There's a term we hear a lot of nowadays.

Golden Age.

People love to announce that we're in a golden age of something, whether it's television,

neuroscience, or even podcasts.

It seems like we're in a golden age of golden ages.

And the term just might start to lose its meaning from being used too much

or too loosely. But there's one golden age whose golden glow has never tarnished, that period

from the early 1920s to the early 50s that was indisputably and will forever remain the golden

age of radio.

When television came along in the 1950s, it became the dominant medium for scripted programs.

But before then, households all across America were immersed in a vast and varied world of audio and imagination.

They could hear classic novels brought to life,

could hear sitcoms and sci-fi and western,

tales of adventure and suspense,

and my personal favorite...

The man with the action-packed expense account.

America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator.

Yours truly, Johnny Dollar.

The hard-boiled private eyes.

The story goes that the very first radio program was broadcast on Christmas Eve in 1906.

Some historians dispute that date, but who am I to question a story that combines two of my favorite things?

Speaking of which, the Golden Age of Radio brought Christmas cheer to the masses the same

...