What happens
Gildersleeve decides to go on a diet and swears off smoking, but his friend Judge Hooker bets him $100 that he cannot lose ten pounds in a week. Bertie, Marjorie and Leroy try to help him keep his resolution, though his meals are plain and his cravings grow. Hooker assigns his brother-in-law Erwin Pidge to follow Gildersleeve and make sure he keeps to the terms. The series is The Great Gildersleeve, first broadcast on NBC on January 4, 1942, starring Harold Peary, with Willard Waterman, Lillian Randolph and Lurene Tuttle.
Summerfield, the Gildersleeve household and nearby town places, during the New Year
Characters: Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve, Bertie, Marjorie, Leroy, Judge Hooker, Erwin Pidge
Listen for: Gildersleeve's attempts to keep his diet and avoid cigars, and the judge's bet
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.