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Calling All Detectives 47-04-16 (xxx) Elusibe Diamond Thief
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Calling All Detectives 47-04-16 (xxx) Elusibe Diamond Thief
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Nicole Byer
We interrupt this program to bring you an important Wayfair message. Wayfair's got style tips for Every Home. This is Nicole Byer helping you make those rooms Flyer Today's Style Tip when it comes to making a statement, treat bold patterns like neutrals. Go wild like an untamed animal. Print area rug under a rustic farmhouse table. From wayfair.com Ooh, fierce. This has been your Wayfair style tip to keep those interiors superior. Wayfair Every style, Every home Sleeping on a Sealy is like sleeping on a cloud. The Sealy Mattress Company presents Calling All Detectives a series of baffling thefts from a locked vault right under your very eyes. Could you solve them? That is the situation on this page. From my casebook, the casebook of Jerry Browning, Private Detective in the famous story Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. What is the first name of Mr. Hyde? That is the Sealy Mystery Quiz question, now worth $1,220. If the person we telephone at the end of the program can answer a question based on tonight's transcribed story, he or she will earn a famous Sealy Tuftless inner spring mattress plus a chance to answer the Seeley Mystery Quiz question. So pull up a chair and listen closely to Calling All Detectives. A private detective like me, Jerry Browning gets all sorts of cases. Some are tough and a few are so easy you don't see the evidence right underfoot. Keith Wickersham was 48 years old, gray at the temples, and expects. Mr. Browning, Wickersham's jewelry Salon is an institution. Both my employees and customers are beyond reproach. I nodded. Yeah, but just the same, somebody is robbing you blind. And if it isn't employees or customers, then it must be pixies. At the sound of the warning buzzer, the remaining customers began to drift out. I watched as clerks took trays of jewels from the display cases and carefully deposited the trays into shelves inside a huge vault. Finally, all the trays were inside the vault. Note, Mr. Browning, that the vault is now locked and the combination thrown. Only I know the combination, and even if someone else were to learn it, the burglar alarm would sound at any attempt to turn the lock. I made a few notes on a pad. Okay so far. What next? Wickersham smiled grimly. Please observe. As each employee left the area where the safe stood, he passed between two tiny beams of light. I had that device installed when the theft began, Mr. Browning if any person were carrying a diamond or a metal object in his pocket, an alarm would sound. Has an alarm sounded. No alarm had sounded, and I said so. Nevertheless, the chances are strong that tomorrow morning a diamond will be missing from the vault. He wasn't kidding. The next morning, a diamond was missing. Now all I had to do was figure out how the thing was worked. At this point, the sponsor's first commercial is heard. Calling all detectives is as different as it is successful. Here's a show that quadrupled its rating in 39 weeks, produced the greatest mail pull in the history of WGN, is the number one program in its time slot against 17 other Chicago stations, and has one of the highest holding power records in radio. Today I won't take any more of your time to repeat facts outlined in the brochure. Now back to Jerry Browning. Despite elaborate precautions, diamonds and other gems were being stolen at regular intervals from a locked vault at a jewelry salon. The man from the Crack Proof Safe company was short, squat and determined. Gents, nobody can pick this luck. I turn to Wickersham Bestore honor. Can somebody possibly have learned the combination? Wickersham shook his head. The combination has been changed three times during the past month. The last time it wasn't even written down. I memorized it. Okay, nobody picked the lock. The store was beginning to fill up as elegantly dressed women and a few men drifted in. Wickersham looked at them with a jaundiced eye. Is it possible, Mr. Browning, that one of my customers is responsible? I shook my head. This is an inside job. But count on the stuff in your trays. Checks every evening. That idea struck me. That gimmick you bought, the device that checks for stones or metal in people's pockets. Maybe it isn't working and one of your employees lifts a stone from a tray just as it's being put away. How can we check that? Don't worry. We'll check it. That evening, as the routine of putting the trays into the vault was being repeated, I walked into the vault, too. I reached up on a shelf, took a diamond from one of the trays. I put it into an inside pocket under a couple of layers of cloth. Then I darted out of the vault. Okay, Mr. Wickerson, your gimmick works fine. Turn it off. There was no sense in hanging around the store now. When you can't figure out how something is being done, maybe you can find out who is doing it. So for a week, I gave all of Wickersham's employees my four star special complete investigation. I learned that one man was living somewhat beyond his means. Another was playing the horses in a Modestly consistent sort of way. And a third, a young woman had just bought a mink coat that she was careful not to wear to work. I kept on investigating and found that the man living beyond his means was getting supplementary income from a brother out west. That the horse player was $600 a head for the season and that the mink coat was dyed muskrat. Okay. I went back to Wickersham store that evening I watched the by now familiar routine of putting the trays into the vault. One by one, impassive faced clerks filed by me, deposited their wares on the shelves. I watched so carefully my eyes ached. Behind me Wickersham said, nothing's been missing for several days, Mr. Browning. You're about due for another theft. I nodded without taking my eyes off the clerks. When the last one had finished, I