As we near our 1000th episode, we continue our look back at some of the best shows we’ve played. Previously, we’ve listed our most exciting episodes and our most humorous. This week, We’ll take a look at those episodes featuring hte most puzzling mysteries with the most surprising solutions.

One exclusion on this category. During this series we’ve played episodes adapted directly from the pens of such masters of mystery as Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and G.K. Chesterton. If we included these, they would dominate the list of “best mysteries” as it’s quite hard for mere radio writers to compete on that level, so we’re limiting to this original stories by radio writers. Let us begin.

10) Johnny Madero-Pete Sutro

The Madero series was best known as a knock off of star Jack Webb’s previous and future role on Pat Novak for Hire.  However, this story is a gem as a man comes to Madero searching for a man whose name he’s been hearing in his sleep. A great premise that’s actually pretty well executed.

9) A Life in Your Hands: Carol Carsoon Murdered

Everyone’s favorite amicus curiae is on vacation when a hated woman is murdered and the sheriff asks for help. The solution is dramatic and the setting is the least formal of Kegg’s career. A real highlight from this series.

8) Yours Truly Johnny Dollar: The McCormack Matter, Parts 1-2, 3-4, and 5

A solid start to Bob Bailey’s Johnny Dollar run is this story which has Johnny moving into action based on a death bed tip from a dying inmate based on something he head a recently released prisoner say in his sleep. We’re giving a twisting, turning case with a shocking conclusion.

7) Let George Do It: Every Shot Counts

George is hired by a singing cowboy who fears a female sharpshooter across the street is being harassed. Murder, blackmail, and a blind man enter in to create an amazing puzzle with an even more amazing solution.

6) Jeff Regan: The Prodigal Daughter

Regan (Jack Webb) is sent for New Orleans by a father to find his estranged daughter. When he arrives, he finds she’s dead, but that doesn’t end it—not by a long shot.

5)  Candy Matson: Candy’s Last Case

Not only is this the only detective show to give its character a fitting finale, it’s a pretty good mystery too.  Her crush Lieutenant Mallard is acting mighty suspicious, and she fears he’s gotten himself caught up in murder.  A great case and Candy’s best capture by far.

4)  Barrie Craig: Zero Hour 

Barrie Craig is hired by the husband of a woman who has been paralyzed through a deliberate attack. Barie goes to a Vermont ski resort to investigate, and while he searches for the truth, suspects to drop like flies. Whose responsible for the attacks and the ever-increasing number of dead bodies? This is a case that’s definitely not what it seems.

3) The Fat Man: The Twice Told Secret

The case starts simply enough as Brad Runyon finds himself chatting with a pawn broker and then gets suspicious about a pawn ticket and finds himself caught up in the struggles of a very conflicted family, and a death that could ruing them all.

2) Sherlock Holmes: The Armchair Solution

The pre-Rathbone radio episodes are rarely remembered but this Luis Hector outing from 1936 suggests that fans may be missing out on a treat. In a plot that’s reminiscent of Rare Window (which wouldn’t be released for another 18 years) finds Holmes solving a murder based on what he saw while confined to his armchair looking out the window.

1) Rogue’s Gallery: Murder with Muriel 

Rogue’s Gallery was the first instance of the hard boiled radio show and this episode was arguably his most hard boiled. An unsavory character who owes Rogue’s money gives Rogue a chance to collect it and a big fee if he reclaims some buried loot. However, he sent Rogue half the map and it hasn’t been received when the man with the other arrives, and then when the man is murdered, Rogue is in a fight for his life.

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Last week, I wrote about our Ten Most Exciting Episodes. This week as we approach the big 1000 number, we continue the celebration with a look back at our most humorous episodes:

10) Pat Novak: Wendy Morris

Really, I could have put any episode of Pat Novak for Hire on this list (with one exception we’ll talk about next week.) and it’d fit. Pat Novak had the best line of patter and some of cleverest lines in all of radio, and a unique style of Novak-speak. This may have been the best in my memory, however, any episode could go on this list.

9) Leonidas Witherall: The State Fair Murder Case

A predictable murder of an unpleasant woman at the state fair is punched by clever deduction and light comedy.

8) Let George Do It: The Brooksdale Orphanage

Early episodes of Let George Do It were trying to be funny as a detective comedy complete with laugh track. Usually, the humor came up lame such as in the awful Cousin Jeff and the Pig. In this one, it works. It’s not George’s greatest moment, and I actually received a complaint from a new listener who thought I’d snookered him by advertising this as a detective’s podcast. Still, if you keep an open mind, it’s a pretty good show.

7) Lux Radio Theater: The Thin Man

Cecil B. Demille brings together William Powell and Mryna Loy to perform their roles from the classic detective comedy.

