{
  "title": "CAPTAIN POST, CRIME SPECIALIST",
  "category": "[RADIO-SERIAL]",
  "article": "Despite the title and the opening lead-in which suggests a story more of gangs and organized\ncrime, this serial is in actuality the earliest of one of Morse’s thematic constants: a decaying family\nin a decaying house.\nMorse: “In ‘Captain Post, Crime Specialist’ we used the hair-raising sound of a siren rising and\nfalling behind the slow movement of ocean waves. These waves, the announcer told the audience,\nin a mysterious whisper, were the waves of crime that were sweeping over the country leaving in\ntheir blood-wake atrocious deeds too terrible even to be whispered.”\n“One of my peculiar wishes was to have a detective hero of my very own. Thus Captain Carter\nPost came into being, in the serial ‘Captain Post, Crime Specialist.’ In the beginning, about all I\nhad was the name. Week by week, I pounded out the episodes just in time to get them into the\nhands of the producer for the week’s show. And as each episode appeared, the plot developed\nstronger and stronger until, about the seventh episode, the producer and I had a REAL show on\nour hands. From then on it was easy sledding, and I sailed into the last three episodes for as\nsmashing a climax as you could ask for.\"\n“Waves of crime again disturb the nimble mind of Captain Post, who will recount another series\nof adventures for KYA listeners…”\nElements of this script were later incorporated by Morse into his I Love a Mystery serial\n“Hollywood Cherry” (also known as “The Thing That Cries in the Night”).",
  "origination": "KGO, San Francisco, California (NBC PACIFIC COAST RED); KYA, San Francisco,\nCalifornia.",
  "duration": "December 5, 1930-February 6, 1931 (KGO); August 17-October 19, 1932 (KYA).",
  "personnel": "Richard LeGrand (director—1932, KYA), Carlton E. Morse (scriptwriter; director—1930,\nKGO).\nCAST [1930, KGO]: Bernice Berwin (Laura Worth), Bobbe Dean (Anna May Worth), Dorothy Desmond\n(Betty Von Loughner), Bert Horton (John Worth), Thomas Kelly (William Worth), Richard LeGrand\n(Captain Carter Post), Rollon Parker (Fritz Zeigler), Michael Raffetto (Dr. Ernest Qoon), Victor Rodman\n(Commissioner Gifford), Barton Yarborough (Sergeant Jack Long).",
  "extant_recordings": "None.",
  "chronology": "CAPTAIN POST, CRIME SPECIALIST (KGO, SAN FRANCISCO—NBC-PACIFIC\nCOAST RED)\n[Friday—10:00-10:30 PM]\nDecember 5, 1930\n[PART 1] “Murder by Phone”\n[“…Preliminary to the action of the play, listeners will be told of a series\nof seemingly natural deaths befalling a group of people. A link ties each\nof these deaths together—one that leads relatives to believe that a\nmurderer is at work… Captain Post is called to investigate a series of\ntelephone calls in which young John Worth, wealthy San Francisco\nresident, has been told that he is to be murdered at a certain time. In\nspite of the protection given him at the appointed hour, the young man is\nmurdered in a mysterious manner that gives the story a startling and\nbaffling climax…”]\nDecember 12, 1930\n[PART 2] “The Phantom with the Knife”\n[“…Tonight’s story tells of another crime being laid at the door of the\nsame murderer. A young girl is being subjected to a series of small flesh\nwounds inflicted by a phantom knifer. The horror of discovering a new\nwound is gradually driving her insane. Captain Post gets on the case and\nanother battle of wits with the criminal is the result…”]\nDecember 19, 1930\n[PART 3] “A New Kind of Murder”\n[“…Betty von Loughner attempts suicide after a series of knife slashings\nplays upon her fear of blood until she is driven to the point of self-\ndestruction. The next victim of the murderer is the French maid in the\nhousehold…”]\nDecember 26, 1930\n[PART 4] “Dead Men Don’t Talk”\n[“…The latest murder in the Worth household points the finger of\nsuspicion at Professor Ernst Qoon, a friend of the Worth family, and\nreveals the mysterious telephone call that caused a death in the first\nepisode. Captain Post has drawn a net around the Worth house and is\ngradually subjecting each of its members to a severe grilling in an\nattempt to trap the murderer… Fritz Ziegler, laboratory assistant of\nProfessor Qoon, is murdered as he is about to tell Captain Post the name\nof the murderer…”]\n[Friday—9:30-10:00 PM]\nJanuary 2, 1931\n[PART 5] “Murder in Triplicate”\n[“…Three members of the Worth household have been murdered by a\nmysterious psychological killer. As a result, Ernst Qoon, professor of\npsycho-physics, has been taken into custody by Captain Post. The last\nwords of Fritz Zeigler, his young student assistant, who was mysteriously\nkilled, seemed to have pinned the series of crimes to the scientist.