Episodi

  • Front Page Drama: Alex Binks

    Front Page Drama: Alex Binks
    Nov 9 2026
    Aired: October 15, 1950 (Front Page Drama — “Alex Binks”)

    What happens when a man's passion for antiques collides with his wife's determination to keep their home free of clutter? In this amusing episode of Front Page Drama, Alex Binks has a weakness for secondhand bargains, much to the frustration of his long-suffering wife, Sally.

    When Alex brings home an antique corn sheller, Sally insists that he return it and get their money back. Unfortunately, the secondhand dealer isn't interested in refunds, and Alex's attempts to recover his money lead to a series of increasingly questionable exchanges. Before long, the couple finds themselves saddled with an old oil painting that Sally considers the worst purchase yet.

    John Gibson, best remembered as Ethelbert on Casey, Crime Photographer, stars as Alex in this lighthearted comedy about bargain hunting, marital disagreements, and the sometimes surprising value of things other people consider junk.

    More than 75 years after its original broadcast, the story remains remarkably relatable to anyone who has ever brought home an irresistible thrift-store find—or lived with someone who does.

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    18 min
  • The Passing Parade: Jules Verne's Uncanny Accuracy. Nicola Tesla's Dreams for the Future

    The Passing Parade: Jules Verne's Uncanny Accuracy. Nicola Tesla's Dreams for the Future
    Nov 2 2026
    Aired: 1949 (John Nesbitt's Passing Parade)

    What do science-fiction pioneer Jules Verne and legendary inventor Nikola Tesla have in common? Both possessed extraordinary imaginations that allowed them to envision technological possibilities far beyond their own times.

    In this 1949 episode of John Nesbitt's Passing Parade, Nesbitt offers two fascinating portraits of men whose dreams helped shape the modern world.

    First, we meet Jules Verne, whose remarkable literary imagination anticipated technological developments ranging from submarines and aircraft to space exploration. Nesbitt explores how Verne's stories inspired real-life pioneers, including aviation innovator Alberto Santos-Dumont, submarine designer Simon Lake, and polar explorer Richard Byrd.

    Then we turn to Nikola Tesla, the brilliant and eccentric inventor whose contributions to electrical technology transformed everyday life. From his unusual personal habits to his ambitious experiments with wireless power transmission, Tesla emerges as a man whose vision extended far beyond what the technology of his day could accomplish.

    Together, these stories celebrate the power of imagination to inspire scientific progress—and remind us that even dreams that remain unfulfilled can help future generations achieve the seemingly impossible.

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    14 min
  • Magic Key: Remote from Ebbets Field in Brooklyn

    Magic Key: Remote from Ebbets Field in Brooklyn
    Oct 26 2026
    Aired: September 20, 1936 (The Magic Key of RCA)

    Step back into the world of 1930s baseball with a remarkable live remote broadcast from Ebbets Field in Brooklyn.

    As the New York Giants battle the Brooklyn Dodgers and anticipation builds for a possible Giants–Yankees World Series, NBC commentator John B. Kennedy takes listeners behind the scenes of one of America's most famous ballparks.

    This segment from The Magic Key of RCA features conversations with future Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel, veteran umpire Ernest Quigley, longtime Dodgers groundskeeper Daniel Comerford, and the team's young mascot.

    Together, they offer a fascinating picture of baseball culture in 1936, from the pressures of umpiring to the traditions and personalities that made the national pastime so popular.The broadcast also captures a period of transition in baseball history. Comerford's complaints about fans keeping foul balls recall an earlier era when spectators were expected to return them, while Quigley's recollections connect listeners with some of the game's legendary players and teams.

    With the sounds and atmosphere of Ebbets Field as its backdrop, this recording offers more than a preview of the 1936 World Series. It's a rare opportunity to hear the people who helped shape baseball during its early decades, speaking about the game they loved.

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    16 min
  • Funtime: Winnie the Pooh

    Funtime: Winnie the Pooh
    Oct 19 2026
    Aired: Summer 1949 (Fun Time, WHA Radio, Madison, Wisconsin

    )In celebration of the 100th anniversary of Winnie-the-Pooh's first appearance in print, we revisit a delightful children's radio adaptation from Fun Time, a program broadcast by Wisconsin radio station WHA in 1949.

    Christopher Robin and Winnie-the-Pooh gather with Uncle Jim for a story about the time Pooh's appetite for honey got him into an unfortunate predicament. After visiting Rabbit for a little something to eat, Pooh discovers that getting out of Rabbit's house may be considerably more difficult than getting in. With help from Christopher Robin and his friends, the beloved bear faces one of his most memorable adventures.

