Yours truly, Johnny Dollar

The opening is familiar among fans of Old Time Radio: "the man with the action-packed expense account...America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator." And if we still weren't sure, he always told us himself: "Yours truly, Johnny Dollar."

Opening on a Friday night, February 18, 1949 (The Paricoff Policy Matter), right at the start of television's golden age, this radio show brought us a high-powered insurance investigator who worked chiefly for the Universal Adjustment Bureau, a clearinghouse for the many insurance companies. The series starred Charles Russell as Johnny Dollar, the smart and tough detective, whose trademark it was to toss silver dollars as tips to busboys and bellhops.
Appearing on CBS Radio, Johnny Dollar was heard each week flying off to a different town filled with danger and possibly murder as he tried to get to the bottom of insurance fraud. There were rarely any recurring characters except Dollar; despite sometimes romance and friends, the character was generally a loner. These early episodes, however, tended to be flat and the character of Dollar too dry. So at the start of the 1950 season, Charles Russell was out and veteran film actor Edmund O'Brien stepped in as the second Johnny Dollar. The series during the O'Brien years improved with scripts by expert crime writer such as E. Jack Neumann, John Michael Hayes, Sidney Marshall and Blake Edwards. The character took on the stereotype of the American detective developed by Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Dollar was more hardboiled; his softer side rarely appeared. O'Brien left in 1952 and John Lund became Dollar number three. With Lund in the role, the character as developed by O'Brien remained.

In 1955, radio actor Bob Bailey, fresh from his long run as George Valentine in LET GEORGE DO IT, stepped into the role as the fourth Johnny Dollar (there was an audition show with Dick Powell in 1948 that is not counted). It was with Bailey that the series really blossomed. Changing to a 15-minute format five times a week, and under the sharp eye of the new producer/director, Jack Johnstone, the scripts got much deeper into characterization and plot. And Bailey's depiction of Dollar had shades of a gritty street fighter, yet bright and sensitive. With a strong cast (many of the same veteran radio actors appearing in different roles) and excellent directing, the portrayals were much more real. And exciting; listen to such serials as "The Open Town Matter" or "The MacCormack Matter." Even while radio drama was already declining, this was radio acting at its best. The sound effects, some of which were canned, fit into the scripts so well as to produce some very exciting adventure/mystery.

But doing a daily show live was taxing, so by the end of 1956, the series reverted to thirty minute, once-a-week episodes. But the power of the show continued, due a lot to the continued presence of both Bailey and Johnstone. Gradually, however, toward the end of the 1950's, the show began to sound tired - some of the scripts were weak and even Bailey did not always seem excited.

Bailey left the show when it moved to New York production studios and initially Bob Readick filled Johnny Dollar's shows. However, that was only a transistion that lasted six months. In June, 1961, Mandel Kramer came to the role. He was perhaps the second best of the Dollar portrayals. Kramer's Dollar displayed more cynical humor than Bailey's. Johnny Dollar remained sensitive yet tough and with Jack Johnstone continuing as producer, the series remained poignant right up to its demise.

Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar has the distinction of being the last dramatic radio series from the golden age of radio. As with the close of Suspense, radio drama sounded its death throes. Among many old time radio fans, Johnny Dollar is usually viewed as the division between original radio drama and the resurgence of nostalgia which began in the seventies.

Lou Costello

Louis Francis Cristillo (Paterson, New Jersey, March 6, 1906 - Los Angeles, California, March 3, 1959), known simply as Lou Costello, was a renowned American comedian. He formed the popular comedy duo Abbott and Costello in the 1940s with Bud Abbott.

Costello moved to Hollywood in the early 1930s and after working in different jobs, he was hired by the Metro Goldwyn Mayer company to work as a stuntman, becoming Tim McCoy's double.

After working as a stuntman in sixty films, Cristillo began to gain weight, which is why he lost his job at Metro Goldwyn Mayer. Deciding to change course, he changed his name to Lou Costello, beginning his career as a comedian at Music Hall until meeting Bud Abbott in 1936.

Together with Bud Abbott he formed the comic duo Abbott and Costello, one of the most famous couples in Hollywood comedy, where he was the soul of said couple, playing a fearful and somewhat ridiculous chubby man who kept being used by his counterpart. It was enormously popular in the United States and also in Latin America. In Spain, even though it enjoyed great success, it never reached the majority of the public's tastes. The peculiar duo that he formed with Bud Abbott gave rise to counterparts such as the duo later starring Jerry Lewis (Joseph Levitch) and Dean Martin.

After her separation from Bud Abbott, he began his solo career, demonstrating dramatic aptitudes, but in this new facet he was only able to shoot one film because death suddenly surprised him on March 3, 1959, dying from a heart attack a few days after filming ended. .
Years later, in 1967, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera produced a series of cartoons based on their characters, in the style of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.

Abbott and Costello

The Abbott and Costello Show was an American television comedy starring the comedy duo Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, which premiered on December 1, 1952 in the United States.
Lou Costello was the creator of the show along with Bud Abbott. The show was not a network program when it was first introduced, but was sold in MCA Inc. syndication to about 40 local stations around the country. As a result, it aired on different days and at different times in different cities. In New York, it first appeared on the CBS affiliate, WCBS, on December 5, 1952 but did not go national on that network. (The 1953-54 season was broadcast locally on WNBT, as New York's NBC flagship station was then known). 

