Crime Classics

FORMAT: (1) MP3 DVD / (2) MP3 CDS Crime Classics came to CBS September 30, 1953 and was a neat little series of "true crime stories". This show introduces itself succinctly: "A series of true crime stories from the records and newspapers of every land, from every time. Your host each week, is Mr. Thomas Hyland -- connoisseur of crime, student of violence, and teller of murders. " Thomas Hyland is played by Lou Merrill, although you'd never know it was an "actor" doing the part. The great Elliott Lewis, actor, producer and director of Suspense, Broadway is my Beat and On Stage is in charge of this very intelligent and enjoyable show. Composer Bernard Herrmann duplicated authentic music of the era being dramatized, and Morton Fine and David Friedkin were the writers. Lewis and his writers collected and developed true crime stories expressly for Crime Classics. Thomas Hyland's delivery is measured and mild-mannered, as if giving a college lecture. Would that all professors were this interesting! The actors in the stories themselves are uniformly. Sensitive orchestral scores by the great Bernard Hermann, who did Orson Welles' Mercury Theater radio show and then Alfred Hitchcock's films, give the stories sophistication and mood. So do the tasteful sound effects. There is a wry, cool-blooded tone to the proceedings. Cases ranged from seventeenth-century murder to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Each and every story, however bizarre, is actually based on fact. For example, the show on the Younger Brothers of the American West has some very interesting background details concerning Quantrell's Raiders and the Kansas Jayhawks. In the story of "John Hayes, his Head, and How They Were Parted," we hear the tale of a glassblower who blows glass perfectly and completely surrounding the severed head of a unknown deadman. Then it is placed in a museum where it remained pending identification. Thus his killers were found out by the dead man, using his head. This show is a good companion to other old time radio shows that are historically-oriented, such as Cavalcade of America, You Are There, and American Trail. For science and research, the shows Science Magazine of the Air and Adventures in Research are very good. Episode List For This Collection The Crime of Bathsheba Spooner (Audition)The Crime of Bathsheba SpoonerThe Shockingly Peaceful Passing of Thomas Edwin Bartlett, GreengrocerThe Checkered Life and Sudden Death of Colonel James Fisk, JrThe Shrapnelled Body of Charles Drew, SrThe Terrible Deed of John White WebsterThe Death of a Picture HangerThe Final Day of General Ketchum, And How He DiedMr Thrower's HammerThe Axe and the Droot Family, How They FaredThe Incredible Trial of Laura D FairThe Alsop Family, How It Diminished And Grew AgainYour Loving Son, NeroThe Torment of Henrietta Robinson, And Why She KilledThe Bloody, Bloody Banks of Fall RiverThe Hangman and William Palmer, Who WonThe Seven-layered Arsenic Cake of Madame LafargeBilly Bonny Bloodletter, Also Known As 'The Kid'John Hayes, His Head And How They Were PartedRaschi Among the Crocodiles, And The Prank He PlayedBlackbeard's Fourteenth Wife, Why She Was Not Good For HimThe Triangle on the Round TableThe Killing Story of William Corder and the Farmer's DaughterIf a Body Need a Body, Just Call Burke and HareThe Assassination of Abraham LincolnJohn and Judith, Their Crime And Why They Didn't Get To Enjoy ItCoyle and Richardson, Why They Hung In A Spanking BreezeThe Younger Brothers, Why Some Of Them Grew No OlderHow Supan Got the Hook Outside BombayMadeline Smith, Maid or Murderess, Which?The Boorn Brothers and the Hangman, A Study In Nip And TuckThe Incredible History of John ShepardTwenty-Three Knives Against CaesarJean Baptiste Troppmann, Killer Of ManyThe Good Ship Jane, Why She Became FlotsamRoger Nems, How He, Though Dead, Won The GameNew Hampshire, the Tiger and Brad Ferguson, What Happened Then?Old Sixtoes, How He Stopped Construction On The B. B. C. and IRobby-Boy Balfour; How He Wrecked A Big Prison's ReputationThe General's Daughter, the Czar's Lieutenant and the Linen ClosetJames Evans, Fireman; How He Extinguished A Human TorchCesare Borgia - His Most Difficult MurderWidow Magee and the Three Gypsies; A Vermont FandangoBunny Baumler; His Close Brush With FameMr Clarke's Skeleton in Mr Aram's Closet; The Noise It MadeThe Lethal Habit of The Marquise De BrinvilliersMr Jonathon Jewett; How Most Peculiarly He Cheated The HangmanThe Assassination of Leon TrotskyThe Death of a Baltimore Birdie and FriendAli Pasha - A Turkish DelightGood Evening, My Name Is Jack the Ripper