The Mysterious Old Radio Listening Society

Join us as we celebrate our 10th anniversary with a live recording of our podcast at Crooners Supper Club! Special guest Shanan Custer joins us as we listen to “The Man Who Knew Everything” from The Strange Dr. Weird! As part of our celebrations, this is the first of ten episodes featuring radio series we have not yet featured on the podcast! And our live audience gets to play MORLS bingo as we discuss the episode and the last ten years of mysterious old radio listening! Why does the mentalist seem to have such a persistent cough? How does The Strange Dr. Weird compare to The Mysterious Traveler? Is anyone going to win this game of MORLS bingo? Listen for yourself and find out!

Some time ago, we had a plan to celebrate our 400th episode with a live recording of ourselves revisiting the program featured on our very first episode “The House in Cypress Canyon” from Suspense! We wound up going with a different option for episode 400, but we still want to share this unused treat! Special guest Shanan Custer joined us at the Bryant-Lake Bowl to discover how time has or has not altered our reactions. What differences have we discovered between performing the show live ourselves and listening to it? What insights did our Patreon members Ryan and Mac discover by studying our voting history? Has our podcast aged like a fine Roma wine? Listen for yourself and find out!

“Spider” is an episode of Lights Out recommended to us by our Patreon supporter Zachary. Thanks Zachary! The story features two down-on-their-luck rogues reduced to hunting for butterflies to fund their escape from a thick tropical jungle. But soon they discover something else among the trees that is more dangerous than anything they anticipated! What is it that makes the creature so deadly? Will they make it out of the jungle? What happened immediately after the final scene of King Kong? Listen for yourself and find out!

This week, we’re enjoying a bit of Rocky Fortune with Frank Sinatra in a story entitled “Double Indemnity”! Rocky’s new job as a chauffeur turns out to be just a ruse that leaves him knocked unconscious. When he wakes up, he doesn’t know where he is and he may not know who he is! Why is he stepping into a new life so far from his home? Will he actually keep this job? Do you have to watch Dangerous When Wet to understand the plot? Listen for yourself and find out! 

Summer is the perfect time to check out an episode of The Mercury Summer Theatre of the Air! Lucille Fletcher penned this story, “The Search for Henri Le Fevre,” which features a composer who has just completed a masterful new work. But as soon as this composition is complete, he turns on the radio only to hear the exact same music playing! Who is the mysterious Henri Le Fevre, the man who wrote what playing on the radio? What is the secret behind the music’s beauty and heartbreak? Is Citizen Kane any good? Listen for yourself and find out!

This week marks our first visit to Rogue’s Gallery, featuring Dick Powell! In this episode, “The House of Fear,” detective Richard Rogue is hired to investigate Slip Crane’s theft of a diamond. But Roue’s efforts are immediately stymied by the family who own the diamond and who evidently have no interest in its recovery. Did one or more members of the family have a hand in the diamond’s disappearance? Is Slip Crane actually involved in the theft? Uhh…Eugor? Listen for yourself and find out! 

This week we’re listening to “Blind Impulse” from The Whistler! The story features a man’s scheme to divorce his wife so that he can marry a woman set to inherit a fortune from her dying father. But things don’t go as planned and people prove to be very unpredictable! Will the former wife’s jealousy spoil the plan? Is the new wife as feckless and carefree as she seems? What outdated legal obscurities will we become obsessed with this time? Listen for yourself and find out!

It’s time once again to find out what evil lurks in the hearts of men with a visit to The Shadow! This episode, “Death Pulls the Strings,” features a puppeteer whose employs human-sized marionettes to perform remarkably life-like dances. During one of his performances, a woman identifies one of the puppets as her sister! Is this performance as morbid as it seems? What is the truth behind Goro and Rico? Who can answer all your questions about the Planet of the Apes television show? Listen for yourself and find out!

This week’s visit to the Listener Library brings us to “Island of the Lost,” an episode of CBS Radio Mystery Theater recommended to us by our Patreon member Melanie! Thanks, Melanie! The story features a man suffering headaches, which may or may not be caused by his marriage to a much younger woman. When he surprises her during her tropical vacation, he begins to struggle to tell reality from illusion. Is he imagining her infidelity? Why did his eye doctor write a letter to the man’s wife? Who are the people in your neighborhood? Listen for yourself and find out!

We’re flipping through The Devil’s Scrapbook to learn the story of “The Conquest of David Rugg”! This episode features Sidney Trent, whose car stalls out after he gets lost driving in a storm. He is rescued by David Rugg, a man driving a horse-drawn carriage. Sidney accompanies Rugg back to his home, and before the night is over, madness and terror will reign. Will Rugg conquer or be conquered? Was this a mere nightmare or did these horrors really happen? Is college really that important? Listen for yourself and find out!