What happens
Homer Macaulay, a teenage messenger boy in a small San Joaquin Valley town, works night shifts at the telegraph office while attending school. His employer, Mr. Grogan, is a genial and eccentric telegraph operator who teaches him the job and its rules. Homer's family depends on the few dollars he earns, and his brother Marcus has gone off to war. Homer's school life brings a rivalry with Hubert Akeley III over a girl named Helen Elliot, and his duties begin to show him the sadder side of life in the town. This Screen Guild Theater radio adaptation of the 1943 film The Human Comedy stars Mickey Rooney and Frank Morgan.
A small town in the San Joaquin Valley, California, during the Second World War
Characters: Homer Macaulay, Mr. Grogan, Marcus Macaulay, Miss Hicks, Hubert Akeley III, Helen Elliot, Coach Blanton, Mrs. Rose Sandoval
Listen for: Mr. Grogan's telegraph key and the telegrams Homer delivers, and Marcus's letter to Homer
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.