\nStartling developments after he has been locked up prove conclusively\nthat he has been wrongly accused… Qoon expresses the theory that the\nkiller is ‘not only a bangup murderer, but a supreme egoist as well.’\nQoon, discovering that two of the deaths were due to the administering of\na poison which he had prepared from a secret formula, lays a trap for the\nmurderer. He puts a box of matches, coated with the poison, on the\nmantelpiece, hoping the killer will attempt to get possession of it. When\nhis back is turned the matches disappear. They are subsequently found in\nLaura Worth’s handkerchief…”]\nJanuary 9, 1931\n[PART 6] “The Match Murder”\n[“…At the insistence of Police Commissioner Gifford, a reconstruction is\nstaged of one of the crimes that Captain Post is investigating… All\nmembers of theWorth household are forced to\nrepeat as accurately as possible their actions just previous to the killing of\nAnnette, the French maid…”]\nJanuary 16, 1931\n[PART 7] “Something About Gifford”\n[“…Sergeant Jack Long, who cleared up the mystery of the City of the\nDead, enters the Worth case in tonight’s episode. He is called into the\ncase after Commissioner of Police Gifford is hurled out of the second\nstory window of the Worth residence… Gifford’s death is the fifth murder\nthat has occurred in the Worth place within thirty-six hours… At the\nclose of the episode, Anna May Worth screams and faints, and when the\nothers go to her assistance, they discover that William Worth, her\nhusband, has disappeared from the group…”]\nJanuary 23, 1931\n[PART 8] “The Murderer’s Game”\nJanuary 30, 1931\n[PART 9] “The Stage Set for Murder”\n[“…Betty, whose wrists were slashed in an earlier episode, meets her\ndeath in tonight’s chapter… Betty either throws herself down a flight of\nstairs or is thrown. A letter supposedly left by Betty, indicated suicide\nand placed the guilt of the murders in the Worth household on Ernst\nQoon… The name of the actual murderer, the motive for the crimes, and\nthe rest of the mysteries connected with the story will be revealed in the\nfinal episode next Friday night…”]\nFebruary 6, 1931\n[PART 10] “The End of the Trail”\n[“Betty was revealed last night as the perpetrator of the crimes that\nCaptain Post had been investigating in the Worth household. Betty, it\nseems, had been suffering from a martyr complex. She was in love with\nQoon and had laid her plans carefully so that she could revenge herself\nupon the entire Worth household. She had fastened a pistol in place at\nthe head of the stairs and attached a thread to it, intending to inflict a\nslight wound in her arm to give the impression that her life had been\nthreatened. Through a miscalculation she received the bullet full in the\narm. The shock and the force of the bullet’s impact caused her to lose her\nbalance and topple down the stairs…”]\nCAPTAIN POST, CRIME SPECIALIST (KYA, SAN FRANCISCO)\n[Wednesday—9:15-9:45 PM]\nAugust 17, 1932\n[PART 1] “Murder by Telephone”\nAugust 24, 1932\n[PART 2] “The Monster with the Knife”\nAugust 31, 1932\n[PART 3] “A New Kind of Murder”\nSeptember 7, 1932\n[PART 4] “Dead Men Don’t Talk”\nSeptember 14, 1932\n[PART 5] “Murder in Triplicate”\nSeptember 21, 1932\n[PART 6] “The Match Murder”\nSeptember 28, 1932\n[PART 7] “Something About Gifford”\nOctober 5, 1932\n[PART 8] “The Murderer’s Game”\nOctober 12, 1932\n[PART 9] “The Stage Set for Murder”\nOctober 19, 1932\n[PART 10] “The End of the Trail”",
  "sources": "",
  "gallery": "",
  "images": []
}