July 25, 2025 • 19 mins
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar was a radio drama which aired between 1949 and 1962. "The man with the action-packed expense account, America’s fabulous freelance insurance investigator, Johnny Dollar". Of the eight different actors who played Johnny Dollar, Bob Bailey is likely considered the most popular. Bailey's interpretation presented a tough, streetwise character, but also sensitive and thoughtful. During it's time, Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar attracted some of the best writers in Hollywood, including Jack Johnstone, E. Jack Neuman, Robert Ryf, and Les Crutchfield.
Hope you enjoy this episode of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar! We offer a Crime, Detective OTR and 4 other old time radio internet radio stations @ theaterofthemind-otr.com - Audio Credit: The Old Time Radio Researchers Group. - All Podcasts @ Spreaker | Apple | YouTube | Spotify | iHeart
Hope you enjoy this episode of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar! We offer a Crime, Detective OTR and 4 other old time radio internet radio stations @ theaterofthemind-otr.com - Audio Credit: The Old Time Radio Researchers Group. - All Podcasts @ Spreaker | Apple | YouTube | Spotify | iHeart
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Well, act nice. What can I do for you?
Speaker 1 (00:08):
I beg your pardon.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
It's quite all right, and it's credited credit and now
that's all you'll.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Have to say. No, wait a minute? Who are you
a minute?
Speaker 3 (00:17):
What for?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
I'm busy.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
I'm a busy man.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
Alvin Peabody Kyride, who you that's right?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Cortright?
Speaker 3 (00:25):
Well, what are you calling about?
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Mister guy right? Calling me? Oh you Johnny Dollar. Listen,
we are jolly what a fortunate coincidence.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
You're just the man I.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Want to talk to.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
No incident, of course that you happened to call on
me this way. Well, I'm afraid it was the other way.
What's on your mind? It's the guy right, Johnny, I'm
being frusted.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Oops again, Yes.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
It since my life's insured by a continental insurance and
trust company makes it.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
An insurance massive.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Yeah, well now look huge.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Let anybody but you look here for such masters. So
I want you to come over here, tonk Wood and see.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
Me right away.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
Yeah, well, mister current right, you're sure this isn't just
some some well you know a couple of times in
the past, that is, These emergency calls are yours? You
think I'm cooking when I'm not you fail to come
here and protect me.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Is this this, this threat and only.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Cooking this can happen?
Speaker 2 (01:20):
First, I can be murdered and good. Second, I'll cancel all.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
The rest of the insurance I have with that company
after you've been murdered.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
So you get yourself on over here right away, mister.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
Cut Hello, Well here we go again, and yet I wonder.
CDs Radio brings you Bob Bailey and the exciting Adventures
of the Man with the Action Pact Expencer count America's
(01:51):
fabulous freelance insurance investigator, Yours truly, Johnny Dollar, and now
act one of Yours truly Johnny Dollar. Expense account submitted
(02:18):
by a special investigator, Johnny Dollar to the Continental Insurance
and Trust Company Home Office, Hartford, Connecticut.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Following is the account of.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Expenses and caurred during my investigation of the Deadly chain matter.
Thanks to Alvin Peabody card right, I've been involved now
and then in some real wild cases, real crazy. On
the other hand, he's an erratic, old, eccentric, but extremely wealthy.
As a result, he's not only been the target of
a lot of rackets, but has come very close to
being murdered more than once. So I don't want on
(02:47):
the expense account of dollar for a TAXI to the officer,
Bill Ferguson at Continental Insurance and Trusts, No, Johnny hasn't
said a word to me. Le Me tell you what
kind of treaty's received.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
No bell as usual, He told me nothing. Well, it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
But with the millions worth of insured we've written for
card Right, and I mean millions, and to be sure
we don't lose his accrd of some other company where
we can afford to pamper a bit, which is to say,
we can well afford to pay your expensive card even
if all he wants to do is say hello to you. Okay,
then Bill, I'll run over to his home in Lakewood
and see him.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Of course, if he really is being threaten, I don't worry.
I'll let you know about it.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
Expense account at him two five seventy mileage on my
car to Lakewood, all my money. It's one of the
prettiest little towns in all of New England, home of
a lot of wealthy retired people. The card Right place
where the old man lives alone. It's on top of
a low hill, at one side of the lake, with
two or three acres surrounding the final house.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Him as card right.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Johnny Dally, Oh will this is an unexpected pleasure?
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Onyx, come in by, come in, give in enough? Thanks? Well, sir?
How are you this fine? Shall I after down? Afternoon?
It's almost evening?
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Can't you see that? Well?
