Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Big Audio Wednesday - Chick Carter, Boy Detective



I was hoping to track down some episodes of Blackhawk, but couldn't find any. So instead enjoy a quick episode of Chick Carter, Boy Detective.

When I was a kid, my mom had a record called "Themes Like Old Times," which featured the opening minute or so of about 60 old radio shows. Some of them were generic, but some were very distinctive, like the creaking door of Inner Sanctum or the dramatic narration followed by a snippet of "Night on Bald Mountain" that opens Escape.

One of the other most distinctive openings was Chick Carter, Boy Detective.

Chick Carter was a show about the adopted son of fictional detective Nick Carter, featured in pulp magazines and on his own radio show, Nick Carter, Master Detective. It was a kid's show, but it was no Encyclopedia Brown. In the episode posted below, Chick works with the police to solve a murder. This episode is nothing special, part of an ongoing storyline. I include it mainly because of the nostalgia of the opening.

The opening features a ham radio-sounding broadcast from callsign Mutual to callsign Y-O-U, immediately making the audience part of the story.

Click the widget to listen.

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