The When old-time radio fans think Niro Wolf, chances are they immediately picture Sydney

Green Street, the big screen star of Casablanca and the Maltese Falcon,

who played Rex Stout's detective in a single season series.

But although he's the best known, Green Street wasn't the first to play Wolf on radio.

Several actors, including veteran radio performers like

Santos Ortega and Louis Van Rutan, voiced Wolf in the early 1940s and five years

before Green Street took up residents in Wolf's radio brownstone, a

silent screen idol voiced the gargantuan gourmet.

On July 17, 1945, the Amazing Nero Wolf premiered on the West Coast Mutual Network

with Francis X Bushman in the title role.

Build at one time is the handsomest man in the world and the king of movies, Bushman was one of the biggest

stars of Hollywood during the silent movie era.

He starred in 175 films before 1920 and he memorably played the villain in the

1925 silent production of Ben Hurr. Unfortunately most of his silent film output has been lost.

So despite Francis X Bushman's stature and stardom of the time,

we have very little of his work to enjoy today.

Bushman's film work slowed in the 1940s and he moved over to

radio. He headlined the long-running CBS soap opera Those We Love and he could be heard

on other shows like Family Theater, Suspense, and Let

George do it.

It may be strange to think of an actor famous for his profile and physique voicing

Niro Wolf, the corpulent detective who hates any kind of exercise,

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