Speaker 1 (03:58):
How are you anyway? I'm terrible time.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Oh, I'm just terrible that rainy weather. The past couple
of days, I've hardly been able to talk. Oh, there's
nothing wrong with today. A lot of nice warm sunshine today.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
All today, I've been feeling fine.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Whatever made you think otherwise? And tell me whatever brought
you here to lake?
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Would a phone call? Mister god right? Hell? Yeah from you?
You said you want to see me right away? I
said I want?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Oh oh yeah, oh of course I did. And you
know why, sir? Because I refuse to do anything foolish,
That's why. And yet if I don't, Johnny, I'll get
myself cute, just like Hector Kenworthy and Elvis J.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
Perrim.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
If you don't want mister cat right, carry on the
chain lesson?
Speaker 4 (04:43):
I received?
Speaker 1 (04:43):
How white?
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Am?
Speaker 1 (04:45):
That's fact?
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Look here I read you see what it says, continue
this chain, he says, and you will not only receive
a lot of money when your name reaches the top
of the list, but in exactly a dozen hours. A
dozen of hours is exactly six days. Yeah, I figured
that went out.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, I'll go on, ready, he's down here.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
In exactly a dozen dozen hours, you will have unexpected
great good luck.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
But if you break the change in a.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Dozen as hours, that disaster bell overtake. Look, look, surely
you don't believe that kind of chunk. It's the very
same lesson was received by the two friends of mine
I mentioned Paraman out in Chicago and Kenworthy out in
Los Angeles. They broke the chain in exactly six days.
A revote, did Coin's.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Oh no, no, this is.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
A vicious, murderous rat. Oh why do you say that,
miss Kirk, because of the way they died, Johnny?
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Oh yes, hmmm, and.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Maybe you'd better tell me about it back too, of
yours truly, Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
In a moment, who would you vote for in the
last general election?
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You may not realize it, but you voted for someone
you probably never heard of, and whose name may not
have appeared on your ballot.
Speaker 4 (06:06):
And who was this stranger.
Speaker 3 (06:08):
He was the elector appointed by your state to decide
who was to be our president. Every state has as
many electors as it has representatives and senators in Congress.
Combined collectively, they're called the Electoral College, and it's the
members of the electoral College alone who can vote for
the president of the United States. Your vote was cast
for the group of electors that pledged itself to vote
(06:31):
for either the Democratic or Republican nominee. But you did
not vote directly for either candidate. Around of our way
of doing things. Yes, but you must remember that when
the Constitution was written, there was no television, no.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
Radio, and few newspapers. The majority of voters had never
traveled more than a few miles from their own homes.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
In these circumstances, it was impossible for a voter in
Maine to know about the great public figures of New
York or Pennsylvania, Virginia or So Carolina. There were not
even any political parties to guide him, and so the
voter in Maine didn't try to do the impossible. He
voted for someone who did know the great men of
the times, and who could render an intelligent decision as
(07:13):
to which one of them should make the best president.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
The system has its faults. Three times in our history.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
The man who got the most votes from the people
was not the elected president because he did not get
the most votes.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
In the electoral college. Yet no one.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Today seriously proposes to abolish the electoral college, because by
and large the people believed that, in spite of its drawbacks,
the present system of electing our president ensures that your
country and mine shall be our country under God. And
now act too of yours, truly, Johnny Dollar and the
deadly chain matter. My good friend Kenworthy out in Los
(07:59):
Angeles died exactly six days after he broke the chain
of these lists, just the way that Leftis said he
would coincidence, I tell you, mister kint right, or at
most rees other of some superstitious fear that the letter.
Speaker 4 (08:10):
Instilled in him.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
No, well, that's what these chain letters do.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
They hold out that phony, hollow promise of giving you
something for nothing, and they scare you into doing it.
Work on your superstition, Jenny. And if you think superstition
is dead and this enlightened age, you're wrong. Are Some
of these chain letters even include a religious sounding prayer
for good luck. You know, are the only people who
prompit by the letters that asked to send money the
people who start them, or maybe one or two others
(08:33):
out of the millions who sent them along millions of
suckers the county that is luck. Ask anybody you know,
anybody who's ever carried on the chain, how much do
they get out of it?
Speaker 4 (08:42):
Nothing?
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Well, now, this one is only for an exclusive group
of Wilfie retired people for all.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Sure, but take my word for it. It's worth it.
But don't you see of this.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
It's one of those that doesn't require sending any money.
You can be sure that Crooko got it going. Either
has some ulterior purpose or it's just a playing car.
Anybody who gets scared into going on with it ought
to have his head exactly, Johnny, will you listen to
they want you to send money. I'm sorryst Cat, Right
go ahead. Just how did your friend in Los Angeles
die after the dozen times a dozen hours had passed? Yes,
(09:14):
we have now the same as my other friend Alpius
Paraman in Chicago. Yeah. Well they were both of them
run over by a hit and run driver and exactly
the time the chain that has said disaster would overtake.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
You know, they're against the law. Don't you chain letters
for any person?
