What happens
Captain George W. De Long leads the steamship Jeannette on an Arctic expedition toward the North Pole, with Chief Engineer George Melville among the crew. The ship is trapped in ice north of Siberia and slowly drifts for months, while tensions grow between officers, seamen and the civilian reporter Jerome Collins. Under the Mercury Theatre on the Air series, this adaptation by Orson Welles of Commander Edward Ellsberg's account is broadcast in October 1938. The episode follows the crew's long wait in the ice, their failed attempts to break free, and the growing hardships of their confinement.
The steamship Jeannette, trapped in Arctic sea ice north of Siberia, 1879
Characters: Captain De Long, George Melville, Chip, Jerome Collins, Dr. Ambler, Nindemann, Newcomb, Erickson
Listen for: The ship's log entries read aloud, the crushing ice sounds as the Jeannette is squeezed, and the tense exchanges between Captain De Long and Collins.
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.