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Johnny races to find a deadly gold radioactive isotope.
Original Air Date: July 27, 1954
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Radioactive Gold reminded me of that great novel of the Cold War,
“Alas, Babylon” by Pat Frank. It is Swiss Family Robinson, set in 1959
Florida, after a total nuclear war, with the Bragg family determined to survive.
I read it in the sixties in middle-school and watched it remain in print and
slowly drift from the fiction section over to the classics. It is better
than Fail-Safe, or Top Secret or some of the Fletcher Knebel novels.
There is a scene where the now-secure small town must
repel a wave of looters travelling north from Miami. They
will kill for a tankful of gas, then strip the town clean.
Their women are bedecked in gold bands and rings,
plucked from smashed and abandoned jewelry stores in
the contaminated city.
The Braggs drive off or kill the looters, through their superior
military tactics and outstanding moral character. The Doc recognizes the
gold is “hot”. Examination of the floozies, jezebels and strumpets
show severe radiation burns under their bracelets. The whole mob
had two, maybe three weeks to live, tops. Randy just cut off their
crime spree a little early, before nature could.
Yes, the lessons are written with a thick, broad brush. The emotional feel is very close to Gunsmoke: Character counts, civilization survives when the
“right people” band together and fight outsiders.
All the diabetics die within the first month, anyone
on “life-support,” be it medical or support on a spouse
or just a pension expected from a city that isn’t there anymore.
You’re all on your own.
Blacks and whites work together, there’s no room
for race prejudice in a town where
Preacher has the only working automobile and takes Doc on his rounds.
Anyone willing to work and contribute is welcome.
“Alas, Babylon” fits right into the Golden Age of Radio timeframe.
Wikipedia says it was adapted as a Playhouse 90 episode with
Don Murray, Rita Moreno and Burt Reynolds.
Hmmmm…. never heard of it, but that would
be interesting! Yes, Don Murray played the junior Senator
from Utah with the shameful secret in “Advise and Consent”,
he’d be perfect as Randy.