Speaker 3 (09:29):
Of course lear they should be. But you just listen
to this, and this is why I'm worried.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:34):
A dozen dozen hours after he received this letter and
carried on the chain, Admiral Parley Baron came into a
great portra sure, yeah, yeah, you see now, and this
one Adjutant, General Frederick milky Or was suddenly and miraculously
cured of cans.
Speaker 4 (09:54):
Same old chung.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
No, no, no, no, listen.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
I listened.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
But a dozen dozen hours after Hector kim Worthy of
Los Angeles broke the chain.
Speaker 4 (10:02):
That's my friend.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Johnny that had guess, honey, And.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
After A J.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Perriman of Chicago broke the chain, they were both dead.
You see them right here, let me see it. And
if you break the chain, beware, the same thing can
happen to you. It will happen to you seasonally.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I think maybe you're right.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
This is the same kind of scared stuff, but it
goes a little bit too far. It isn't the one
hundred dollars I'm supposed to see him dollars, yes, one
hundred dollars in cash to the name at the top
of the list sex exclusive list of honest, wealthy.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Retired people exactly.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
And do you know who else is received man killing lake.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Wid Oh, this is Templeman, the rich widow who lives
over at tiny Woods and Wilford w Woods bottom the
retired oil mellionaires. This name at the top, the one
who gets the hundred bucks, mister Daniel Stringer. Yes he's
either there's care of post office box winning.
Speaker 4 (10:53):
In New York Zone eighty four, New York.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I don't know what part of New York that postal
zone is, but believe me, I'm going to find out
what to leave me. I'm not just gonna sit here,
but don't you do a dozen times? A dozen hours
are over for me? And you're superstitious too enough to
be scared by the threat in this chain letter enough
to maybe hurt yourself by doing some fool thing, or rather.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Because you are scared, well, no, john no, why of course?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
All right, then I'm going to get you a bodyguard
from the local police.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Where's your phone?
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Did they under stand in the corner? But now, Johnny,
if the police come around, I wouldn't that warn anybody
who might be coming here?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
To harm me, mister cat.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Right, Yes, there are times when I think you're well,
I think a lot of things about you. Oh I know, yes,
wild and crazy, eccentric old man.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
It'll be very blood about it.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yes, and maybe I am a little.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Bit blowing the chips are down. You're no fool. Oh No,
I wouldn't be too sure about that.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I've never really given much thought to this chain other
thing before. I'm sure I've tossed some of them into
the waste basket, But maybe I should have investigated them,
even the little ones, because they all work on the
same principle. They all contain a threat, and they all
capitalize on fear.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Look look at that it.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Says exclusive list of honest, wealthy retired people.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Why list like that can be brought.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
From a hundred sources from companies that kidd to the
mail out of it and say, yes, of course, oh,
maybe I'm all wrong. But suppose somebody bought a list
of wealthy people all over the country. Suppose he went
to Los Angeles. Well, we're kin where he lived, all right, Yeah,
Suppose he rented a post office box. Then he sent
out a couple of hundred of these letters, maybe a thousand,
A lot of rich people ab out there.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
The letters were all the.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Same, with his name at the top of the list,
then half a dozen fictitious ones fictitious any names on
that list that you recognize?
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Oh see here?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
No? All right, so maybe only one hundred people were
scared into sending the money carrying on the chain after all,
like you said, it isn't one hundred dollars. You're right,
Johnny had one hundred people. At one hundred dollars and
ten thousand bucks, even half of that would make it
worth sending out those letters. And by the time the
six days are up, he's collected enough so he skips down.
Can people like Kenworthy in Peraman? Do you think he
(12:52):
killed him to carry out the warning?
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Oh, frankly, I doubt it. Just the same.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
I think I'll call the Lakewood police and have somebody
sent out here to look after you. Even though.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
What is it, Johnny?
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Maybe I was wrong. Mister Carter right, your phone wire
has been cut, and now act three of yours, truly
Johnny dollars.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Johnny the phone.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
The telephone doesn't work as me, mister card right, somebody's
cut the wires in the press in that lesson. It
means that somebody has come here to carry it out.
Only one way, to make sure you stay inside here
while I go out and take a look around. Maybe
that's what they want you to go out there in
the dark.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Huh jnny. I'm going with you now. You're staying right here.
I'll be back in a minute. But there may be
some danger, or it may be that your phone is
just out of order. We'll see.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
There was enough moonlight for me to see where the
line off the telephone pole into.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
A connected box at the back end.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
Of the house.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
There wasn't enough light for me to notice a training
mine as I edged my way along. So what happened?
