Frank Lovejoy stars as a National Guard fighter pilot with evil personal intent in a story by Hank Searls. The script has a Whistler-esque ending and was written with the pseudonym “Michael Frost.”
Lovejoy’s character is having an affair and wants to get his wife out of his romantic equation. His girlfriend is getting impatient with the situation, and seems to have an interest in coming up with ideas to set him free from his marriage. She wistfully comes up with an idea of how to do it, and he wisely dismisses it. He can take the newest high-speed plane, go to Los Angeles, murder his wife, then get back into the plane, have its speed enhanced with the flow of the jet stream, and be back in time like nothing happened. But the wisdom of saying no to the evil idea doesn’t last for long. Many years ago, he forged a check, but was never convicted of the crime. All it took to change his mind about the girlfriend’s idea was a call from his wife. She stated her intent to make his work superiors aware of his long-ago financial malfeasance, so he would lose his job, and likely his standing in the Air National Guard. This sends him thinking that he needs to act soon.
That crazy idea now sounds like a perfect crime, to use his training as a pilot and one of the newest military jets. He can serve his country and serve his selfish romantic motives at the very same time. To ensure his alibi, he has to use another pilot's name and credentials so it will be clear he never left New York. There is another Guard member in the office, and he uses his. It will just be another flight, and no one will ever notice it in the paperwork. (If you can forge checks, you won’t have a problem forging other paperwork, it seems, which is why Searls included that background). He gets to Los Angeles, strangles her, makes it look like a robbery, and leaves his two-year-old son crying. When he gets back to the California air field, he learns that the position of the jet stream at that time was 45,000 feet, and was exceptionally strong this particular day. It will be of great advantage to making the nefarious plan work. He gets back at the New York office very early, before the other employees arrive to start the workday. There is a call from police to the office that his wife was murdered. It is obvious he could not have done it. But there’s a twist to his presence at the office at that particular time that leads to the surprise ending.
The program was recorded on Monday, November 25, 1957. The rehearsal began at 2:00pm and ended at 5:00pm. The recording began at that time and was concluded at 7:00pm with edits. Additional editing started at 7:00pm and finished at 9:00pm.
There are two surviving recordings of this episode, both from the Armed Forces Radio Service, AFRS#659 and AFRS#961. No network recording is known to survive. The two AFRS recordings can be identified by the announcements after Robson’s opening monologue:
AFRS#659: The word “citizen” in the US Constitution
AFRS#961: Emblem of Meritorious Unit Commendation (read by Vin Scully, voice of the Los Angeles Dodgers).
The better recording is AFRS#961. The other AFRS recording has a narrow range and is less natural sounding.
Advertisers on the network program were Kent cigarettes, Vicks Medi-Mist, clothing dye RIT and shoe polish Shinola, and Heinz.
The F-100 was a real plane that set many speed records in its day https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_F-100_Super_Sabre
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https://archive.org/details/TSP571201
THE CAST
Frank Lovejoy (John Martin), Ellen Morgan (Vickie), Virginia Gregg (Millie Martin / Baby / Timmy), James McCallion (Bud Lynch / Omaha radio), Harry Bartell (Oper. Officer Johnson / Photographer), Norm Alden (Sergeant / Lt. Berman), Sam Pierce (Control Tower / Denver radio), George Walsh (Narrator)
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