WBW Theater

For over twenty years, in over 180 different countries, Robert Ripley has collected facts in their strangest, most remarkable form. So let's see what he has in store for you tonight, when he can show you how amazing he truth can be. But first, the show opens with a medley of tunes, from Ozzie Nelson and his orchestra. The first tune is called 'Puttin' On My White Tie'.

Cast: Robert Ripley, Harriet Hilliard, Gino Palmisano

Broadcast: November 3, 1935

Today's show is all about aviation oddities, thrills from high in the air, and some of the strangest and more daring aeronautical feats ever recorded. 

Cast: Robert Ripley

Broadcast: December 1, 1935

Today's show bring you lots more interesting facts from Robert Ripley, beginning with a quiz. Here's the first question. Which weighs more? A pound of gold, or a pound feathers? But before you get the answer, first the discussion of the day is one of the most frightening phobias ever to delude mankind - witchcraft. Believe it or not, it began with the publication of one book...

Host: Robert Ripley

Broadcast: August 4, 1947

It's the year 4000, and the colonization of the planet Mars is a fact. The folks up there aren't much different to those on Earth - except maybe a little wiser. Today's tale is the story of Matt Morrow, editor of the successful telepaper The Morrow News, and of what happened after a strange little man walked into his office, wearing a shiny blue suede suit and a straw hat - the kind that went out of fashion on Earth hundreds of years ago. The strange man was little, he was incongruous, and he was frightened.

Cast: Maurice Tarplin, Raymond Edward Johnson, Rolly Bester, John Raby

Broadcast: April 2, 1953

Maurice Tarplin starred as the Mysterious Traveler in this supernatural drama series. The stories began; “This is the Mysterious Traveler, inviting you to join me on another journey into the strange and terrifying. I hope you will enjoy the trip, that it will thrill you a little and chill you a little. So settle back, get a good grip on your nerves, and be comfortable – if you can!"

Cast: Vicki Volante, Ann Sheppard, Bret Morrison, Lawson Zerbe, Maurice Tarplin, Orson Welles, Ted Osborne, Various, Jackson Beck, Lon Clark, Ed Begley, Lyle Sudrow, Eric Dressler, Roger DeKoven, Robert Dryden, Mary Jane Higby, Joyce Gordon, Ralph Bell, Cliff Carpenter, Joe Julian, Leon Janney, Bill Zuckert, Helen Shields, Bryna Raeburn, Jack Manning, Alan Manson, Art Carney, Chuck Webster, James Van Dyk

Broadcast History: 5 December 1943 to 16 September 1952

Ellery Queen begins by dedicating this program to the fight against crime. Not merely crimes of violence and crimes of dishonesty but crimes of intolerance, discrimination, and bad citizenship, crimes against America.

He then tells us the story of a mysterious international figure suspected of diamond smuggling.

Cast: Hugh Marlowe

Broadcast: 7th September 1947

Professor O’Donnell is a great scientist who has become cruel and inhuman and it is for that reason that his assistant Miss St Clair has decided to leave him. The Professor has created Mechanical robots, which go out and capture animals from the zoo so that the professor can use their brains to create a super brain for his robots. But of course he can’t let her go for fear of her telling the police. He intends to kill her and use her brain too.

Cast: James Monks

Broadcast: 15th June 1945

Jeff Martin had been engaged to Gloria Bennett 15 years ago before he murdered her and now he believed her ghost was back to haunt him and his wife Helen.

Cast: Peter Lorre

Broadcast: 3rd February 1954

Did you ever have a dream in which you were running and running, running away from some grotesque horrible thing that was after you to kill you? And you scream and you keep running it runs too and no matter how you run, how fast you run it’s still after you. This thing, this thing runs fast and you can’t get away from it no matter where you turn. When you wake up you know you’ve been dreaming but the sweat soaks your body like a wet shroud and your heart beats wildly and you find it’s a silkscreen because even though you’re awake that thing is still there in the room with you. It clings like a leech.

Listen then to this story of a man and of a leech he couldn’t get away from but in this story the Leech was dead and it was human…

Cast: Peter Lorre

Broadcast: 7th April 1954

A mid fields of clover, 

'T was just a little over a hundred years ago, 

A handful of strangers, 

they faced many dangers to make their country grow,

It's now quite a nation of wond'rous population,

And free from every king, 

It's your land, it's my land, 

A great do or die land, 

And that's why I sing.

From all sorts of places, 

They welcomed all the races to settle on their shore, 

They didn't care which one, 

The poor or the rich one, 

They still had room for more, 

To give them protection, 

By popular election, 

A set of laws they chose, 

They're your laws and my laws, 

For your cause and my cause,

That's why this country rose.

America, I love you, 

You're like a sweetheart of mine,

From ocean to ocean, 

For you my devotion, is touching each bound'ry line, 

Just like a little baby, 

Climbing it's mother's knee, 

America, I love you, 

And there's a hundred million other's like me.

Cast: Edgar Leslie, Archie Gottler

Broadcast: 1915