October 15, 2025 • 29 mins
Chronicles the cases of a law enforcement officer in the American West, blending traditional Western themes with modern investigative techniques. The stories are based on real cases.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The National Broadcasting Company presents Joel McCrae in Tales of
the Texas Rangers from Hollywood. Another authentic reenactment of the
case transcribed from the files of the Texas Rangers Tales
(00:24):
of the Texas Rangers, starring Joe McCray Ranger Chase Persons.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Texas more than two.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Hundred and sixty thousand square miles and fifty men who
make up the most famous and oldest law enforcement body
in North America. Now from the files of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Can these stories based on fact, names, case and.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Places are fixtitious for a preetent, they amends themselves not
a matter of record. Cayse Fortnite wheelchair killing.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
It is eight forty pm May First, several years ago.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Colby, Texas, near.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
The edge of the Great Piney Woods is unusually crowded.
There's several hundred young men from a nearby CCC camp.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I've converged on the town to spend.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Their monthly allowance in the office of Sheriff Pete Saunders.
The sheriff and his deputy are standing by in case
any emergency should arrive.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
Oh, I don't know why I'm so goggy here not
even nine o'clock after that, tired rag, I think if
they need for your stay there later I can handle things.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Why don't you go home with only am young budge
in town.
Speaker 4 (01:55):
Oh they seem to be all right. We'll sign them
any first. I walked down Main Street a while ago. Oh,
they were behaving just the same camp as news. It's
the first pay day they've had around here.
Speaker 5 (02:05):
And man can get pretty high with thirty bucks in
his pocket.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
They don't get the whole thirty rag, They only get
five of its. Government makes them send the rest home.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Sure, that's the whole idea. Well, I guess this chairs
harvest fares orders speaking.
Speaker 6 (02:22):
You better go to the old house on lock Hill.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
You better go there right.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Away, old man swains place.
Speaker 6 (02:28):
Yes, yes, before we go there quickly and bring a doctor.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Why what's wear out there? Who is this aunt?
Speaker 6 (02:35):
That's all? You better go hright away.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
You better give me your theirs. You're hello? Hello, hello?
He know what's the matter if you hung up on me?
Hellos sathm wrong? Old Man's wings wings to them twenty over.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
Somebody's idea of a joke aboule and a half out
the Swains and he hasn't.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Got a fold in that collas to come from some
place else.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
And yeah, see who can crazy? Then kick up Micro
and Carl and follow me out to Swains. I'll get
the Dark on the way. Wimbley Swain, a victim of rheumatoid.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Arthrotis, was found dead in his dilapidated home, seated in
his wheelchair. An in Christmas call and an autopsy order.
He had not died for natural courts.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
The sheriff called for the help of a.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Texas ranger, and Ranger jas Pearson was a sign joining
the sheriff at the funeral home.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Party's in here, jerse, Uh huh. He was a pretty
old man, press already crippled up bed the last twenty
years or so. Hadn't been for that phone call. Id
figured his heart just gave out.
Speaker 7 (03:37):
Yes, the Dark would have two the thing you asked
for a coroner's inquest.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Let me see the autopsy report.
Speaker 4 (03:43):
Yeah here, he died about eight last night.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Ruptured spleinging concussion.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Dark says he was beaten to the funning.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
No marks on the body.
Speaker 4 (03:54):
All the damage was inside. Whatever he was hit with,
it didn't leave any marks, only rubber hoes.
Speaker 7 (04:00):
Maybe something like that wouldn't leave him mind. You find
anything like that there, but.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
Chance to look jas Maybe my deputies run. Of course
I'm lower left. Three of 'em a swing class.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Why three of 'em?
Speaker 4 (04:11):
I may need more in that when he gets around.
If the old man is dead, the place will be loaded.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Will Vulture what I mean, Will?
Speaker 4 (04:16):
It's kind of a funny thing, Jace. The old man
was kind of peculiar.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Living off by himself in that big old house, not
even a cleaning woman to help him. Started some crazy talk.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
A long time back. Wilma got around that he had
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Stakes to weigh his plays. You think there was anything
to it?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
Nope, because I know what he was living on. Gott
to check for seventy dollars every month from some insurance company.
Speaker 7 (04:38):
I know he Yeah, too bad everybody didn't know that.
Probably killed by somebody trying to force him to tell where.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
He hid the money people think he had. That could
be a motive.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
On the other hand, might be other reasons for killing
him that we.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Didn't know about.
Speaker 8 (04:52):
Had doubt a share.
Speaker 7 (04:53):
When a man comes into a place to kill with
nothing else on his mind, he does it fast. This
beating took time, and I wanna look at Swain's place.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
The sheriff was right about the vultures.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Because deputies hadn't been on guard, the house would have
been as shambles. One of the deputies came inside with us.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
At the old man's sweet chair.
Speaker 4 (05:17):
Yeah, that little lou that's where we phone him setting.
Speaker 7 (05:21):
My lab crewill be coming in from Austin making dust
the chair for prints while they're going over the place. Anyway,
what's this on the floor where you standing there?
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (05:30):
It's got a little crunchy when I walked across it before,
like somebody spilled some sugar.
Speaker 8 (05:35):
Yeah, it's not sugar, more.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Like white beach sand, a little beach sand or this
country Jason is the same.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
That's what it looks like.
Speaker 7 (05:43):
Lab boys can tell whether it is or uh.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
And then the old man's chair too. You get around
much outside, I mean rest of mind only is you'd
never real himself further to the front porch to get
set hard to get his food in, reg continded I
we used to stand in the porch and flag down
a passing car truck asked them to pick up things
for him at the market.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
I stopped buying often to get him. Thing had a
red planel shirted wave. Spot it easy from the road
and slipped through the rest of the place. And wait
a minute, what is it? Jay?
Speaker 7 (06:15):
A few more grains of sand on the floor. Here,
more of it, right on into the kitchen.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Let's go out back, well living here, jays, it's the stump.
Feel all the way back to them. He'll somebody's been
out here.
Speaker 7 (06:32):
Oh, look out of a shoe mark on the ground,
barely seas the outline the tow dug in deepest man
must have been running.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Well.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
The one thing wrong about the whole set up jas
that phone call I got was from a girl.
Speaker 7 (06:46):
It doesn't register as the kind of a killing has
been done by a woman. Besides, the murder doesn't usually call.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
In a report. Too bad. You couldn't find out who
made it.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
Well, as we know, it came from a payphone in
the lobby of the Kobe House.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Deskert didn't notice anybody to do.
Speaker 7 (07:00):
I see, let's spread out a little. See if we
can cut across any more tracks like this one. Rag,
you move off to my right about five paces rage,
I'll fall out on this side.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Good let's move.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
I'm getting some light tracks over here, but the ground's.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Too hard and not very clear. You must be on
the right trail. There's nothing it all over this way.
I'm going to plank.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
Us find something.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Rag. Yeah, hey, you better come here. What is it? Man? Sock?