I dripped and fell flat on my face before I
could get back.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Up on my feet.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
So you come out to see what was wrong?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
You were, mister Carr right, are not reading your mail?
Speaker 4 (14:12):
Real good?
Speaker 1 (14:19):
When I finally came to I found myself in a
big leather self in.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
One corner mister Clever's library.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
My head felt like it had been the target for
a bolt of lightning, and the lightning had missed.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
A familiar face slowly came into focus.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Sad journey, another little sip of this, brandy, and you
feel much better, mister cord here, nice nice. I was
afraid there might be somebody out there, so I sneaked
on out after you.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yes, and I took.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
Along an old crooked match o't And when I saw
what he was doing to you, I let him have it,
I said.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
With all I had, Slady, who is he worth?
Speaker 3 (15:01):
He and I had an over time dragging him into
the house, But I did it, Jenny, as indeed I
did it. And I locked him up in the broom
closet too, and I locked him up.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Tight good, and I told you you're okay when the
chip said down, Oh, it's just that I caught him off. God, sure, sure.
But now if I can get up on my feet,
it's the boy.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, I think i'd like to talk to him.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Our visitor.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
It turned out to be a puggugly gorilla, highly the
brains behind a chain letter racket, except for admitting even
hired by somebody in New York to come up here
and give mister Kittrid a beating that make it look
like a burglary job. He refused to talk, so he
locked him up again, and I laid my splitting head on.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
A pillow for some much needed rest. By the time
I awoke in the morning.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Feeling somewhat but mister Conrad affects me. A messup bag
and an eggs for bread is here, Johnny. I just
walked down to the corn gas station and called a
telephone company, and you know something, They came out here
and I had that line all connected up again in
less than an hour. Yes, he just like that.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
So maybe I'll.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
Buy a couple of pous more here's of stock in
up On, Dominia, just to show him how I appreciate it.
And what about a little pow?
Speaker 1 (16:04):
I mean, the one who's slugged me last night?
Speaker 3 (16:05):
He knows, So, Johnny, I decided that after the way
he behaved last night, he doesn't deserve any breakfast.
Speaker 4 (16:12):
No, I mean where is he?
Speaker 3 (16:13):
He's still locked up in the brutal closet. Do you
think I ought to call the police to.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Come and get him.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
No, not yet.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Maybe I can beat some information out of him if
we need it. Well, of course we need it, don't.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Let's wait and see.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
First, I'd like to make a phone call. The call
was to my old friend, Lieutenant Randy Singer, New York
Police deprive on eighteenth precincts.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Post office box one on one.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Yes, postal is only any four.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
And if he comes around to pick up his mail,
you and neb him, Johnny fraud sending threading, let us
through the mail or anything you can think of, Okay, something.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
But I can't hold him for a while unless you
come down here and prefer something. Don't it against him?
Speaker 4 (16:52):
And Johnny, Yeah, you still haven't.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Told me what this is all about.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
And if I didn't know yet, just you grab hold
of that box holder.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
If he shows, and I hope he will, just you
be sure to get on the moon here, my friend.
Don't do it.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
But if I do, something terrible might happen to me, Jane,
I said, so if you do, it'll be a violation
of federal law, that's right, and you could end up
in prison for it.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Prison. Well, missus Templeman, there's.
Speaker 4 (17:23):
Mister Dollar, sir.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
Yes, that I do as he says. He still wings him, master,
But I didn't realize I didn't know you, now, sir.
Then back to mister Contrad's home on the hill, just
in time to answer the telephone Johnny Dollar, Johnny, I've
got him, Dan, what a fun Yeah, any Daniels Stringer
(17:45):
alias Danny McKay alias Willie Daniels, and I have a
dozen other things.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
I watched him unload the post office box myself.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Johnny and I tail him to a cheap rooming house.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Go on when I nabbed him.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
If he was opening must have been fifty sixty letters.
He'd got j letters and Johnny.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
Yah, do you know what he was taking out of him?
Speaker 3 (18:01):
I can guess Randy thousands, enough.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Money to alt him on suspicion almost.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Anything, and Johnny still here.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
He also had a bunch of new letters he'd written,
all addressed to folks in a wealthy section down their
German down Pa and hang on to him, Randy, I'll
be down to make formal charges against him.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Okay, maybe I'll pick up a.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Chief inspector from the post Office department to do it.
Speaker 5 (18:21):
Okay, Johnny, Yeah, maybe some of those chain letters are
little ones are harmless.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
But again maybe they're nuts and they're all against the law.
