Blood Money: Gunsmoke (March 6, 1960)

“Blood Money” is an episode of Gunsmoke, the old-time radio show, first broadcast March 6, 1960. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

Marshal Dillon and Chester find a drifter named Joe Harp helping an injured cowboy named Spinner out on the prairie. Dillon brings both men back to Dodge, where Harp recovers and stays on, gambling and seeming respectable. Six weeks later, a wanted poster arrives revealing that Harp is wanted for bank robbery and murder. When Dillon learns Harp has fled town with Spinner's help after Spinner was warned of the arrest, he pursues them into the territory.

Dodge City, Kansas and the surrounding prairie territory, 1960s

Characters: Matt Dillon, Chester Proudfoot, Joe Harp, Spinner, Doc, Kitty

Listen for: The tension between Dillon's duty to arrest a wanted criminal and his uncertainty about a man who seemed to be doing good deeds; Spinner's unexpected loyalty to Harp despite their initial antagonism.

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.