The Nelson Matter: Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar (August 25, 1953)

“The Nelson Matter” is an episode of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, the old-time radio show, first broadcast August 25, 1953. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

Insurance investigator Johnny Dollar arrives in New York to investigate the death of a small-time criminal known as the Frog, who was insured for $10,000 with beneficiary Maude Gilkerson. Dollar meets with police lieutenant Korchak, learns the Frog had ties to crime boss Ellis Hartchier, and uses an informant named Wilbur Truett to locate the beneficiary, but immediately faces intimidation from two thugs warning him to drop the case.

New York City, primarily at a police precinct, a skid row saloon called Hep's Hilarity, a hotel, and the streets between locations

Characters: Johnny Dollar, Lieutenant Korchak, Ellis Hartchier, The Frog (Nelson), Maude Gilkerson, Wilbur Truett

Listen for: The colorful, rambling dialogue of Wilbur Truett, a derelict informant with a gift for flowery speech; the threat delivered by the two thugs at the episode's climax

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.