Episode 643 - Everyone Needs a Hobby (Leonidas Witherall, Gregory Hood, Box 13, & Mr. and Mrs. North)

Down These Mean Streets (Old Time Radio Detectives)

Jack Mooney

Arts, Performing Arts, Mystery, Detectives, Old, Radio, Time, Tv & Film, Oldtimeradio

4.6 • 982 Ratings

🗓️ 9 November 2025

⏱️ 120 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Not all radio detectives carried a badge or a private eye's license. Some were amateur sleuths who dabbled in deduction in addition to their day jobs, and we'll hear a collection of those crimesolvers and their adventures. Walter Hampden stars as Leonidas Witherall - professor, author, dead ringer for Shakespeare, and amateur detective - in "Murder at the State Fair" (originally aired on Mutual on September 24, 1944). Gale Gordon is San Francisco importer and detective Gregory Hood in "The Forgetful Murderer" (originally aired on Mutual on July 29, 1946). Alan Ladd is mystery writer Dan Holiday, who seeks adventures to fuel the plots of his stories, in "Killer at Large," a syndicated episode of Box 13. And finally, Joseph Curtin and Alice Frost are book publisher Jerry North and his wife Pam, and their idea of a date night involves stumbling over a dead body. We'll hear "The Premature Corpse," an Armed Forces Radio Service rebroadcast of Mr. and Mrs. North (originally aired on CBS on February 12, 1952).

Transcript

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0:00.0	Get this and get it straight.
0:02.1	Crime is a sucker's road.
0:03.9	And those who travel
0:04.6	it wind up in the gut of the prison of the grave.
0:12.3	The story you were about to hear is true.
0:15.2	Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.
0:18.6	The Adventures of Sam Spade, Detective.
0:21.7	The Adventures of the Saint,
0:23.4	starring Vincent Price.
0:25.5	Bob Bailey,
0:26.6	in the exciting adventures
0:27.7	of the man with the action-packed expense account.
0:30.6	America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator.
0:33.4	Yours truly, Johnny Dollar.
1:02.7	Thank you. Yours truly, Johnny Dollar. Hello and welcome to Down These Mean Streets and more old-time radio detectives and crime solvers.
1:08.6	This week our spotlight shines on the amateur detectives of the radio era.
1:13.5	Generally when we think of radio sleuths, we imagine the cops and private eyes, Joe Friday and Philip Marlowe and their brethren. But there were many amateurs on the
1:20.6	air, people who didn't make crime-solving their full-time job, but who were no slouches when it came
1:26.1	to discovering clues and cracking cases.
1:29.9	Today we'll hear four old-time radio mysteries starring a collection of moonlighting crime
1:36.3	fighters. First up is Leonidas Witherall, a gentleman who wore many hats. In addition to
1:43.6	being an amateur detective, he was a professor,
	...

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