Old Time Radio
 

The Shadow

 

Who Knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men...
...The Shadow Knows!

With that phrase and a sinister sounding laugh The Shadow, one of the all-time-great Audio Adventure shows, begins.

To this day it remains one of the best known of all radio shows and is one of the highest quality Old Time Radio productions featuring good acting and great stories. If you're an Audio Adventure fan, you should have this show in your collection.

The series was first heard on the legendary Mutual Network on September 26, 1937, on Sundays at 5:30 PM. It was the highest-rated daytime series for many years. It was sponsored by Blue Coal and featured the young and relatively new theater and radio personality: Orson Welles (pictured below in a silly looking publicity still). Welles was still a couple of years from becoming famous (infamous?) for his Mercury Theater's "War of the Worlds". Welles does a good job but some of the later actors such as Bill Johnstone, Bret Morrison, John Archer, and Steve Courtleigh seem to Orson Welles as The Shadowbe more comfortable in the role.

Margot Lane (played by Agnes Moorehead among others) was Cranston's love interest and crime-solving partner.

The crimefighter was "a man of mystery" who was "never seen, only heard" and who proved each week that "crime does not pay". Radio listeners knew him as;

Quote about The Shadow featuring Orson WellesLamont Cranston, wealthy young man-about-town who years ago in the Orient learned a strange and mysterious secret -- the hypnotic power to cloud men's minds so they cannot see him."

Interestingly, the character first appeared, not as a crime fighter, but as an announcer. In September 1931, on CBS, as part of the hour-long, The Blue Coal Radio Revue, Frank Readick debuted the "voice" that would become so well known. Later the character became so popular in his own right, the sponsers decided to create a show around him. The phantom announcer voice set the style for later mystery hosts including The Whistler, Suspense's Man in Black, The Mysterious Traveler and Inner Sanctum Mysteries' Raymond.

Once The Shadow joined Mutual as a half-hour series, it did not leave Sunday evenings radio until December 26, 1954.

Orson WellesYou can find many places on the internet to add to your Shadow collection including this good one: 



 

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