What happens
Engineer Jim Gaines runs the rolling roads that carry freight and passengers across the country. When a faction of engineers led by his deputy Van Cleek seizes control, plotting to hold the roads for their own ends, Gaines must confront them. X Minus One presents this 1956 episode, adapted from Robert Heinlein's story, with an announcer introducing it on the National Broadcasting Company. Gaines and the engineers' rebellion drive the tale, which turns on how the road system depends on the men who run it.
Mid-1950s America, where a network of mechanized rolling roads has replaced automobile highways, running from city to city.
Characters: Jim Gaines, Van Cleek, Mr. Evans, Davidson, Harvey, Jack, Edmonds
Listen for: Listen for how Gaines reacts when Van Cleek reveals the engineers have seized control of the roads, and how the cadets are sent north to retake them.
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.