Speaker 7 (07:35):
It's morn, Just a sock, noted at the middle and
heavy at the toe.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
It's full of sand. So that's where those grains.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
Who say go by kid the much to throw that
away while it was running.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Jee, there's a murder weapons sheriff.
Speaker 7 (07:47):
Now all we gotta do is find the person who
used it. Trail behind Swain's house, Keeter down past the
stump field, and we lost all trades a mile into
the thick foliage of the piny woods. I sent the
sock full of sand through to the Austin lab for examination. Meanwhile,
(08:09):
the lab crew met me at the Kobe funeral home
and went over Swing's body.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
That sock must have been the weaponar right, Jason, look
just combed a few grains of the sand out of
the old man's hair, a.
Speaker 7 (08:18):
Little more embedded than the scout. Impact of the blows
must have forced some of it through the sack.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
While you must have. That's why you found traces of
it on the floor.
Speaker 7 (08:26):
I can't make it out that you don't know much yet, sirff.
We checked with the other lab men out of Swains.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
Yeah, usual Joe Lolis Smith quiz.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
That may be a report from Austin. I'll get it
well at all.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
Yeah, I've had rigs check it over. That say, little
food of the Airy Hills.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
That's good, that's funny.
Speaker 7 (08:46):
He isn't likely the killer came from far off or
talk about the old man's having money stashed away sort
of a local run Andy and Austin with a report
from that sock.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
There an army camp around here any place? No, that
shock because army issue.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
How there's a new CCC camp up in the Piney Woods, Jase,
about nine miles from here.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Hey, they're civilian, but they get their closed.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
From army issue. Camps are run by army officers.
Speaker 4 (09:12):
More than one hundred men up there.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Yeah, and a good chance that one of them as
the boy we're looking for. That rumor about Swain having money,
he's been around for a long time. If somebody from
the town was gonna do him and they had done
it before this, come on, sheriff. Let's drive up to
that camp.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
It would be better if we could borrow a truck
from someplace.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Wire truck.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Old Loggers Road is the only one of the camp
high center. It's kind of rough on the passions of car,
especially one throwing a horse trailer like you.
Speaker 7 (09:39):
Well, I got charcoal in my trailer. Can't we cut
straight through the woods on horses.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It's a good idea. Say it was time a couple
of months. Got a horse at your place. Yeah, it's
on the way, all right, I'll drive you out. He'll
stack from there.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
We got the sheriff's horse, I amloaded charcoal from the
trailer and we headed into the pining woods. As we
drew near to the camp, we caught lynches of men
working in squads of four or five, and finally ran
across one man alone and mounted.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Fellow on horseback. Ahead there case, did you see him?
Speaker 4 (10:15):
Yeah, it looks like a straw boss moved into a
train there.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Oh, he's waiting for it. Who boys, ye.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
Charko, you must be working fur from the agriculture of college.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Understand they got four of them. The supervisor.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
If they have somebody who knows the woods, most of
the other camp boys in the big cities. Yeah, you
feed us.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Looking for the camp Ooh, that's right. It's about three
quarters a mile off that way. You'll see the tents
when you get over that ride.
Speaker 4 (10:43):
Who are you?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Oh, my name is Joe Roberts, Section Leader. My name
is Spears, and this is Sheriff Saunders.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Well, how to show up you out here about something
connected with that burder in town?
Speaker 7 (10:52):
I do know about that wasn't around town till this morning,
and you're quite aways.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
A major Beck told me about it when the truck
brought him out from town this morn. The major was
in town all night.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
Yeah, he doesn't live in the camp, just comes out days.
No place out here for his wife and daughter, Wife
and daughter, anybody else out here? Have women poke in town?
Know why?
Speaker 2 (11:12):
I'm just curious? You know where the major and his
family are living in town? Which, sure at the hotel
Colby House.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
That's where that phone call came from. Jase, I know,
thanks a lot. Roberts along, show up, better have a
little talk with a major. If to say that again,
go a work coach.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
In just a moment, we will continue with tales of
the Texas Rangers starring Joel McCrae as Ranger Chase Pearson.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
It's the Sober Jubilee on NBC.
Speaker 4 (11:54):
Every Friday evening, there's another stirring adventure series for Western
towns on the station.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yes, Every Friday at.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
NBC brings you the King of the Cowboys, Royal Rogers
with the Queen of the West Day elevens. Make your
date for thrilling listening with the Royal Rogers Show every
Friday evening at the same spot on your dial. There's
action and adventure in.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Paradise Valley when Roy Rogers rides Dale.
Speaker 4 (12:15):
Waves, and there's also a sol or two by these
wonderful Western entertainers Royan Dale.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Be sure to hear them Friday.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
We continue now with tales of the Texas Rangers and
today's case wheelchair Killing, an authentic story from the files
of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Major Becket's regular army in his early fifties, over age
in rank, a gray, embittered man. His office was a
field tenth ahead of the company street. So do you
think that old man was killed by somebody from this camp?
Speaker 2 (12:52):
We've got a raisin to think so, because of a
sock sucks like that have been general issues since nineteen seventeen.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
I don't like any accusations against my.
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Command, especially accusations based on such clumsy evidence.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
There's something else beside the sock.
Speaker 7 (13:05):
Major, I notice your company streaked between the tents is
paved with gravel.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
What about it? That gravel bedded in beat sand? You
can see it around the borders, can't you?
Speaker 4 (13:14):
So we can see it. There's the same kind of
sand we fall in the sock that Swain.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Was beaten with.
Speaker 7 (13:19):
There's no beach sand anyplace else in this area. Major,
Where'd this come from?
Speaker 4 (13:23):
How do I know?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
An advanced cattery of engineers set the camp up?
Speaker 4 (13:27):
Both The sand was trucked in with other material. All right,
everything you've found points to this camp.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
You should have expected something like this. What do you
mean by that?
Speaker 6 (13:38):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
What would I mean? Ranger? What can you expect from
sidewalk bombs?
Speaker 7 (13:42):
Bums don't work, Major, and the crews we pass seem
to be working pretty hard.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
I have to spend my time with him. You don't.
Speaker 7 (13:48):
By time your men come in from the woods four o'clock.
All the clothing may have issued through your own supply.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yes, all listed and sin Bawl good. It couldn't have
lost much in a month.
Speaker 7 (13:57):
At four o'clock, I'd like you to call for an
inspection of it equipment. Seep, we can find somebody who's
missing a sock. All sorts of equipment was missing.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Shirts, extra shoes, and the kits.
Speaker 7 (14:13):
There was only one man who couldn't account for a
pair of socks.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
All right, rendesto in the tent, all right.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
All right, look major, what kind of crime is it
to lose a sock?
Speaker 4 (14:23):
There's a shortageanlem or something.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
A ranger and her will tell you.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
I thought you nd you guys.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
It was just something they made up of a movie.
Speaker 4 (14:29):
They've been around since long before there were any movies, Randezzo.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
Okay, so you're a cowboy detector, so fine, I will
store my socks.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
It'll be funny, fellow, I must time trying to be funny.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But what are you all jumping on me? Huh?
