Hard Boiled Radio Trivia Quiz

Answer: Jack Webb

This was a pretty good show, fairly witty. The show was a bit better plotted than some of the PI series - there was at least an attempt to give the plot a twist, and have it make some sense.

Lyon is an unscrupulous and money grubbing lot, and Regan follows his orders with a sort of disgusted contempt. It gives a nice cynical and world weary edge.

Lyon was played by Wilms Herbert, a familiar voice on radio. He was also Sergeant Otis on "Richard Diamond".

Answer: Margo Lane

Margo was played by several actresses over the 21 season run of the show. The name most familiar to modern audiences would probably be Agnes Moorehead, who years later played Endora, Samantha's mother, on "Bewitched".

Answer: A shoeshine boy, Homer, who is always angling to get in on the action.

The show was on the air rather spottily, off and on from April 1949 until the fall of 1953. The series was written and directed by Blake Edwards, later of "Pink Panther" fame.

Answer: The Saint

This was another show that usually aimed for a laugh - "radio noir" it was not. The running bit here was the cab driver, Louie, (played by Larry Dobkin) who always seemed to be the one to pick Templar up, and who often reluctantly helped solve the case.

Answer: Tales of the Texas Rangers

Although this series was set in contemporary times, it wasn't too much of a stretch for Western star McRae. He used modern methods and science to catch the criminals, but nearly every episode had him saddling up his horse Charcoal at some point. The show was produced and directed by Stacey Keach Sr, father of actors James and Stacey Keach.

Answer: False

Many of the shows were based, more or less exactly, on the original Arthur Conan Doyle stories, sometimes using word for word dialogue. The adaptations were written by Edith Miser, who, as the fund of original stories was used up, also wrote stories of her own based on Doyle's characters.

The character of Holmes has, of course, been portrayed on radio many times over the years, in different ways. The format of this particular show had the spokesman for the advertiser chatting with an elderly Dr Watson in his home. Watson would set up the story, and then tie up loose ends in an epilogue - always fitting in a nice segue into the advertising pitch, of course.

Answer: I Love a Mystery

I'm not alone in loving this series; many people consider it the best mystery/adventure radio series ever. Jack, Doc and Reggie were just an enormous amount of fun, less wooden and stereotypical than many 'heroes' of the time. The serial nature of the shows (15 minute episodes Monday to Friday) meant that the plots could be considerably more thought-out than the 30 minute stand-alone episodes of many other series, while the three week wrap-up kept the snap in the story - they did not indulge in the rambling incoherence of other, longer, serials.

There was often some element of the fantastical in the plots - vampires, tiger-women, curses - but there was always a prosaic solution. It's said that the creators of "Scooby Doo" were influenced by "I Love a Mystery".

There were two main casts over the 13 years the show ran on one broadcaster or the other. The earlier Hollywood cast included Michael Raffetto as Jack, Barton Yarborough as the Texan Doc, and Walter Paterson as the Englishman Reggie. Later, in New York, Jack was played by Russell Thorson, Doc by Jim Boles, and Reggie by Tony Randall, who of course is familiar as Felix in TV's "The Odd Couple". Many of the female parts were played, throughout the years, by the wonderful Mercedes McCambridge.

Unfortunately, many of the few surviving tapes of this show are in poor condition.

Answer: Dragnet

That quote was from "The Big Little Mother" from Oct 6, 1953.

Dragnet was Jack Webb's baby, from the beginning. Webb had become friends with a Los Angeles policeman who was technical adviser on a movie he'd worked on, and had gone on several ride-alongs with him, seeing how the police *really* worked. He had an idea for a realistic show, based on actual cases, that portrayed something of what police work actually was like, rather than the overly dramatic nonsense of most of the contemporary radio series. After a fairly rocky start, it worked - "Dragnet" was wildly successful, and still signifies "police procedural" to many people.

Answer: The hero is knocked out in every episode, and ascends to "Cloud 8".

About halfway through every episode, Richard Rogue is knocked out, and lands on Cloud 8, where he meets up with Eugor. Never spelled out, but fairly obvious, is that Eugor ("Rogue" spelled backwards) is Rogue's subconscious, which gives him some clues to the solution to the mystery.

This was a fun show, with many of the same elements that later went into the character of Richard Diamond - a lighthearted, wisecracking approach to the PI business.

Answer: Alan Ladd

This was a competent detective show - plots that made at least surface sense, and some well drawn characters. Holliday's secretary, Suzy, was always good for a laugh, with some lovely malapropisms.

Most of these shows are fairly widely available on the web, and are well worth a listen. I hope this quiz inspires some of you to check them out - you won't regret it.