But there's only one thing to do, a point them.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
Like the plague.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Or better still, if you get one ta get right
down to your local postmaster. He'll know how to go
about helping to stamp out this racket and believe me
that's all.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
It is a.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Rackets expense account total including manageer, my car and the
trip to New York and back twenty seven thirty five Hers,
Truly Johnny Dollar, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, Storrying. Bob Lley
(19:19):
originates in Hollywood and has written, produced and directed by
Jack Johnson. Heard an ourcast for Virginia, Greg Howard mcneer,
Paul Dubab, Frank Hurstle and her Biker.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Be sure to join us next.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Week, same time in station for another exciting story of
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar. This is Jim Matthew speaking.
Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Well, act nice. What can I do for you?
Speaker 1 (00:08):
I beg your pardon.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
It's quite all right, and it's credited credit and now
that's all you'll.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Have to say. No, wait a minute? Who are you
a minute?
Speaker 3 (00:17):
What for?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
I'm busy.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
I'm a busy man.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
Alvin Peabody Kyride, who you that's right?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Cortright?
Speaker 3 (00:25):
Well, what are you calling about?
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Mister guy right? Calling me? Oh you Johnny Dollar. Listen,
we are jolly what a fortunate coincidence.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
You're just the man I.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Want to talk to.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
No incident, of course that you happened to call on
me this way. Well, I'm afraid it was the other way.
What's on your mind? It's the guy right, Johnny, I'm
being frusted.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Oops again, Yes.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
It since my life's insured by a continental insurance and
trust company makes it.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
An insurance massive.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Yeah, well now look huge.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Let anybody but you look here for such masters. So
I want you to come over here, tonk Wood and see.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
Me right away.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
Yeah, well, mister current right, you're sure this isn't just
some some well you know a couple of times in
the past, that is, These emergency calls are yours? You
think I'm cooking when I'm not you fail to come
here and protect me.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Is this this, this threat and only.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Cooking this can happen?
Speaker 2 (01:20):
First, I can be murdered and good. Second, I'll cancel all.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
The rest of the insurance I have with that company
after you've been murdered.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
So you get yourself on over here right away, mister.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
Cut Hello, Well here we go again, and yet I wonder.
CDs Radio brings you Bob Bailey and the exciting Adventures
of the Man with the Action Pact Expencer count America's
(01:51):
fabulous freelance insurance investigator, Yours truly, Johnny Dollar, and now
act one of Yours truly Johnny Dollar. Expense account submitted
(02:18):
by a special investigator, Johnny Dollar to the Continental Insurance
and Trust Company Home Office, Hartford, Connecticut.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Following is the account of.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Expenses and caurred during my investigation of the Deadly chain matter.
Thanks to Alvin Peabody card right, I've been involved now
and then in some real wild cases, real crazy. On
the other hand, he's an erratic, old, eccentric, but extremely wealthy.
As a result, he's not only been the target of
a lot of rackets, but has come very close to
being murdered more than once. So I don't want on
(02:47):
the expense account of dollar for a TAXI to the officer,
Bill Ferguson at Continental Insurance and Trusts, No, Johnny hasn't
said a word to me. Le Me tell you what
kind of treaty's received.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
No bell as usual, He told me nothing. Well, it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
But with the millions worth of insured we've written for
card Right, and I mean millions, and to be sure
we don't lose his accrd of some other company where
we can afford to pamper a bit, which is to say,
we can well afford to pay your expensive card even
if all he wants to do is say hello to you. Okay,
then Bill, I'll run over to his home in Lakewood
and see him.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Of course, if he really is being threaten, I don't worry.
I'll let you know about it.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
Expense account at him two five seventy mileage on my
car to Lakewood, all my money. It's one of the
prettiest little towns in all of New England, home of
a lot of wealthy retired people. The card Right place
where the old man lives alone. It's on top of
a low hill, at one side of the lake, with
two or three acres surrounding the final house.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Him as card right.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Johnny Dally, Oh will this is an unexpected pleasure?
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Onyx, come in by, come in, give in enough? Thanks? Well, sir?
How are you this fine? Shall I after down? Afternoon?
It's almost evening?
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Can't you see that? Well?
Speaker 1 (03:58):
How are you anyway? I'm terrible time.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Oh, I'm just terrible that rainy weather. The past couple
of days, I've hardly been able to talk. Oh, there's
nothing wrong with today. A lot of nice warm sunshine today.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
All today, I've been feeling fine.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Whatever made you think otherwise? And tell me whatever brought
you here to lake?
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Would a phone call? Mister god right? Hell? Yeah from you?
You said you want to see me right away? I
said I want?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Oh oh yeah, oh of course I did. And you
know why, sir? Because I refuse to do anything foolish,
That's why. And yet if I don't, Johnny, I'll get
myself cute, just like Hector Kenworthy and Elvis J.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
Perrim.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
If you don't want mister cat right, carry on the
chain lesson?