Speaker 3 (14:42):
I washed my socks to hang them up to dry
in one of these bull drops. Put those hooks on them.
That makes you a federal case, Randezzo. A sock belonging
to somebody in this camp was used to kill an
old man. It was filled with sand from the company
street and used as a blackjack. You may not sty
not got that old nickel pincher, I log you, Oh,
but old Camp knows about it.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
What are you looking at me?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
The guy that picks an aide up told us about
it when he brought the truck.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Back this morning. Were you in town last night?
Speaker 3 (15:10):
It was all in town last night. We got paid yesterday.
The major let us go in on the truck. So
times you come back to camp when everybody else come back.
Trucks picked all of us up again at midnight, same
place they thought us out of Main street.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Put a corner near that hotel, Kobe House.
Speaker 4 (15:24):
That's the only one. And what'd you do while you
were in town up to nine o'clock? I was having a.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Handboider and that place next to the bus people, I
was there from eight till ten.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
You must be a slow eater.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
It's a long time for one hamburger who cared.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
A brought the ham boker.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
I was trying to pick up the bride behind the counter.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
She keeps giving me the smile with all her teeth picked.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
He yea for what time she gets off?
Speaker 2 (15:45):
She tells me ten o'clock?
Speaker 3 (15:46):
So what happens five minutes to tense. You got a
boyfriend comes to me, a guy eight foot tall.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
You know the girl he's talking about, Sheriff.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Yeah, Lucille Mason. M's have been her husband, married her husband.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
How do you like that?
Speaker 7 (15:58):
But she been the one who made the phone call.
You got schafft of chairs lit.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
The call was a lot younger.
Speaker 5 (16:04):
I don't think you have any right to hold this
man till you've checked on the story.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
We're not holding.
Speaker 7 (16:08):
Anybody Major until we've checked on a lot of things.
All right, Rona or you can go, but don't leave
this camp except your work crew.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Leave this camp, he says, for now. One ain't even
go on in my tent. I should have never left Brooklyn.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Major.
Speaker 7 (16:21):
That goes for everybody out here. Don't let him use
the trucks. Keep them in camp. You better stay here
to make sure.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
My wife and daughter are in town. Well, I can't
stop you from going home, but if.
Speaker 7 (16:31):
You do, the sheriff will have to send deputies out
here to keep them in confined to the camp area.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I don't want similar parties here. I'll stay.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Thanks, Come on, Sheriff, let's get back to town. You
know jah I kind of got n o.
Speaker 7 (16:46):
I a girl's voice, young not from around here, as
the major's daughter stay.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
At the kolbery hers. I think he knows more than
these tible and that's kind of funny.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Nah, he's all right, probably a pretty good man. Woo.
Speaker 7 (16:58):
He hates his men because they're not what he's used to,
but given credit for one thing, he doesn't want any
of them involved in this. If he had the authority
to do it, he'd probably take that Randazzel and hang
him to the highest tree.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
But when he thought we might take the man in
who went to bat for him.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
Yeah, that's shoe what you mean? Hey, there is that
fellow Roberts we met riding in the Search and Leader.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
You know, giving a horses water good for him. The
horse is the kind of person. Yeah, thanks for taking
care of them, Roberts. It's all right.
Speaker 4 (17:27):
Hey, Hi to make out with Randazzo. He s used
to be all right, and most of them are najor.
Bet doesn't like them both.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Well, that's his privilege. I guess he'd rather have.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
Some young army officers around so he could sort of
hand take a son in law. It count's pretty she
associated with any of the fellows here. Well, when the
camp first opened, the fellow named O'Brien, a good looking.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Kid, better education than most of the others.
Speaker 4 (17:49):
He used to drive the Major back and forth in town,
and all of a sudden he got somebody else put
O'Brien on messhole.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Detailed trick mark trucks all together.
Speaker 7 (17:58):
You know, if O'Brian was seeing the girl, nobody could
have met her pretty often that first two weeks picking
up the Major. Well, the truck drivers get into town
almost every day hauling supplies and things.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
Uh, well, thanks, a lot of Roberts horses. Look like
they had enough share.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Yeah so old Roberts. So yeah, Clark, where, yes, what's her?
Exclude a right out of here to my car and
then drive back to town. We're gonna do make your
back a favor? What kind of a favor?
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Tell his daughter he won't be in town tonight, and
see if you can recognize her voice.
Speaker 7 (18:38):
At the Kobe House, we got a break. The Major's
wife wasn't in, but the daughter answered when we knocked
at the.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Door of her room. Where is that is that the voice? Good?
I got a message from your father. Mess that's the voice? Old?
Speaker 4 (18:58):
Huh what's the matter of mass Sheriff? And I can't
look bad enough to make you go pale like that.
Speaker 6 (19:03):
I thought when you said you had a message it
it would be somebody in my father's then from camp.
What did he want you to tell me?
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Just that he won't be in town tonight. You and
mind if we come in mess we'd like to talk
to you, like I have a lot to do in
and I.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
We only wanna know where you were between say, seven
and nine o'clock last night.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
We know that you were in the phone mooth in
the lobby at eight forty because that's where your Calmary
office was.
Speaker 6 (19:28):
Please please don't talk in the hall.
Speaker 4 (19:30):
You mean, were you out at old man Swain's house
last night?
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Yes, if I walked up there just before eight o'clock
before to meet somebody, somebody named O'Brien.
Speaker 6 (19:46):
We didn't have anything to do with it. Johnny liked
the old man out.
Speaker 4 (19:50):
You and your boyfriend come to pick Swain's place for
your meetings because.
Speaker 6 (19:55):
My father somebody might have seen us if we met
in town.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
I'd this, said Johnny. Get to know a crippled old
man who never left his house when.
Speaker 6 (20:04):
He was driving one of the cab trucks. Mister Swain
waved to him from the courch. One day, Johnny saw
he was in a real chair, and he started to
see what was wrong. The old man wanted some things
from town, and did that they got to be friends.
Speaker 7 (20:18):
Huh fit sheaff and deputy said to swinging and flagged
down a car truck when he needed anything. Alright, miss,
now what about that meeting last night?
Speaker 6 (20:27):
M Johnny got a lift from camp On on the
last truck in after the early trucks came in. I
started to walk out the swings like I always did,
so so that Johnny could catch up to me on
the way, on the road out of town where nobody
would see us walking together.
Speaker 4 (20:41):
Did he catch up to you before he reached Swains?
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Yes?
Speaker 6 (20:46):
And from when we got there and went in, we
saw that the old man was slumped over in his chair.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
He raised his head just once and said something about.
Speaker 6 (20:56):
Not wanting to be hit aget, and then he almost fell,
but then he set him back in the chair, and
then we couldn't get him to mind with gnant and
we got frightened him. And since there was no foe,
he came back to town.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
He both left the house together by the front door,
and then.
Speaker 6 (21:15):
When we got back in here town we split up.