    This charming adaptation comes from a special summer series of Fun Time broadcasts featuring Winnie-the-Pooh stories. The program gave local children an opportunity to participate in radio performances, bringing A. A. Milne's beloved characters to life with youthful enthusiasm and imagination.Nearly a century after the original book's publication in 1926, this recording offers a nostalgic glimpse of how children experienced the Hundred Acre Wood long before Pooh became a familiar figure in animated films.

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    19 min
  • Old Time Radio Ad Sampler 3

    Old Time Radio Ad Sampler 3
    Oct 12 2026
    The Old Time Radio Snack Wagon serves up its third sampler of vintage commercials, featuring five memorable advertisements from the 1940s through the 1960s. From beloved radio personalities to singing cereal mascots and science-fiction comedy, these commercials offer an entertaining look at how advertisers captured audiences' attention during radio's golden age and beyond.

    The collection begins with a 1968 Texaco commercial featuring Jack Benny and Dennis Day, making good use of Benny's legendary reputation for thriftiness. Next comes an unusually apologetic 1945 Wrigley's Spearmint advertisement, reflecting the shortages and manufacturing challenges that continued after World War II.

    The sampler also features a 1950s Crest toothpaste commercial emphasizing scientific research, a musical appearance by Snap, Crackle, and Pop promoting Rice Krispies, and a wonderfully unusual 1959 Lysol advertisement featuring visitors from outer space.

    Together, these commercials reveal how advertising reflected the concerns, humor, popular culture, and changing consumer expectations of mid-20th-century America.Subscribe to the Old Time Radio Snack Wagon at https://www.snackwagon.net

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    11 min
  • The Player: They Do It In Books

    The Player: They Do It In Books
    Oct 5 2026
    Long before generations of children knew Paul Frees from his work for Disney and Jay Ward, his extraordinary versatility made him an ideal performer for radio. The Player gave Frees a particularly impressive showcase: a one-man theater in which he portrayed every character.

    In “They Do It in Books,” that talent is put to work in an offbeat gangster comedy. sw0138Gang boss Steve Paddy is frustrated with his outfit's lack of success until one of his henchmen discovers an unexpected source of criminal inspiration: classic literature.

    Beginning with Hamlet, the gang starts looking to the great books for ideas, soon turning to everything from The Count of Monte Cristo to Machiavelli while baffled investigators try to figure out why Paddy's formerly unimaginative gang has suddenly become so clever.

    Written by Jerome Lawrence, who would later co-write Inherit the Wind with Robert E. Lee, “They Do It in Books” combines crime-story conventions with increasingly absurd comedy while giving Frees plenty of opportunities to demonstrate why he became known as “The Man of a Thousand Voices.”

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    20 min
  • Family Doctor: Glass Houses

    Family Doctor: Glass Houses
    Sep 28 2026
    Show Notes

    Aired: 1937 (The Family Doctor)

    In “Glass Houses,” the seventh episode of The Family Doctor, hardware-store owner Jess Rankin comes to Doc Adams with a problem no medicine can cure. Years earlier, Jess served time in prison, but since then he has rebuilt his life, married, established a successful business, and become a respected citizen of Cederton. Now, newspaper editor Amos Day is threatening to reveal Jess's past—not out of concern for the community, but because Jess took some of his advertising business elsewhere.

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    18 min
  • The Story of Jackie Gleason's Life

    The Story of Jackie Gleason's Life
    Sep 21 2026
    Aired: May 21, 1944 (Philco Radio Hall of Fame)

    Before Jackie Gleason became a television icon as Ralph Kramden on The Honeymooners, he was building his reputation in nightclubs, movies, Broadway, and radio. This 1944 appearance on Philco Radio Hall of Fame catches Gleason during his successful run in the Broadway musical Follow the Girls, more than a decade before The Honeymooners reached television.

    Asked to introduce himself to listeners who might not know his name, Gleason responds with a comic autobiography that quickly abandons any concern for accuracy. He takes the audience from his supposedly difficult infancy through school, romance, burlesque, nightclubs, and some decidedly unsuccessful adventures in radio, delivering a rapid succession of jokes along the way.

    It's an entertaining opportunity to hear the distinctive comic personality of Jackie Gleason years before his best-known television work—and a glimpse of a performer whose biggest successes were still ahead of him. Subscribe to the Old Time Radio Snack Wagon at https://www.snackwagon.net















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    10 min