OTR Wednesday – The Rocket Ship

I am a child of the 80s, and like most children of that time one fear overrode all others for me – nuclear war. It probably sounds strange to anyone born after 1985 or so, but I assure you, the threat was very real during that days of the Cold War. I distinctly remember the Fallout Shelter signs on the walls of basement classrooms in elementary school – as if hiding under a little desk with my hands over my head would have helped at all if it had come to that…

One day I’ll do into just how deep this fear ran, but if you don’t know who Samantha Smith is – read up on her. She made a big impression on me. (Also The Day After and War Games – if those things don’t ring a bell and you have a few extra minutes)

I didn’t hear this episode of Lights Out until a few years ago (thank goodness). It aired on July 28, 1945 – only 12 days after the first atomic bomb was tested (near Alamogordo, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945, during the Manhattan Project) and a little over a week before those bombs were used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (August 6 and 9, 1945).  I didn’t realize the significance of this until I looked up the dates just now.

Maybe leave the lights on for this one?

 

 

OTR Wednesday – Big Town (with an Edward G. Robinson tangent)

Today I’m sharing another old radio show that influenced my fictional detective serial “The Darkness Knows”. This is Big Town starring Edward G. Robinson (“See?”) and Claire Trevor. Robinson plays Steve Wilson, the crusading editor of the Illustrated Press. Trevor plays his sidekick who also happens to be the society editor of the paper. This episode is from 1937 right about the time Vivian was breaking into the radio biz.

Edward G. Robinson is probably one of the stars of the golden age of Hollywood that you recognize (even if you aren’t a fan) due to his reputation for playing gangsters and his distinctive tough guy way of speaking. He’s also parodied in a that Merrie Melodies cartoon that I’ve featured before on the blog called “Hollywood Steps Out” from 1941.

And as an added bonus I’m including this episode of Suspense called “The Man who Wanted to be Edward G. Robinson” from 1946. If you think the whole pop culture meta thing is a recent invention… you have to listen to this. It’s about a henpecked husband who meets the real Edward G. Robinson and wants him to help him kill his wife because he believes he is exactly like the heartless gangsters he plays on the screen.