My name is Jim Hendrickson and I have list of things I am trying to collect and it must be complete,my friends have called me a completeist(my spelling)for many years and this is my blog. I cover just about everything, so you never know what will show up here. I have very eclectic taste ranging from pop music to history to horse racing and many more things that catch my interest. Come along and see whats out there.
Dennis Cullen, raised as a white boy but really an Indian, leaves to join the Cheyenne during an Indian uprising. The script was used on the Gunsmoke television series October 27th 1956
September 6, 1959 "Matt's Decision" The first show of the season Matt Dillon is getting fed up with the Marshal's job, but an Indian problem and gun-runners show him where he's really needed.
Melinda Miles and Tom Porter plan on getting married. However, Melinda's father, Harry, strongly objects to the union as does the hired hand Roy Tayloe. Tom loses all his money to Tayloe in a poker game and when Tayloe is found murdered and robbed, Matt suspects Potter of the crime
After being bluffed into fleeing Dodge City, 3 con men take Doc hostage as they run from Marshall Dillon.
The TV version of this episode has Joseph Kearns, legendary radio actor, as Mr. Papp the banker in charge. Joe Kearns voice such characters as Ed the vault guard on the Jack Benny Show and The Man in Black narrator on the early seasons of Suspense. He went on to be remembered by the TV generation as Mr. Wilson on Dennis the Menace.
In an ironic twist one of the con men taking the banker for money was Raymond Bailey, better known to TV audiences as Mr. Drysdale the banker on The Beverly Hillbillies.
Miss Kitty arrives in Dodge after a visit to Elsworth, with news that the stage she was traveling on had been robbed. The modus operandi fits Teddy Blue Fish, a modern Robin Hood who robs from the rich, while sparing the women and the poor. As in Kitty's case, the robber stole the strong box containing $500 and took all of banker Botkin's money, but left the other two passengers and Kitty alone. He was a perfect gentleman and well disguised, wearing a flour sack over his head. Matt is in a quandry since no one has been able to get enough evidence to get Fish, and being sort of a gentleman bandit, people feel obliged to protect him.
Gunsmoke on TV
"Robin Hood"
Season 1 episode 17
aired February 4th 1956
John Henry Jordan has 19 arrests to his credit, ranging from robbery to murder, but he consistently confounds the law by avoiding convictions. The secret of his success is that he robs from the rich and not the poor. Henry is no altruist, however, but rather a scheming criminal who buys the loyalty of potential witnesses in this manner. Every time he goes to trial they give conflicting testimony to protect him. Jordan enjoys his bounties in Dodge until Matt discovers a way to turn the tables against the so-called Robin Hood.
A bank robber masquerading as a respectable citizen of Dodge is thwarted in his plans by Tobeel, an embittered Indian upon whom he perpetrated a cruel joke. As a result, the robber kills Tobeel, but the Indian's death is the catalyst for his own doom.
This week's presentation of Gunsmoke on Radio and Television is the episode that was the television version's season 4 premiere. The 1958-59 television season would be the 2nd of 4 straight seasons that Gunsmoke was the #1 show on prime time network television.
April 26th 1952 CBS radio debuted a new "adult western" for its radio audiences. Starring radio veteran William Conrad as Marshall Matt Dillon, this Norm MacDonnell and John Meston creation was aimed at a more adult audience instead of a fast action shoot'em up like Gene Autry, The Lone Ranger or Cisco Kid. This was an almost true to life depiction of the old west with all its grit,grime and death. Known for not usually a happy ending that had kids cheering, the end was one could have expected to have actually happened in the life of Marshall Dillon in a wild town of Dodge City, Kansas.
The last great drama in the golden age of radio, Gunsmoke would be on the air until 1960, but by then radio was an antiquated form of entertainment and television and Gunsmoke's own version on television had become a huge success. Still consider by many old time radio enthusiast and experts as the best drama radio produced it to this day remains a popular choice on social media sites old time radio.
Time for this week's double dose of Gunsmoke. As always its the radio version followed up by the television version of the same episode. This week we see the basic idea of the radio episode used on tv but the writers (Endre Bohem and Louis Vittes) took the John Meston's original storyline in a different direction and substituted different characters as the protagonist. The did work in Miss Kitty to be rescued and only the bad guy dies such were the changes beginning on Gunsmoke's tv version. The radio episode features legendary voice actor Ralph Moody as "Tobiel" the Indian.
Another big thank you to Buck Benny and his tremendous podcast that helps bring you this radio treat every week. Follow him and hear all the classic radio shows Jack Benny, Fred Allen, Suspense, Phil Harris, Bing Crosby and many more surprises each week. Click here for Buck Benny
