program, and it made the humorous interludes with Doc or the assistant even funnier. I know there are other shows, I just can’t think of them right now. What are some of your favorites, Otto? Do you do re-enactments? I never have. pat PS: I don’t think this topic has been covered, thanks for starting it, its something I like to talk about. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/3 "2000-03-06T11:14:00Z")
The Goon Show. 'nuff said. * * * [The Legend Of PigeonMan](http://www.hotkey.net.au/~guanolad/pigeonman/) - **Shadow of the Pigeon** - Weirdo of the Night ---
**Author:** ![Daniel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Daniel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daniel)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/4 "2000-03-06T13:31:00Z")
I love OTR. I spend way too much of my money on tapes because of it. My favorite is [Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy](http://fathom.org/snerdville); I created the web page I just linked to. It’s got info about the show, some jokes from it, and links to places online where you can hear it for free. I also like Abbot and Costello, Burns and Allen, Jack Benny, and The Shadow. * * * Mayor of [Snerdville](http://fathom.org/snerdville), the home of Mortimer Snerd “I’m just too much for human existence – I should be animated.” –Wayne Knight ---
**Author:** ![WallyM7](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b5e925/32.png) [@WallyM7](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WallyM7)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/5 "2000-03-06T13:58:00Z")
Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of man? Well? Who? ---
**Author:** ![drollman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f04885/32.png) [@drollman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drollman)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/6 "2000-03-06T17:51:00Z")
THE SHADOW KNOWS!!! (Start the theremin!) I love OTR. Unfortunatly, there’s not a lot of re-broadcasts around this neck of the woods. Used to be lots on overnight radio, but I can’t find any “theatre of the mind” on the air anymore. (The sad state of radio…and I work in the industry.) However, just before Christmas, I found a 7 CD set of OTR shows. (Actually there were a number of sets, this particular one was OTR-Comedy) I got it for a my dad and he loves it! Anyone ever listen to “I Love a Mystery” or “The Inner Sanctum”? (That one scared the b’gee-beeies out of me when I was a young 'un.–They used the sound of pulling scotch tape off a roll to create the sound of stripping flesh off a corpse. Gave me the willies for days!) * * * My fate keeps getting in the way of my destiny. ---
**Author:** ![Ursa\_Major](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/a88e57/32.png) [@Ursa\_Major](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ursa_Major)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2000, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/7 "2000-03-07T06:59:00Z")
I’m also a big fan of _Dimension X_ and _X-Minus One_. In high school I exhausted just about every short story anthology of 1940s and 1950s SF ever published. A couple years later, in my college days, while delivering pizzas I’d listen to KNX on the car radio. I think the SF shows were on Wednesday nights. I don’t think they did a single story I hadn’t already read, but they were always entertaining. Some shows that KNX used to air that Pat hasn’t already mentioned: _Sgt Preston_ was always taking credit for the real hero of the show; his dog, King of the Yukon. _Tales of the Texas Rangers_ and _Gangbusters_: two shows whose violence is unrivaled by anything ever aired on TV. _The Six-Shooter_ starring Jimmy Stewart. _Night Beat_ and _Box Thirteen_ were both about reporters, I think. _Burns and Allen_ and _The Edgar Bergan Show_ whould take turns airing on Saturdays after _Jack Benny_. Another humorous show you’d hear every now and then was _Damon Runyan Theater_ For a while, I used to listen to old radio shows on KPPC on Sunday evenings. The only one I remember really liking was a show from the '50s called _Johnny Dollar_ about an intrepid insurance investigator. I think I read somewhere that_Johnny Dollar_ was the last radio drama series to air before being run out of business by TV. I think _The Stan Freberg Show_ (a collection of which I have on tape) holds this distinction for radio comedies. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/8 "2000-03-06T20:07:00Z")
Those are all before my time, but when I was a kid I used to listen to E.G. Marshall’s _Radio Mystery Theatre_ on KNX 1070, Los Angeles. This was in the 70s. ---
**Author:** ![pluto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f08c70/32.png) [@pluto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pluto)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/9 "2000-03-06T21:11:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by GuanoLad: > \*\*The Goon Show. > > 'nuff said. > \*\* Ing-tong-tiddle-I-po! * * * “Cheddar?” “We don’t get much call for that around here, Sir.” ---
**Author:** ![Abner\_Normal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a87d85/32.png) [@Abner\_Normal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abner_Normal)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2000, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-time-radio/14397/10 "2000-03-06T21:25:00Z")
If you have real player, [Scifi.com](http://Scifi.com) has several old time radio shows on line… [http://www.scifi.com/set/classics/](http://www.scifi.com/set/classics/)