The Hot Chocolate Matter: Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar (January 7, 1962)

“The Hot Chocolate Matter” is an episode of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, the old-time radio show, first broadcast January 7, 1962. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

Johnny Dollar is called to investigate a $104,000 diamond theft from Mac Bilby's jewelry store on Madison Avenue in New York. A night watchman named McDuggins was shot during the robbery, and a cleaning boy named Daniel Fairling has disappeared. Johnny begins tracking leads, visiting the wounded watchman in the hospital and searching for Fairling's whereabouts.

New York City, primarily Manhattan, including Mac Bilby's jewelry store on Madison Avenue near 57th Street, Bellevue Hospital, and a residential building where Daniel Fairling lives.

Characters: Johnny Dollar, Lieutenant Randol Singer, Mac Bilby, McDuggins, Miss Tovish, Daniel Fairling, Mr. Dubin, Dr. Leffman

Listen for: The clever setup of the diamond heist mystery with multiple suspects, the dynamic between Johnny Dollar and Lieutenant Singer, and clues pointing to the missing cleaning boy Daniel Fairling who was seen delivering chocolates to the store.

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.