Speaker 4 (04:43):
I received?
Speaker 1 (04:43):
How white?
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Am?
Speaker 1 (04:45):
That's fact?
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Look here I read you see what it says, continue
this chain, he says, and you will not only receive
a lot of money when your name reaches the top
of the list, but in exactly a dozen hours. A
dozen of hours is exactly six days. Yeah, I figured
that went out.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, I'll go on, ready, he's down here.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
In exactly a dozen dozen hours, you will have unexpected
great good luck.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
But if you break the change in a.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Dozen as hours, that disaster bell overtake. Look, look, surely
you don't believe that kind of chunk. It's the very
same lesson was received by the two friends of mine
I mentioned Paraman out in Chicago and Kenworthy out in
Los Angeles. They broke the chain in exactly six days.
A revote, did Coin's.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Oh no, no, this is.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
A vicious, murderous rat. Oh why do you say that,
miss Kirk, because of the way they died, Johnny?
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Oh yes, hmmm, and.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Maybe you'd better tell me about it back too, of
yours truly, Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
In a moment, who would you vote for in the
last general election?
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You may not realize it, but you voted for someone
you probably never heard of, and whose name may not
have appeared on your ballot.
Speaker 4 (06:06):
And who was this stranger.
Speaker 3 (06:08):
He was the elector appointed by your state to decide
who was to be our president. Every state has as
many electors as it has representatives and senators in Congress.
Combined collectively, they're called the Electoral College, and it's the
members of the electoral College alone who can vote for
the president of the United States. Your vote was cast
for the group of electors that pledged itself to vote
(06:31):
for either the Democratic or Republican nominee. But you did
not vote directly for either candidate. Around of our way
of doing things. Yes, but you must remember that when
the Constitution was written, there was no television, no.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
Radio, and few newspapers. The majority of voters had never
traveled more than a few miles from their own homes.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
In these circumstances, it was impossible for a voter in
Maine to know about the great public figures of New
York or Pennsylvania, Virginia or So Carolina. There were not
even any political parties to guide him, and so the
voter in Maine didn't try to do the impossible. He
voted for someone who did know the great men of
the times, and who could render an intelligent decision as
(07:13):
to which one of them should make the best president.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
The system has its faults. Three times in our history.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
The man who got the most votes from the people
was not the elected president because he did not get
the most votes.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
In the electoral college. Yet no one.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Today seriously proposes to abolish the electoral college, because by
and large the people believed that, in spite of its drawbacks,
the present system of electing our president ensures that your
country and mine shall be our country under God. And
now act too of yours, truly, Johnny Dollar and the
deadly chain matter. My good friend Kenworthy out in Los
(07:59):
Angeles died exactly six days after he broke the chain
of these lists, just the way that Leftis said he
would coincidence, I tell you, mister kint right, or at
most rees other of some superstitious fear that the letter.
Speaker 4 (08:10):
Instilled in him.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
No, well, that's what these chain letters do.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
They hold out that phony, hollow promise of giving you
something for nothing, and they scare you into doing it.
Work on your superstition, Jenny. And if you think superstition
is dead and this enlightened age, you're wrong. Are Some
of these chain letters even include a religious sounding prayer
for good luck. You know, are the only people who
prompit by the letters that asked to send money the
people who start them, or maybe one or two others
(08:33):
out of the millions who sent them along millions of
suckers the county that is luck. Ask anybody you know,
anybody who's ever carried on the chain, how much do
they get out of it?
Speaker 4 (08:42):
Nothing?
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Well, now, this one is only for an exclusive group
of Wilfie retired people for all.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Sure, but take my word for it. It's worth it.
But don't you see of this.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
It's one of those that doesn't require sending any money.
You can be sure that Crooko got it going. Either
has some ulterior purpose or it's just a playing car.
Anybody who gets scared into going on with it ought
to have his head exactly, Johnny, will you listen to
they want you to send money. I'm sorryst Cat, Right
go ahead. Just how did your friend in Los Angeles
die after the dozen times a dozen hours had passed? Yes,
(09:14):
we have now the same as my other friend Alpius
Paraman in Chicago. Yeah. Well they were both of them
run over by a hit and run driver and exactly
the time the chain that has said disaster would overtake.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
You know, they're against the law. Don't you chain letters
for any person?
Speaker 3 (09:29):
Of course lear they should be. But you just listen
to this, and this is why I'm worried.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:34):
A dozen dozen hours after he received this letter and
carried on the chain, Admiral Parley Baron came into a
great portra sure, yeah, yeah, you see now, and this
one Adjutant, General Frederick milky Or was suddenly and miraculously
cured of cans.
