So True, Mr. Barnum: Have Gun, Will Travel (April 10, 1960)

“So True, Mr. Barnum” is an episode of Have Gun, Will Travel, the old-time radio show, first broadcast April 10, 1960. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

Listen to Have Gun, Will Travel free, live around the clock: every episode, in the order it first aired. No sign-up.

What happens

Paladin receives a letter from a man in Mexico offering to share the location of buried gold in exchange for $2,000. Recognizing it as a classic con game, Paladin agrees to guide his trusting employee Hey Boy and the members of the Celestial Dragon Society to the Arizona desert to search for the treasure, hoping the journey might somehow lead them to the swindler and recover their money.

San Francisco in 1875, and the Arizona desert near the Mexican border

Characters: Paladin, Hey Boy, Miss Wong, Bill Sweeney, Arizona Ranger, Professor Burdick

Listen for: Paladin's explanation of the treasure scam to Hey Boy, and the encounter with Arizona Ranger Bill Sweeney who reveals information about a criminal hiding across the border in Mexico

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.