started into the vault. I see the Cleggio, Wickerson, my key points from my pocket, my tire clasp. The alarm bell stopped. Then I stepped into the vault, looked around. I had no idea of what I was looking for. I turned to Wickersham. The floor of this vault is dusty. Don't you ever sweep it out? Certainly we do every morning after the stock is removed. John, sweep this floor. I questioned the porter. John, did you sweep this morning? Yes sir, I did. I bent down, ran my fingers over the floor. Then I straightened up. You can go, John. Mr. Wickersham, there will be a diamond missing tomorrow morning. And I know how the thing has worked. Now all we have to do is catch our crook. Well, there was a diamond missing the next morning. But I didn't do a thing about it. Instead I resumed my all day watching session. Except that I knew whom I was watching. The horse player who was ahead for the season. But that further reports had shown to have dropped all his winnings and many thousands more at roulette. He waited a full week before trying again. One day at noontime as the clerk stepped outside the door on his way to lunch, I stepped up to him. You're under arrest. I had handcuffs on him so fast he didn't know what had happened. Back inside I searched him and found a diamond in his pocket. This is how he fools your high priced gimmick. He doesn't steal at night. He does it at lunchtime, gets rid of it to offense. But there is no diamond missing from any of the trays, Mr. Browning. I grinned, took an envelope from my pocket, dumped a little dust on the desk. It's a new twist on the old switch technique, Mr. Wickerson. He prepares a spun Glass imitation diamond. Substitutes it for the one he plans to steal. The imitation looks good under the glaring lights of your showcase. Unless you watch as I did for imitations. Then that evening, inside the vault, he takes the imitation jewel out. Just as he slips the tray onto the shelf, he drops the imitation, grinds it under his heel. And what have you got? Just a little dust on the floor. Well, we got a confession, of course. Though he didn't need it since the dust analyzed as glass particles. And we caught him with a real stone in his pocket. Like I said, sometimes the very toughest cases are the easiest. If you know enough to look at the evidence right under your own feet. In a moment, we'll have the mystery quiz question. The sponsor's second commercial is heard at this point. Calling All Detectives for the first time cleverly combines two sure fire forms of radio entertainment. The mystery story and the telephone quiz. Finally, we offer an open end program with a plus value. Usually you drop in the commercials. And that's where sponsor identification ends. In calling all detectives, there's an opportunity for added local identification through ad lib dialogue during the telephone quiz portion of the show. Well, time now for the Seely Mystery Quiz. And that means cash prizes coming up if the right answers pay off. That's enough. Our first call tonight we'll go to the west side section and call the kedsey exchange, k e3 14 and a couple more. Now, if the listener we phone can answer the question about tonight's story, he or she will earn a sealy toughless inner spring mattress. Plus an opportunity to answer the Sealy Mystery quiz question. Now worth $1,220. They're still ringing. No answer yet. Maybe they're out shouting for a Seely. Hello, this is Larry Leroy of the Feely Calling All Detectives radio program on WGN. May I have your name and address, please? Mrs. Joseph Turner, 3240 West Roosevelt Road. You say you've heard us, Mrs. Tanner. Good. Your phone number is KEDSY3 1429. Thank you. Now, if you can answer my question about tonight's story, you'll earn a world famous sealy toughest in his spring mattress. Plus an opportunity to answer the Sealy Mystery Quiz question. Now worth $1220 in cash. Are you ready? I'll try, she says. All right, Mrs. Center, in tonight's story, what was the name of the company that made Mr. Wickersham's vault? Try to give me the answer by the time I spell sleep. S, E, A, L, Y. What Crack proof safe Company. Right you are. And you win that Sealy mattress and. Hold on now. You also get a crack at Sealy's giant jackpot. $1,220 in cash. Wanna hang up now? She says no, no, no. Okay, madam, sit down, relax and think hard for hard cash. Now, what was the first name of Mr. Hyde in the famous novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? 10 seconds to answer, ma'am, and I'll try me by spelling Seeley twice. S E, A, L, Y. S, E, a. You say Mr. Hyde's first name was. Well, don't hide that answer because it's as white as Seeley. And you win twelve hundred and twenty dollars cash. What's this? It's a half year's pay. Wonderful. Now, let's check your name and address again so our Seeley secretary can shoot that check to you fast. Mrs. Joseph Turner. 3240 West Roosevelt Road. Right? Right. And you are so right, you're richer tonight by $1220. Sealy dollars. Mrs. Turner, you won that Sealy mattress too. So now you can go to bed nights absolutely sure that sleeping on a Seelie is like sleeping on a cloud. Congratulations, ma'am. Pleasant dreams and happy bank account. Oh, is she excited. Well, friends, since Mrs. Turner won our Seeley Mystery Quiz, we've got another question. Tomorrow night, if the person we telephone answers the question taken from tomorrow's calling all detective story, he or she will win a famous Sealy supplis in a spring mattress and a chance to shoot for the new cash prize, which will start tomorrow at $20. And build $20 more every program so somebody answers both questions and wins the Sealy mattress and the cash. Now get this advanced tip. The new Sealy Mystery Quiz question starting with tomorrow's program will be. What was the name of the theater near which gangster John Dillinger was shot? Remember, the answers were $20 cash tomorrow night. And we add $20 more every night till someone collects. So to cash in, be sure to tune in. Calling all detectives as Jerry Joss. Feature transcribed with Paul Barnes in the role of Jerry Browning.