Speaker 4 (09:54):
Same old chung.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
No, no, no, no, listen.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
I listened.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
But a dozen dozen hours after Hector kim Worthy of
Los Angeles broke the chain.
Speaker 4 (10:02):
That's my friend.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Johnny that had guess, honey, And.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
After A J.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Perriman of Chicago broke the chain, they were both dead.
You see them right here, let me see it. And
if you break the chain, beware, the same thing can
happen to you. It will happen to you seasonally.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I think maybe you're right.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
This is the same kind of scared stuff, but it
goes a little bit too far. It isn't the one
hundred dollars I'm supposed to see him dollars, yes, one
hundred dollars in cash to the name at the top
of the list sex exclusive list of honest, wealthy.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Retired people exactly.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
And do you know who else is received man killing lake.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Wid Oh, this is Templeman, the rich widow who lives
over at tiny Woods and Wilford w Woods bottom the
retired oil mellionaires. This name at the top, the one
who gets the hundred bucks, mister Daniel Stringer. Yes he's
either there's care of post office box winning.
Speaker 4 (10:53):
In New York Zone eighty four, New York.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I don't know what part of New York that postal
zone is, but believe me, I'm going to find out
what to leave me. I'm not just gonna sit here,
but don't you do a dozen times? A dozen hours
are over for me? And you're superstitious too enough to
be scared by the threat in this chain letter enough
to maybe hurt yourself by doing some fool thing, or rather.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Because you are scared, well, no, john no, why of course?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
All right, then I'm going to get you a bodyguard
from the local police.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Where's your phone?
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Did they under stand in the corner? But now, Johnny,
if the police come around, I wouldn't that warn anybody
who might be coming here?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
To harm me, mister cat.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Right, Yes, there are times when I think you're well,
I think a lot of things about you. Oh I know, yes,
wild and crazy, eccentric old man.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
It'll be very blood about it.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yes, and maybe I am a little.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Bit blowing the chips are down. You're no fool. Oh No,
I wouldn't be too sure about that.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I've never really given much thought to this chain other
thing before. I'm sure I've tossed some of them into
the waste basket, But maybe I should have investigated them,
even the little ones, because they all work on the
same principle. They all contain a threat, and they all
capitalize on fear.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Look look at that it.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Says exclusive list of honest, wealthy retired people.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Why list like that can be brought.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
From a hundred sources from companies that kidd to the
mail out of it and say, yes, of course, oh,
maybe I'm all wrong. But suppose somebody bought a list
of wealthy people all over the country. Suppose he went
to Los Angeles. Well, we're kin where he lived, all right, Yeah,
Suppose he rented a post office box. Then he sent
out a couple of hundred of these letters, maybe a thousand,
A lot of rich people ab out there.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
The letters were all the.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Same, with his name at the top of the list,
then half a dozen fictitious ones fictitious any names on
that list that you recognize?
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Oh see here?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
No? All right, so maybe only one hundred people were
scared into sending the money carrying on the chain after all,
like you said, it isn't one hundred dollars. You're right,
Johnny had one hundred people. At one hundred dollars and
ten thousand bucks, even half of that would make it
worth sending out those letters. And by the time the
six days are up, he's collected enough so he skips down.
Can people like Kenworthy in Peraman? Do you think he
(12:52):
killed him to carry out the warning?
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Oh, frankly, I doubt it. Just the same.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
I think I'll call the Lakewood police and have somebody
sent out here to look after you. Even though.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
What is it, Johnny?
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Maybe I was wrong. Mister Carter right, your phone wire
has been cut, and now act three of yours, truly
Johnny dollars.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Johnny the phone.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
The telephone doesn't work as me, mister card right, somebody's
cut the wires in the press in that lesson. It
means that somebody has come here to carry it out.
Only one way, to make sure you stay inside here
while I go out and take a look around. Maybe
that's what they want you to go out there in
the dark.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Huh jnny. I'm going with you now. You're staying right here.
I'll be back in a minute. But there may be
some danger, or it may be that your phone is
just out of order. We'll see.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
There was enough moonlight for me to see where the
line off the telephone pole into.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
A connected box at the back end.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
Of the house.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
There wasn't enough light for me to notice a training
mine as I edged my way along. So what happened?
I dripped and fell flat on my face before I
could get back.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Up on my feet.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
So you come out to see what was wrong?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
You were, mister Carr right, are not reading your mail?
Speaker 4 (14:12):
Real good?
Speaker 1 (14:19):
When I finally came to I found myself in a
big leather self in.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
One corner mister Clever's library.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
My head felt like it had been the target for
a bolt of lightning, and the lightning had missed.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
A familiar face slowly came into focus.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Sad journey, another little sip of this, brandy, and you
feel much better, mister cord here, nice nice. I was
afraid there might be somebody out there, so I sneaked
on out after you.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yes, and I took.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
Along an old crooked match o't And when I saw
what he was doing to you, I let him have it,
I said.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
With all I had, Slady, who is he worth?