I came back here to the hotel him and called
from the lobby. Oh. We weren't even sure he was
deadnant until we heard it was murder.
Speaker 4 (21:25):
H reckon, you're gonna ask go along with us. We'll
send somebody out to get a bird.
Speaker 7 (21:29):
Now, just a minute, chair, miss, Yes, where does Johnny
O'Brien come from his home? City boy all his life?
Speaker 4 (21:37):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Oh, no, my father he's gonna find out one down, murf.
Speaker 6 (21:42):
We were very nurse.
Speaker 7 (21:44):
Your father's gonna find out, all right, but not from us,
from you, I think you better tell him.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Come on, Chell, we're just gonna leave her for now.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
Come on, jeez, I know she sounded like she was
telling the truth.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
He was telling the truth. Do anything about that? Up
a few things.
Speaker 7 (22:02):
Whoever killed the old man bolted out the back door,
one person running.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yeah, they found the old man conscious, still alive, oh, she.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Said, And at this if the old man had died
after the beating was no disturbance. Kill had spent some
time looking for hidding money, gi a move things left
dust rings.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
He didn't because he had to run.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
That brings us back to the fellow with the missing socks.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Randazzo.
Speaker 8 (22:24):
Yeah, he's not going either.
Speaker 7 (22:26):
We're going back to the camp and talk to the
men who drove those trucks in last night.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
We want the man who came into town.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
On a truck and went back on foot.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
But we needed a missing passenger on the return trip.
If there was a missing.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Passenger, he followed somebody's.
Speaker 2 (22:40):
Trail all the way across log Hill into the finey wood.
Whoever was kept going, They wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (22:45):
Have gone that deep if they were going to cut
back to the road. Who Okay, Just somebody who'd been
scared off like that would head for the cables through
the tab.
Speaker 7 (22:54):
Sure, it gives us a big bunch of suspects, though
now it doesn't share. What chance would a man from
the city these streets have if he tried to make
his way to a camp nine miles deep in the
piny woods, especially on foot and at night, with no
path to follow. It take somebody who'd spend his life
in open country.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Well, the man who villa of the camp section leaders, Yeah.
Speaker 7 (23:13):
And the truck drivers would be able to count for
them out of the camp as section leaders or bosses,
and nobody forgets seeing a boss.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
There was two aids.
Speaker 4 (23:27):
When we reached the camp and woke the major led
us to the truck driver's tent.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
One of the drivers had the answer we were looking for.
He'd hold section leader.
Speaker 7 (23:36):
Roberts into town Saturday night. But Roberts hadn't ridden back
with him. We left the tanner. Robert sleeps in the
last tent at the end of this line.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Oh yes, the section leader. He has a frivate tent.
Speaker 7 (23:50):
Hold of a minute, his rendezo sleep A fellow was
missing the sock m Let me see that tent right there.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
It's way he came him up first.
Speaker 4 (24:01):
We what rendezo for jas He's clear, I know.
Speaker 7 (24:03):
It, but I want him to help us with something.
We haven't got enough to make a case against Robert Stick.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
What's your play? Tell you? As soon as I get
Randazzo out.
Speaker 7 (24:11):
Here, you know which betty's in mincha and it's uh
first bet of the writers you go into ten.
Speaker 8 (24:16):
We'd like get him.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Sandazzo Aandazzo right, well, sh no, get up and come outside.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
Don't wake anybody. I can't come out without my pants, alright,
slip into him.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
I look out.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
I'm being pinched him.
Speaker 8 (24:38):
No, we'll be able to make an arrest in a minute.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
For your help, you men, you know what.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
The right to put his hooks on that soacka was missing,
that's right, and just laid me, tore him out, feed him.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
A mouth full of knuckles.
Speaker 8 (24:48):
Never mind, Bath, just do as I say you ready, yeah, now,
pletten capt.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Here's what you do. I gave Randazzo the plan and.
Speaker 7 (25:09):
Leaning over with him the Roberts temp ready to jump
in if the plan worked.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
This is the timp. All right, Randazzel, we'll be right
out here. They just lived a crumb to me. I
hope your pay right, Robin.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Who is it?
Speaker 2 (25:27):
Who's in there? It's me Ran Dazel? What are you
doing in here?
Speaker 3 (25:30):
I'll come and talk with you at this time of
Get out of here, get back to your temp.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Listen to Mali.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
You do drop, you'll talk to me right now.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
I'll go to town of mine talking arranging.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
What do you mean?
Speaker 4 (25:39):
You don't know what I mean? Your crumb, that sock
was stalling from me.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I saw your take.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Keep your voice down.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
Why would I take anything from you? That's what I
wanted when I saw you. That's why I didn't say nothing.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
Then I found out, all right, well, you crumb if
I couldn't have told him where.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
I was when the old man was not going, I
don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Worry, I keep quiet, I keep quiet. Well, it's gonna
question is a hundred bus?
Speaker 2 (26:02):
I haven't got a hundred bucks? Oh you kid?
Speaker 4 (26:05):
Oh god, money hitting all over the joint.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Everybody knew that, but I didn't get it. Fuck you
want him up about me? And I'm being a great.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
God.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Yeah, alright, Roberts, I didn't wrong. Craggy Rangel. He killed
that old bit.
Speaker 4 (26:23):
He just told me. If we heard what he told you,
he's trust verse I.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
He's lying about those shots. I never hit any Shut
up until you get a lawyer, all right, yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, sure, got a flat nam a gadin come.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
In claiming Roberts as a prisoner major. Any objection?
Speaker 5 (26:38):
What objection can I have? He's that military personnel. You're
the law here.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Thanks. I didn't mean to hit the old fool if
it only told me where the money was.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
I never wasn't there any money, Roberts.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
The old man never had a time.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
But everybody said, you can savior story for your cellmates
at Huntsdale Roberts, get your clothes.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
On, Let's go.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Alan Roberts made a full confession to the brutal murder
of age and crippled Finley Swims, and the following year
he was sentenced to Huntsville Penitentiary for the rest of
his life.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
Next week, Joel McCray and another authentic reenactment, The McKee
from the Miles House, not Texas Rangers.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Joel McCray is.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Currently seen starring in the Universal International Technicolor production Cattle Drive.
The cast included Tony Barrett, Bill Johnstone, Tom Tully, Mike Barrett,
Frank Kirstell, and Tom McKee.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Technical advisor was Captain m T. Lone Wolf and Kallas
of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
This story was transcribed and adapted by Joel Murcott, and
the program of are used and directed by Stacy Keith
al Gidney speaking.
