Dragnet on Radio: The Big Drive
Jumpstarting ‘Fridays For Friday’
Here at the world headquarters for The Silver State Chronicles, things are always happening! I decided to dedicate the remaining Fridays of 2007 to one of my great heroes, Joe Friday and the series Dragnet!
We’ll start this week off with a Dragnet Doubleheader! While Jack Webb and Dragnet are often identified with great television, a lot of folks don’t know that Dragnet originated as a very successful, long running radio drama.
So how about a little dose of old time radio? Sit back and enjoy the August 14, 1952 episode of radio’s Dragnet, “The Big Drive.”
Also of interest:
Categories: Audio, Fridays for Friday, Old Time Radio Fridays for Friday, Jack Webb, Joe Friday, Old Time Radio
I certainly know that Dragnet started as a radio show. Radio and an outdoor ‘facility’ was our mode in the backwoods of KY back when. We had the Yankees and the Cardinals Baseball teams allowed (as favorites for my brothers) for baseball and then whoopie we had nighttime radio for all the old-time greats like “Dragnet” the “Shadow,” The Creaking Door,” and oh, so many more wonders on the old staic-filled Philco Radio…that as child gave me the shivers to think of them as real and something outside might “get me;” if I had to use the “outdoor facility.”
iTunes has all these great old radio shows for free….
“Who knows what lurks in the hearts of men…The Shadow (Lamont Cranston) knows.”
Vinniepedia, I didn’t know that Dragnet originated as a radio show. Love that rapid-fire manner of speaking and the background sound effects!
NWVeryBerry, I love the radio Dragnet! Many radio eps were remade as tv episodes in the 1950s, and some were even remade AGAIN in the late 1960s version of Dragnet! Mr. Webb never let a good idea go by!
And I love The Shadow! My dad was a kid in the 30s and a big fan of old time radio, so I was exposed to this stuff from an early age. I have had a lifelong love affair with old time radio!
Thelma, Dragnet was a GREAT radio drama before it was a GREAT tv series! I love the 50s version of the show – some episodes are very hard-hitting and deal with very mature subject matter. I find it amusing that tv and movies often labeled as for ‘mature’ audiences are, in fact, for very immature audiences!
And yes, I love the way the people talk in Dragnet. Mr. Webb had a great ear for that kind of stuff! His writing is often regarded as spartan but in fact, it is quite sophisticated and sharp.