Deadhead Freight: Tales of the Texas Rangers (January 7, 1951)

“Deadhead Freight” is an episode of Tales of the Texas Rangers, the old-time radio show, first broadcast January 7, 1951. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

A woman's body is discovered sewn into a duffel bag aboard a deadhead freight train near Lubbock, Texas in 1938. Ranger Jason Pierce takes over the investigation and uses clues from the bag and its contents to narrow down where the body was loaded onto the train, focusing his search on an area near a cotton field where migrant workers are operating.

Santa Fe freight yards in Lubbock, Texas and the surrounding cotton belt region in 1938

Characters: Ranger Jason Pierce, Captain Stinson, Brakeman, Railroad Detective, Gin Operator, Old Rosie

Listen for: The clever deduction that places the time and location of when the body was loaded onto the train based on the train's schedule and the unusual soil found on the duffel bag

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.