Speaker 4 (28:24):
It's the Silver Jubilee on NBC Today. Here the Big
Show broadcast from Paris and featuring such stars as Fred Allen,
Josephine Baker, and your unpredictable hostess Saluna Bankhead. Then joining
the Fund with Phil Harris and Alice Bay They bring
You a half hour.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Of mirth and music.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
Later, Theater Guild on the Air presents Casanova Brown with
Dinah Linne, Dan Dailey and Kenny Delmar.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Next, It's The Big Show, All This and Lula Tou
on NBC
The National Broadcasting Company presents Joel McCrae in Tales of
the Texas Rangers from Hollywood. Another authentic reenactment of the
case transcribed from the files of the Texas Rangers Tales
(00:24):
of the Texas Rangers, starring Joe McCray Ranger Chase Persons.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Texas more than two.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Hundred and sixty thousand square miles and fifty men who
make up the most famous and oldest law enforcement body
in North America. Now from the files of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Can these stories based on fact, names, case and.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Places are fixtitious for a preetent, they amends themselves not
a matter of record. Cayse Fortnite wheelchair killing.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
It is eight forty pm May First, several years ago.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Colby, Texas, near.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
The edge of the Great Piney Woods is unusually crowded.
There's several hundred young men from a nearby CCC camp.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I've converged on the town to spend.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Their monthly allowance in the office of Sheriff Pete Saunders.
The sheriff and his deputy are standing by in case
any emergency should arrive.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
Oh, I don't know why I'm so goggy here not
even nine o'clock after that, tired rag, I think if
they need for your stay there later I can handle things.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Why don't you go home with only am young budge
in town.
Speaker 4 (01:55):
Oh they seem to be all right. We'll sign them
any first. I walked down Main Street a while ago. Oh,
they were behaving just the same camp as news. It's
the first pay day they've had around here.
Speaker 5 (02:05):
And man can get pretty high with thirty bucks in
his pocket.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
They don't get the whole thirty rag, They only get
five of its. Government makes them send the rest home.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Sure, that's the whole idea. Well, I guess this chairs
harvest fares orders speaking.
Speaker 6 (02:22):
You better go to the old house on lock Hill.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
You better go there right.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Away, old man swains place.
Speaker 6 (02:28):
Yes, yes, before we go there quickly and bring a doctor.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Why what's wear out there? Who is this aunt?
Speaker 6 (02:35):
That's all? You better go hright away.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
You better give me your theirs. You're hello? Hello, hello?
He know what's the matter if you hung up on me?
Hellos sathm wrong? Old Man's wings wings to them twenty over.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
Somebody's idea of a joke aboule and a half out
the Swains and he hasn't.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Got a fold in that collas to come from some
place else.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
And yeah, see who can crazy? Then kick up Micro
and Carl and follow me out to Swains. I'll get
the Dark on the way. Wimbley Swain, a victim of rheumatoid.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Arthrotis, was found dead in his dilapidated home, seated in
his wheelchair. An in Christmas call and an autopsy order.
He had not died for natural courts.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
The sheriff called for the help of a.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Texas ranger, and Ranger jas Pearson was a sign joining
the sheriff at the funeral home.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Party's in here, jerse, Uh huh. He was a pretty
old man, press already crippled up bed the last twenty
years or so. Hadn't been for that phone call. Id
figured his heart just gave out.
Speaker 7 (03:37):
Yes, the Dark would have two the thing you asked
for a coroner's inquest.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Let me see the autopsy report.
Speaker 4 (03:43):
Yeah here, he died about eight last night.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Ruptured spleinging concussion.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Dark says he was beaten to the funning.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
No marks on the body.
Speaker 4 (03:54):
All the damage was inside. Whatever he was hit with,
it didn't leave any marks, only rubber hoes.
Speaker 7 (04:00):
Maybe something like that wouldn't leave him mind. You find
anything like that there, but.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
Chance to look jas Maybe my deputies run. Of course
I'm lower left. Three of 'em a swing class.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Why three of 'em?
Speaker 4 (04:11):
I may need more in that when he gets around.
If the old man is dead, the place will be loaded.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Will Vulture what I mean, Will?
Speaker 4 (04:16):
It's kind of a funny thing, Jace. The old man
was kind of peculiar.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Living off by himself in that big old house, not
even a cleaning woman to help him. Started some crazy talk.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
A long time back. Wilma got around that he had
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Stakes to weigh his plays. You think there was anything
to it?
Speaker 4 (04:32):
Nope, because I know what he was living on. Gott
to check for seventy dollars every month from some insurance company.
Speaker 7 (04:38):
I know he Yeah, too bad everybody didn't know that.
Probably killed by somebody trying to force him to tell where.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
He hid the money people think he had. That could
be a motive.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
On the other hand, might be other reasons for killing
him that we.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Didn't know about.
Speaker 8 (04:52):
Had doubt a share.
Speaker 7 (04:53):
When a man comes into a place to kill with
nothing else on his mind, he does it fast. This
beating took time, and I wanna look at Swain's place.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
The sheriff was right about the vultures.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Because deputies hadn't been on guard, the house would have
been as shambles. One of the deputies came inside with us.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
At the old man's sweet chair.
Speaker 4 (05:17):
Yeah, that little lou that's where we phone him setting.
Speaker 7 (05:21):
My lab crewill be coming in from Austin making dust
the chair for prints while they're going over the place. Anyway,
what's this on the floor where you standing there?
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (05:30):
It's got a little crunchy when I walked across it before,
like somebody spilled some sugar.
Speaker 8 (05:35):
Yeah, it's not sugar, more.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Like white beach sand, a little beach sand or this
country Jason is the same.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
That's what it looks like.
Speaker 7 (05:43):
Lab boys can tell whether it is or uh.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
And then the old man's chair too. You get around
much outside, I mean rest of mind only is you'd
never real himself further to the front porch to get
set hard to get his food in, reg continded I
we used to stand in the porch and flag down
a passing car truck asked them to pick up things
for him at the market.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
I stopped buying often to get him. Thing had a
red planel shirted wave. Spot it easy from the road
and slipped through the rest of the place. And wait
a minute, what is it? Jay?
Speaker 7 (06:15):
A few more grains of sand on the floor. Here,
more of it, right on into the kitchen.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Let's go out back, well living here, jays, it's the stump.
Feel all the way back to them. He'll somebody's been
out here.
Speaker 7 (06:32):
Oh, look out of a shoe mark on the ground,
barely seas the outline the tow dug in deepest man
must have been running.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Well.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
The one thing wrong about the whole set up jas
that phone call I got was from a girl.
Speaker 7 (06:46):
It doesn't register as the kind of a killing has
been done by a woman. Besides, the murder doesn't usually call.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
In a report. Too bad. You couldn't find out who
made it.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
Well, as we know, it came from a payphone in
the lobby of the Kobe House.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Deskert didn't notice anybody to do.
Speaker 7 (07:00):
I see, let's spread out a little. See if we
can cut across any more tracks like this one. Rag,
you move off to my right about five paces rage,
I'll fall out on this side.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Good let's move.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
I'm getting some light tracks over here, but the ground's.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Too hard and not very clear. You must be on
the right trail. There's nothing it all over this way.
I'm going to plank.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
Us find something.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Rag. Yeah, hey, you better come here. What is it? Man? Sock?
Speaker 7 (07:35):
It's morn, Just a sock, noted at the middle and
heavy at the toe.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
It's full of sand. So that's where those grains.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
Who say go by kid the much to throw that
away while it was running.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Jee, there's a murder weapons sheriff.
