The Anna Compton Murder Case: Broadway Is My Beat (September 15, 1951)

“The Anna Compton Murder Case” is an episode of Broadway Is My Beat, the old-time radio show, first broadcast September 15, 1951. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

A woman's body is discovered in a car parked on Broadway, shot once in the back. Detective Danny Clover traces the vehicle's registration to Edward Bishop and learns that the victim, Anna Compton, has been having an affair with him. When Clover visits Anna's husband Leo in New Rochelle, Leo reveals that he discovered the affair through an expensive bracelet and even paid Bishop $200 for it—yet Anna left with Bishop anyway.

New York City, primarily Broadway and the surrounding neighborhoods, with a scene in New Rochelle at the Compton home and the Hunter Galleries on the Avenue of the Americas.

Characters: Detective Danny Clover, Edward Bishop, Anna Compton, Leo Compton, Officer Captain, Doc, Edward Bishop's roommate, Bishop's employer

Listen for: The atmospheric opening narration capturing Broadway at dawn, the discovery of the body in the parked car, and the revelation of the affair through Leo Compton's account of the expensive bracelet and his payment to Bishop.

Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.