However, the episodes of the first season were repeated as part of the CBS program "Saturday Morning" during the 1954-1955 season.

The comedy revolves around the adventures of two likeable unemployed people: the cunning Bud Abbott and the naive Lou Costello, who live in an apartment rented by a grumpy Sidney Fields, since they almost never pay him rent. On the other hand, both Abbott and Costello often get into trouble with beautiful women and, from time to time, they are accompanied by Hillary, their neighbor. In addition, Costello also has problems with Stinky, a very mischievous young man dressed in a sailor suit (played by Joe Besser), and Mike, a police officer who always ends up losing his patience with Costello, and then hits him with his club.

Bud Abbott

William Alexander Abbott was born on October 2, 1895, known simply as Bud Abbott, was an American actor, producer, and comedian.1 He was very popular as a comic actor in the 1940s. , forming part of the duo Abbott and Costello with Lou Costello.

William Alexander Abbott was born in Asbury Park, New Jersey. He spent his early years at the Ringling Brothers Circus, where his parents worked; From this experience came his vocation to act and he began to work.

In the 1920s, together with his brother Harry, he tried to organize a chain of theaters that turned out to be a failure, so he dedicated himself to music hall, in which he played the serious character in comic duets.

In 1936 he teamed up with Lou Costello to form the comedy duo Abbott and Costello, having hits especially on the radio. Buster Keaton even said that they were radio actors more than film actors.

In June 1939 they also triumphed on Broadway, in the magazine Streets of Paris, and the following year they moved to the movies. Their great success led the Universal production company to make a few films about the couple's comedic skills. They stood out from the rest of the film and television duos because of the peculiarities that set them apart. The role of Bud Abbott, within the duo, was a serious character but who evidently took advantage of the naive Costello, whom he used for everything, causing healthy hilarity, since acting clumsily always spoiled the former's intentions.

The success they had, motivated or inspired the birth of other duos that undoubtedly took on many of their characteristics, such as the one formed by Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin.
Their collaboration would last until 1956, when they resumed their separate artistic careers. At that time Abbott again made an association, now with Candy Candido, performing in nightclubs, but the union was a total failure, due to the public's memory of their previous union.

In 1967 he was hired by Hanna-Barbera as a voice actor for his same character in a series of cartoons inspired by Abbott and Costello, after working on 156 episodes he was forgotten again.

He died from prostate cancer in 1974, at the age of 78.

The Green Valley Line

The Green Valley Line was a syndicated radio drama from the 1930s. Narrated in 26 quarter hour parts, it tells the story of Bill Reed, the son of a wealthy railroad baron who comes to work for the Green Valley Line, a small western railroad that his father wants to buy out.

The Green Valley Line is "the story of a back-country railroad in the early years of the 20th Century". Not much is known about the people or history of the Green Valley Line old time radio show. 

There's a real live quality to the show, since there's misreading of dialogue, and skewed inflections, but that's a great deal of the charm with this rarely heard local show. It has simple, direct dialogue and almost no sound effects except for the great sounds of the trains and some random railroad office sounds such as typewriters and such. Old Train Bill Reed is the hero who is developing the growing Green, using a telegraph and telephone to keep track of train orders and runs. He's managing railroad hands, the trains themselves, managing freight shipments and unfortunately, a gang of operatives who are intent on destroying the growth of the line but his father, Jacob Reed, may be a big businessman with a deceitful plan. Seems there's a family quarrel brewing here.

Kerry is Bill's Gal Friday, and together he's trying to manage the mounting problems that come roaring down the tracks on the Green Valley Line. The actress doing Kerry has a sweet, sincere dialogue delivery. Her Pop sounds like a real duffer, but he's a lot smarter than he makes out. He figures out what Bill's up to along the way. The railroad hands are Irish, judging from their names and brogues. Most enjoyable about this show are the details on railroad equipment and operation that spices every conversation. It's a sure thing that railroad buffs and lovers of regional history of radio will enjoy this adult serial series.

Jack Benny

Jack Benny was born in February 14, 1894, in Chicago and died in December 27, 1974, in Beverly Hills. He was an entertainer whose unusual comedic method and expert timing made him a legendary success in U.S. radio and television for more than 30 years.

Benny Kubelsky was reared in Waukegan, Illinois, a small city north of Chicago, where his father operated a saloon and later a dry goods store. As a boy, he helped out in the store and took up the violin, and by his high-school years he had become proficient with the instrument. He played it in vaudeville from 1912, and in 1918 when he was taken into the U.S. Navy he was assigned to entertainment duties. It was there that his comic talent came to light, and, while he remained a competent violinist in private, on stage his violin soon became little more than a prop which he played ineptly for comic effect.

After World War I Benny returned to vaudeville as a comedian. He appeared in his first motion picture in 1927, and he completed 18 more between 1930 and 1945. The turning point in his career, however, came in 1932 when he entered radio and quickly gained a large following.
Audiences responded to Benny’s type of humour. In an era of comedy characterized by broad jokes and rapid delivery, his style was subtle and languid. Over the years, he and his cast—including Eddie Anderson as Rochester, his chauffeur and valet; and Benny’s wife, Sadie Marks, as Mary Livingstone, his nemesis—carefully developed his stage image as a vain, stingy man and would-be violinist. He was notable for his verbal inflection and his acute sense of timing.
The Jack Benny Program remained on network radio for 23 years, at which time Benny moved to television, where he appeared regularly until 1965.