Speaker 3 (15:01):
He and I had an over time dragging him into
the house, But I did it, Jenny, as indeed I
did it. And I locked him up in the broom
closet too, and I locked him up.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Tight good, and I told you you're okay when the
chip said down, Oh, it's just that I caught him off. God, sure, sure.
But now if I can get up on my feet,
it's the boy.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, I think i'd like to talk to him.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Our visitor.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
It turned out to be a puggugly gorilla, highly the
brains behind a chain letter racket, except for admitting even
hired by somebody in New York to come up here
and give mister Kittrid a beating that make it look
like a burglary job. He refused to talk, so he
locked him up again, and I laid my splitting head on.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
A pillow for some much needed rest. By the time
I awoke in the morning.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Feeling somewhat but mister Conrad affects me. A messup bag
and an eggs for bread is here, Johnny. I just
walked down to the corn gas station and called a
telephone company, and you know something, They came out here
and I had that line all connected up again in
less than an hour. Yes, he just like that.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
So maybe I'll.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
Buy a couple of pous more here's of stock in
up On, Dominia, just to show him how I appreciate it.
And what about a little pow?
Speaker 1 (16:04):
I mean, the one who's slugged me last night?
Speaker 3 (16:05):
He knows, So, Johnny, I decided that after the way
he behaved last night, he doesn't deserve any breakfast.
Speaker 4 (16:12):
No, I mean where is he?
Speaker 3 (16:13):
He's still locked up in the brutal closet. Do you
think I ought to call the police to.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Come and get him.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
No, not yet.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Maybe I can beat some information out of him if
we need it. Well, of course we need it, don't.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Let's wait and see.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
First, I'd like to make a phone call. The call
was to my old friend, Lieutenant Randy Singer, New York
Police deprive on eighteenth precincts.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Post office box one on one.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Yes, postal is only any four.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
And if he comes around to pick up his mail,
you and neb him, Johnny fraud sending threading, let us
through the mail or anything you can think of, Okay, something.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
But I can't hold him for a while unless you
come down here and prefer something. Don't it against him?
Speaker 4 (16:52):
And Johnny, Yeah, you still haven't.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Told me what this is all about.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
And if I didn't know yet, just you grab hold
of that box holder.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
If he shows, and I hope he will, just you
be sure to get on the moon here, my friend.
Don't do it.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
But if I do, something terrible might happen to me, Jane,
I said, so if you do, it'll be a violation
of federal law, that's right, and you could end up
in prison for it.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Prison. Well, missus Templeman, there's.
Speaker 4 (17:23):
Mister Dollar, sir.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
Yes, that I do as he says. He still wings him, master,
But I didn't realize I didn't know you, now, sir.
Then back to mister Contrad's home on the hill, just
in time to answer the telephone Johnny Dollar, Johnny, I've
got him, Dan, what a fun Yeah, any Daniels Stringer
(17:45):
alias Danny McKay alias Willie Daniels, and I have a
dozen other things.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
I watched him unload the post office box myself.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Johnny and I tail him to a cheap rooming house.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Go on when I nabbed him.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
If he was opening must have been fifty sixty letters.
He'd got j letters and Johnny.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
Yah, do you know what he was taking out of him?
Speaker 3 (18:01):
I can guess Randy thousands, enough.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Money to alt him on suspicion almost.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Anything, and Johnny still here.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
He also had a bunch of new letters he'd written,
all addressed to folks in a wealthy section down their
German down Pa and hang on to him, Randy, I'll
be down to make formal charges against him.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Okay, maybe I'll pick up a.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Chief inspector from the post Office department to do it.
Speaker 5 (18:21):
Okay, Johnny, Yeah, maybe some of those chain letters are
little ones are harmless.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
But again maybe they're nuts and they're all against the law.
But there's only one thing to do, a point them.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
Like the plague.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Or better still, if you get one ta get right
down to your local postmaster. He'll know how to go
about helping to stamp out this racket and believe me
that's all.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
It is a.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Rackets expense account total including manageer, my car and the
trip to New York and back twenty seven thirty five Hers,
Truly Johnny Dollar, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, Storrying. Bob Lley
(19:19):
originates in Hollywood and has written, produced and directed by
Jack Johnson. Heard an ourcast for Virginia, Greg Howard mcneer,
Paul Dubab, Frank Hurstle and her Biker.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Be sure to join us next.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Week, same time in station for another exciting story of
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar. This is Jim Matthew speaking.
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