Speaker 7 (07:47):
Now all we gotta do is find the person who
used it. Trail behind Swain's house, Keeter down past the
stump field, and we lost all trades a mile into
the thick foliage of the piny woods. I sent the
sock full of sand through to the Austin lab for examination. Meanwhile,
(08:09):
the lab crew met me at the Kobe funeral home
and went over Swing's body.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
That sock must have been the weaponar right, Jason, look
just combed a few grains of the sand out of
the old man's hair, a.
Speaker 7 (08:18):
Little more embedded than the scout. Impact of the blows
must have forced some of it through the sack.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
While you must have. That's why you found traces of
it on the floor.
Speaker 7 (08:26):
I can't make it out that you don't know much yet, sirff.
We checked with the other lab men out of Swains.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
Yeah, usual Joe Lolis Smith quiz.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
That may be a report from Austin. I'll get it
well at all.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
Yeah, I've had rigs check it over. That say, little
food of the Airy Hills.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
That's good, that's funny.
Speaker 7 (08:46):
He isn't likely the killer came from far off or
talk about the old man's having money stashed away sort
of a local run Andy and Austin with a report
from that sock.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
There an army camp around here any place? No, that
shock because army issue.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
How there's a new CCC camp up in the Piney Woods, Jase,
about nine miles from here.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Hey, they're civilian, but they get their closed.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
From army issue. Camps are run by army officers.
Speaker 4 (09:12):
More than one hundred men up there.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Yeah, and a good chance that one of them as
the boy we're looking for. That rumor about Swain having money,
he's been around for a long time. If somebody from
the town was gonna do him and they had done
it before this, come on, sheriff. Let's drive up to
that camp.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
It would be better if we could borrow a truck
from someplace.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Wire truck.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Old Loggers Road is the only one of the camp
high center. It's kind of rough on the passions of car,
especially one throwing a horse trailer like you.
Speaker 7 (09:39):
Well, I got charcoal in my trailer. Can't we cut
straight through the woods on horses.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It's a good idea. Say it was time a couple
of months. Got a horse at your place. Yeah, it's
on the way, all right, I'll drive you out. He'll
stack from there.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
We got the sheriff's horse, I amloaded charcoal from the
trailer and we headed into the pining woods. As we
drew near to the camp, we caught lynches of men
working in squads of four or five, and finally ran
across one man alone and mounted.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Fellow on horseback. Ahead there case, did you see him?
Speaker 4 (10:15):
Yeah, it looks like a straw boss moved into a
train there.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Oh, he's waiting for it. Who boys, ye.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
Charko, you must be working fur from the agriculture of college.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Understand they got four of them. The supervisor.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
If they have somebody who knows the woods, most of
the other camp boys in the big cities. Yeah, you
feed us.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Looking for the camp Ooh, that's right. It's about three
quarters a mile off that way. You'll see the tents
when you get over that ride.
Speaker 4 (10:43):
Who are you?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Oh, my name is Joe Roberts, Section Leader. My name
is Spears, and this is Sheriff Saunders.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Well, how to show up you out here about something
connected with that burder in town?
Speaker 7 (10:52):
I do know about that wasn't around town till this morning,
and you're quite aways.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
A major Beck told me about it when the truck
brought him out from town this morn. The major was
in town all night.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
Yeah, he doesn't live in the camp, just comes out days.
No place out here for his wife and daughter, Wife
and daughter, anybody else out here? Have women poke in town?
Know why?
Speaker 2 (11:12):
I'm just curious? You know where the major and his
family are living in town? Which, sure at the hotel
Colby House.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
That's where that phone call came from. Jase, I know,
thanks a lot. Roberts along, show up, better have a
little talk with a major. If to say that again,
go a work coach.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
In just a moment, we will continue with tales of
the Texas Rangers starring Joel McCrae as Ranger Chase Pearson.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
It's the Sober Jubilee on NBC.
Speaker 4 (11:54):
Every Friday evening, there's another stirring adventure series for Western
towns on the station.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yes, Every Friday at.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
NBC brings you the King of the Cowboys, Royal Rogers
with the Queen of the West Day elevens. Make your
date for thrilling listening with the Royal Rogers Show every
Friday evening at the same spot on your dial. There's
action and adventure in.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Paradise Valley when Roy Rogers rides Dale.
Speaker 4 (12:15):
Waves, and there's also a sol or two by these
wonderful Western entertainers Royan Dale.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Be sure to hear them Friday.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
We continue now with tales of the Texas Rangers and
today's case wheelchair Killing, an authentic story from the files
of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Major Becket's regular army in his early fifties, over age
in rank, a gray, embittered man. His office was a
field tenth ahead of the company street. So do you
think that old man was killed by somebody from this camp?
Speaker 2 (12:52):
We've got a raisin to think so, because of a
sock sucks like that have been general issues since nineteen seventeen.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
I don't like any accusations against my.
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Command, especially accusations based on such clumsy evidence.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
There's something else beside the sock.
Speaker 7 (13:05):
Major, I notice your company streaked between the tents is
paved with gravel.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
What about it? That gravel bedded in beat sand? You
can see it around the borders, can't you?
Speaker 4 (13:14):
So we can see it. There's the same kind of
sand we fall in the sock that Swain.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Was beaten with.
Speaker 7 (13:19):
There's no beach sand anyplace else in this area. Major,
Where'd this come from?
Speaker 4 (13:23):
How do I know?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
An advanced cattery of engineers set the camp up?
Speaker 4 (13:27):
Both The sand was trucked in with other material. All right,
everything you've found points to this camp.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
You should have expected something like this. What do you
mean by that?
Speaker 6 (13:38):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
What would I mean? Ranger? What can you expect from
sidewalk bombs?
Speaker 7 (13:42):
Bums don't work, Major, and the crews we pass seem
to be working pretty hard.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
I have to spend my time with him. You don't.
Speaker 7 (13:48):
By time your men come in from the woods four o'clock.
All the clothing may have issued through your own supply.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yes, all listed and sin Bawl good. It couldn't have
lost much in a month.
Speaker 7 (13:57):
At four o'clock, I'd like you to call for an
inspection of it equipment. Seep, we can find somebody who's
missing a sock. All sorts of equipment was missing.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Shirts, extra shoes, and the kits.
Speaker 7 (14:13):
There was only one man who couldn't account for a
pair of socks.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
All right, rendesto in the tent, all right.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
All right, look major, what kind of crime is it
to lose a sock?
Speaker 4 (14:23):
There's a shortageanlem or something.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
A ranger and her will tell you.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
I thought you nd you guys.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
It was just something they made up of a movie.
Speaker 4 (14:29):
They've been around since long before there were any movies, Randezzo.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
Okay, so you're a cowboy detector, so fine, I will
store my socks.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
It'll be funny, fellow, I must time trying to be funny.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But what are you all jumping on me? Huh?