6) Jeff Regan: She’s Lovely, She’s Engaged, She Eats Soybeans 

After Jack Webb left Jeff Regan, the show retooled with Frank Graham taking the lead role of Jeff Regan and comic character actor Frank Nelson took over as the boss Anthony J Lyon and turned the character into a lovable scoundrel. The result was a new series with some hard boiled elements, but also a few lighter comedic touches as illustrated in this story of Regan trying to guard a beautiful model on a health food kick.

5) Candy Matson: Devil in the Deep Freeze

A classically quirky Candy Matson story that finds Candy hired to find out who killed a man in a devil costume found in a theater. A hilarious solution follows with some pretty good action

4) Columbia Worshop: Murder in Studio One

We paid tribute to the late great Norman Corwin when he died in 2011 when playing this episode of the Columbia Workshop. Corwin was known for his powerful poetry, not his skill as a mystery writer, but this is a pretty good satirical comedy mystery as Helen Hayes investigates the murder of a man who may have deserved his fate as he was a traitor.

3) Barrie Craig; A Very Odd Job

Barrie Craig is hired to deliver a puppet to a showgirl in one of the oddest adventures of his career.

2) X Minus One: Protective Mimicry

Veteran radio character actor Mandell Kramer plays a futuristic T-man in search of a counterfeiter. The story is played relatively straight-laced which makes its humorous funny, and the denouement of the case is a classic.

1) Sherlock Holmes: The Second Generation

Does being able to fool Sherlock Holmes run in the family? The daughter of Irene Adler sure hopes so in this Rathbone-Bruce Holmes story.

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As we approach our 1000th regular episode, we’ll be taking a look back at some of the best episodes we’ve brought you over the last 3 1/2 years. I decided it’d be best to do this by category beginning with the most exciting. Next week we’ll discuss the most humorous.

10) Let George Do It: High Card

In this episode, four men have been implicated in the murder of a beautiful woman and there’s not proof on any of them. So, they come up with a desperate gambit. They decide to draw and the person who gets high card will write a confession and commit suicide. George arrives and discovers the game and finds out the draw was rigged. Now, George has to prevent the suicide and reveal the guilty party.

9) Sherlock Holmes: The Elusive Agent, Parts One, Two, and Three

While the John Stanley Sherlock  Holmes series wasn’t among my favorites, this three part spy serial was definitely a highlight of the show’s run with plenty of twists and turns in search of missing submarine plans.

8)  Studio One: The Thirty-Nine Steps

This radio retelling of the Alfred Hitchcok movie version of the Graham Greene classic finds Glenn Ford playing a Canadian caught in a web of intrigue and espionage in the Scottish countryside.  So suspenseful and fun.

7) Nero Wolfe: The Case of the Calculated Risk:

The radio incarnation of Wolfe was notorious for its deviation from portrayals of Wolfe in the corpus. This worked to some advantage in this episode which begins with a man who claims to have been framed for murder and involves a crooked card game. It ends with one of the most exciting gambits between Wolfe, Goodwin (Mohr), and the murderer.

6) Box 13: Find Me, Find Death:

Dan Holiday got plenty of crazy letters, but this one took the cake. The letter writer informed Holiday that he would kill him in 4 days and that if he went to the police, he’d kill Holiday sooner.  Holiday’s challenge is to find the madman–without finding deat

5) Let George Do It: The Hearst Was Painted Pink:

George is  told to court the girlfriend  of a dangerous mobster by another dangerous mobster who threatens his life and that of Miss Brooks. He quickly finds himself int he crossfire.

4) Sherlock Holmes: The Paradol Chamber

Has a female scientist in the 19th century discovered the secret to teleportation?  When Watson and Holmes investigate in this Rathbone-Bruce episodes, they find themselves up against a most deadly foe.

3) Yours Truly Johnny Dollar: The Yankee Pride Matter

Johnny Dollar (Edmund O’Brien) goes to Singapore to investigate some constantly delayed cargo. It builds up to a challenge that requires Dollar to get tougher than he’s ever gotten before.

2)  Box 13: Hare and Hounds

This is a very tense and suspenseful story as Holiday finds himself framed for murder, with the local police hunting for him, along with the real killer. His job is to stay alive. It’s one of Holiday’s cleverest adventures.

1) Lux Radio Theater: To the Ends of the Earth:

The Lux Radio Theater of this underrated Dick Powell classic was our 500th episode special was a stunner.  Powell reprises his screen role as Narcotics Commissioner Michael Barrows who witnesses a Japanese sea captain throwing 100 slaves overboard to cover up a narcotics ring. Barrows is determined to get justice and sets out on a globe trotting adventure to break the ring and capture the murderous captain.

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