The Dead First-Helpers: Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar (April 11, 1950)

“The Dead First-Helpers” is an episode of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, the old-time radio show, first broadcast April 11, 1950. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

Johnny Dollar goes undercover as a cinder snap at Cornell Steel in Pittsburgh to investigate a series of deaths among experienced first helpers at the open-hearth furnaces. The company reports them as accidents, but Johnny suspects murder and begins to uncover tension and fear among the workers that may connect to planned layoffs.

Cornell Steel mill in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; steel workers' homes and cafeteria

Characters: Johnny Dollar, Mr. Barrett, Andre, Joe Poland, Fred, Kirk Brody's widow, Edmund O'Brien

Listen for: The details of industrial hazards in steel mills, the conversations between Johnny and the workers he befriends, and the revelation about layoff notices posted in the locker room.

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.