Speaker 3 (14:42):
I washed my socks to hang them up to dry
in one of these bull drops. Put those hooks on them.
That makes you a federal case, Randezzo. A sock belonging
to somebody in this camp was used to kill an
old man. It was filled with sand from the company
street and used as a blackjack. You may not sty
not got that old nickel pincher, I log you, Oh,
but old Camp knows about it.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
What are you looking at me?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
The guy that picks an aide up told us about
it when he brought the truck.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Back this morning. Were you in town last night?
Speaker 3 (15:10):
It was all in town last night. We got paid yesterday.
The major let us go in on the truck. So
times you come back to camp when everybody else come back.
Trucks picked all of us up again at midnight, same
place they thought us out of Main street.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Put a corner near that hotel, Kobe House.
Speaker 4 (15:24):
That's the only one. And what'd you do while you
were in town up to nine o'clock? I was having a.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Handboider and that place next to the bus people, I
was there from eight till ten.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
You must be a slow eater.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
It's a long time for one hamburger who cared.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
A brought the ham boker.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
I was trying to pick up the bride behind the counter.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
She keeps giving me the smile with all her teeth picked.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
He yea for what time she gets off?
Speaker 2 (15:45):
She tells me ten o'clock?
Speaker 3 (15:46):
So what happens five minutes to tense. You got a
boyfriend comes to me, a guy eight foot tall.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
You know the girl he's talking about, Sheriff.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Yeah, Lucille Mason. M's have been her husband, married her husband.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
How do you like that?
Speaker 7 (15:58):
But she been the one who made the phone call.
You got schafft of chairs lit.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
The call was a lot younger.
Speaker 5 (16:04):
I don't think you have any right to hold this
man till you've checked on the story.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
We're not holding.
Speaker 7 (16:08):
Anybody Major until we've checked on a lot of things.
All right, Rona or you can go, but don't leave
this camp except your work crew.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Leave this camp, he says, for now. One ain't even
go on in my tent. I should have never left Brooklyn.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Major.
Speaker 7 (16:21):
That goes for everybody out here. Don't let him use
the trucks. Keep them in camp. You better stay here
to make sure.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
My wife and daughter are in town. Well, I can't
stop you from going home, but if.
Speaker 7 (16:31):
You do, the sheriff will have to send deputies out
here to keep them in confined to the camp area.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I don't want similar parties here. I'll stay.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Thanks, Come on, Sheriff, let's get back to town. You
know jah I kind of got n o.
Speaker 7 (16:46):
I a girl's voice, young not from around here, as
the major's daughter stay.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
At the kolbery hers. I think he knows more than
these tible and that's kind of funny.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Nah, he's all right, probably a pretty good man. Woo.
Speaker 7 (16:58):
He hates his men because they're not what he's used to,
but given credit for one thing, he doesn't want any
of them involved in this. If he had the authority
to do it, he'd probably take that Randazzel and hang
him to the highest tree.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
But when he thought we might take the man in
who went to bat for him.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
Yeah, that's shoe what you mean? Hey, there is that
fellow Roberts we met riding in the Search and Leader.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
You know, giving a horses water good for him. The
horse is the kind of person. Yeah, thanks for taking
care of them, Roberts. It's all right.
Speaker 4 (17:27):
Hey, Hi to make out with Randazzo. He s used
to be all right, and most of them are najor.
Bet doesn't like them both.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Well, that's his privilege. I guess he'd rather have.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
Some young army officers around so he could sort of
hand take a son in law. It count's pretty she
associated with any of the fellows here. Well, when the
camp first opened, the fellow named O'Brien, a good looking.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Kid, better education than most of the others.
Speaker 4 (17:49):
He used to drive the Major back and forth in town,
and all of a sudden he got somebody else put
O'Brien on messhole.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Detailed trick mark trucks all together.
Speaker 7 (17:58):
You know, if O'Brian was seeing the girl, nobody could
have met her pretty often that first two weeks picking
up the Major. Well, the truck drivers get into town
almost every day hauling supplies and things.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
Uh, well, thanks, a lot of Roberts horses. Look like
they had enough share.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Yeah so old Roberts. So yeah, Clark, where, yes, what's her?
Exclude a right out of here to my car and
then drive back to town. We're gonna do make your
back a favor? What kind of a favor?
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Tell his daughter he won't be in town tonight, and
see if you can recognize her voice.
Speaker 7 (18:38):
At the Kobe House, we got a break. The Major's
wife wasn't in, but the daughter answered when we knocked
at the.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Door of her room. Where is that is that the voice? Good?
I got a message from your father. Mess that's the voice? Old?
Speaker 4 (18:58):
Huh what's the matter of mass Sheriff? And I can't
look bad enough to make you go pale like that.
Speaker 6 (19:03):
I thought when you said you had a message it
it would be somebody in my father's then from camp.
What did he want you to tell me?
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Just that he won't be in town tonight. You and
mind if we come in mess we'd like to talk
to you, like I have a lot to do in
and I.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
We only wanna know where you were between say, seven
and nine o'clock last night.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
We know that you were in the phone mooth in
the lobby at eight forty because that's where your Calmary
office was.
Speaker 6 (19:28):
Please please don't talk in the hall.
Speaker 4 (19:30):
You mean, were you out at old man Swain's house
last night?
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Yes, if I walked up there just before eight o'clock
before to meet somebody, somebody named O'Brien.
Speaker 6 (19:46):
We didn't have anything to do with it. Johnny liked
the old man out.
Speaker 4 (19:50):
You and your boyfriend come to pick Swain's place for
your meetings because.
Speaker 6 (19:55):
My father somebody might have seen us if we met
in town.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
I'd this, said Johnny. Get to know a crippled old
man who never left his house when.
Speaker 6 (20:04):
He was driving one of the cab trucks. Mister Swain
waved to him from the courch. One day, Johnny saw
he was in a real chair, and he started to
see what was wrong. The old man wanted some things
from town, and did that they got to be friends.
Speaker 7 (20:18):
Huh fit sheaff and deputy said to swinging and flagged
down a car truck when he needed anything. Alright, miss,
now what about that meeting last night?
Speaker 6 (20:27):
M Johnny got a lift from camp On on the
last truck in after the early trucks came in. I
started to walk out the swings like I always did,
so so that Johnny could catch up to me on
the way, on the road out of town where nobody
would see us walking together.
Speaker 4 (20:41):
Did he catch up to you before he reached Swains?
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Yes?
Speaker 6 (20:46):
And from when we got there and went in, we
saw that the old man was slumped over in his chair.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
He raised his head just once and said something about.
Speaker 6 (20:56):
Not wanting to be hit aget, and then he almost fell,
but then he set him back in the chair, and
then we couldn't get him to mind with gnant and
we got frightened him. And since there was no foe,
he came back to town.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
He both left the house together by the front door,
and then.
Speaker 6 (21:15):
When we got back in here town we split up.
I came back here to the hotel him and called
from the lobby. Oh. We weren't even sure he was
deadnant until we heard it was murder.
Speaker 4 (21:25):
H reckon, you're gonna ask go along with us. We'll
send somebody out to get a bird.
Speaker 7 (21:29):
Now, just a minute, chair, miss, Yes, where does Johnny
O'Brien come from his home? City boy all his life?
Speaker 4 (21:37):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Oh, no, my father he's gonna find out one down, murf.
Speaker 6 (21:42):
We were very nurse.
Speaker 7 (21:44):
Your father's gonna find out, all right, but not from us,
from you, I think you better tell him.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Come on, Chell, we're just gonna leave her for now.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
Come on, jeez, I know she sounded like she was
telling the truth.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
He was telling the truth. Do anything about that? Up
a few things.
Speaker 7 (22:02):
Whoever killed the old man bolted out the back door,
one person running.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yeah, they found the old man conscious, still alive, oh, she.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Said, And at this if the old man had died
after the beating was no disturbance. Kill had spent some
time looking for hidding money, gi a move things left
dust rings.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
He didn't because he had to run.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
That brings us back to the fellow with the missing socks.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Randazzo.
Speaker 8 (22:24):
Yeah, he's not going either.
Speaker 7 (22:26):
We're going back to the camp and talk to the
men who drove those trucks in last night.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
We want the man who came into town.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
On a truck and went back on foot.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
But we needed a missing passenger on the return trip.
If there was a missing.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Passenger, he followed somebody's.
Speaker 2 (22:40):
Trail all the way across log Hill into the finey wood.
Whoever was kept going, They wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (22:45):
Have gone that deep if they were going to cut
back to the road. Who Okay, Just somebody who'd been
scared off like that would head for the cables through
the tab.
Speaker 7 (22:54):
Sure, it gives us a big bunch of suspects, though
now it doesn't share. What chance would a man from
the city these streets have if he tried to make
his way to a camp nine miles deep in the
piny woods, especially on foot and at night, with no
path to follow. It take somebody who'd spend his life
in open country.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Well, the man who villa of the camp section leaders, Yeah.
Speaker 7 (23:13):
And the truck drivers would be able to count for
them out of the camp as section leaders or bosses,
and nobody forgets seeing a boss.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
There was two aids.
Speaker 4 (23:27):
When we reached the camp and woke the major led
us to the truck driver's tent.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
One of the drivers had the answer we were looking for.
He'd hold section leader.
Speaker 7 (23:36):
Roberts into town Saturday night. But Roberts hadn't ridden back
with him. We left the tanner. Robert sleeps in the
last tent at the end of this line.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Oh yes, the section leader. He has a frivate tent.
Speaker 7 (23:50):
Hold of a minute, his rendezo sleep A fellow was
missing the sock m Let me see that tent right there.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
It's way he came him up first.
Speaker 4 (24:01):
We what rendezo for jas He's clear, I know.
Speaker 7 (24:03):
It, but I want him to help us with something.
We haven't got enough to make a case against Robert Stick.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
What's your play? Tell you? As soon as I get
Randazzo out.
Speaker 7 (24:11):
Here, you know which betty's in mincha and it's uh
first bet of the writers you go into ten.
Speaker 8 (24:16):
We'd like get him.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Sandazzo Aandazzo right, well, sh no, get up and come outside.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
Don't wake anybody. I can't come out without my pants, alright,
slip into him.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
I look out.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
I'm being pinched him.
Speaker 8 (24:38):
No, we'll be able to make an arrest in a minute.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
For your help, you men, you know what.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
The right to put his hooks on that soacka was missing,
that's right, and just laid me, tore him out, feed him.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
A mouth full of knuckles.
Speaker 8 (24:48):
Never mind, Bath, just do as I say you ready, yeah, now,
pletten capt.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Here's what you do. I gave Randazzo the plan and.
Speaker 7 (25:09):
Leaning over with him the Roberts temp ready to jump
in if the plan worked.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
This is the timp. All right, Randazzel, we'll be right
out here. They just lived a crumb to me. I
hope your pay right, Robin.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Who is it?
Speaker 2 (25:27):
Who's in there? It's me Ran Dazel? What are you
doing in here?
Speaker 3 (25:30):
I'll come and talk with you at this time of
Get out of here, get back to your temp.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Listen to Mali.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
You do drop, you'll talk to me right now.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
I'll go to town of mine talking arranging.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
What do you mean?
Speaker 4 (25:39):
You don't know what I mean? Your crumb, that sock
was stalling from me.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I saw your take.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Keep your voice down.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
Why would I take anything from you? That's what I
wanted when I saw you. That's why I didn't say nothing.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
Then I found out, all right, well, you crumb if
I couldn't have told him where.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
I was when the old man was not going, I
don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Worry, I keep quiet, I keep quiet. Well, it's gonna
question is a hundred bus?
Speaker 2 (26:02):
I haven't got a hundred bucks? Oh you kid?
Speaker 4 (26:05):
Oh god, money hitting all over the joint.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Everybody knew that, but I didn't get it. Fuck you
want him up about me? And I'm being a great.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
God.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Yeah, alright, Roberts, I didn't wrong. Craggy Rangel. He killed
that old bit.
Speaker 4 (26:23):
He just told me. If we heard what he told you,
he's trust verse I.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
He's lying about those shots. I never hit any Shut
up until you get a lawyer, all right, yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, sure, got a flat nam a gadin come.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
In claiming Roberts as a prisoner major. Any objection?
Speaker 5 (26:38):
What objection can I have? He's that military personnel. You're
the law here.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Thanks. I didn't mean to hit the old fool if
it only told me where the money was.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
I never wasn't there any money, Roberts.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
The old man never had a time.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
But everybody said, you can savior story for your cellmates
at Huntsdale Roberts, get your clothes.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
On, Let's go.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Alan Roberts made a full confession to the brutal murder
of age and crippled Finley Swims, and the following year
he was sentenced to Huntsville Penitentiary for the rest of
his life.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
Next week, Joel McCray and another authentic reenactment, The McKee
from the Miles House, not Texas Rangers.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Joel McCray is.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Currently seen starring in the Universal International Technicolor production Cattle Drive.
The cast included Tony Barrett, Bill Johnstone, Tom Tully, Mike Barrett,
Frank Kirstell, and Tom McKee.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Technical advisor was Captain m T. Lone Wolf and Kallas
of the Texas Rangers.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
This story was transcribed and adapted by Joel Murcott, and
the program of are used and directed by Stacy Keith
al Gidney speaking.
Speaker 4 (28:24):
It's the Silver Jubilee on NBC Today. Here the Big
Show broadcast from Paris and featuring such stars as Fred Allen,
Josephine Baker, and your unpredictable hostess Saluna Bankhead. Then joining
the Fund with Phil Harris and Alice Bay They bring
You a half hour.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Of mirth and music.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
Later, Theater Guild on the Air presents Casanova Brown with
Dinah Linne, Dan Dailey and Kenny Delmar.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Next, It's The Big Show, All This and Lula Tou
on NBC
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!