D (31:20)
Welcome back. Okay, I really do enjoy this episode. It's does make my top 25 list of the best dragnet stories of all time. And there are a few things I really admire about it. I think the main thing is just Friday's dedication to staying in this role despite getting some serious punches. I mean quite literally. And he is able to move believably about that world, which I think that some people who like, know the character on a very shallow basis would be like, yeah, he would scream cop. But the fact is when you get into high level narcotics trades, there are lots of people who are very careful, who are very cautious and follow very strong guidelines for what they do so that they don't get caught. And so the one thing I was thinking, I was listening to this, particularly when he called Red out on the fact that he was using users as carriers. By the way, he's right that that is dumb. I mean, it's going to happen if you are a retail pusher, but when you are dealing with moving large quantities out to drug dealers, you don't want someone hooked on the product. So it's not like Joe Friday's inventing a character here. It's just Joe Friday. But if he was a drug dealer and he is very much all business and doing due diligence, and because of that, he is able to carry this into some quite frankly dangerous territory. I think this was also a great story for the time period. I don't know when this script had been planned for, but it does work really well for this post Romero era. It gives some space to write a story where the relationship between Joe and his partner is not nearly so reliant on a relationship with the partner. All right, well, listener comments and feedback and we have a few comments from Spotify and we start out on with some thoughts on the big overtime Harrison wrote. I don't know if I'm ready for Barton Yarborough's last episode. I remembered when I heard the first episode without him in it. He was such a perfect fit for Dragnet and Jack Webb as a co star. And dawn says with this being the last Ben Romero episode, we should praise what he did for Dragnet. He was the most like me on my police force. I too would be talking about how stinky the stakeout room is, wondering about the cost of rent at a crime SC and having a second lunch because it smells good. Without him, the police force would be clinical. Joe Friday and authoritarian overlords. Ben was a true partner rather than a sidekick. That becomes the norm from here. And I think you're right on what is different about him as a partner who stood on an equal level to Joe Friday, both in terms of rank and in terms of storytelling. That would not be the case once you get firmly into the Frank Smith era. What I think does continue on is the humanity which I think Ben brought to the series. And it would become more important as Tom went on and as their efforts to give Friday a home life and more human touches kind of went by the board. There's a sense that Joe Friday became iconic as the embodiment of the police, as an implacable symbol of law and order who was married to the job. Probably the best comparison, and I know it's not completely apt. Is Batman. If that had been the whole series, I think that Dragnet would not have been nearly as popular or lasted as long or had as deep of an influence. Ben Romero brought the humanity to the role, and I think that became a part of the formula. And certainly it not only helped the show, it helped Friday as a character, as I think his partners tended to bring out aspects of his character that you just don't see in the investigations and their efforts to try to get him into normal human situations, such as dating or having a night at Friends for dinner. It often doesn't work out, but I think it does add some depth to the series. So I think that the other partners did continue that legacy, although in their own way. Mechanic 66 wrote that since one of the bills they recovered was a five dollar bill, the ransom money was obviously in small bills. The fastest stenographer couldn't record serial numbers faster than 7 in a minute. I figured it took around 800 bills to make up the 10k. No way one stenographer could have got them all recorded in less than 12 hours. Well, I appreciate the question. It does make an assumption though. Well, a couple. First that they were all small bills, and second, that there was only one stenographer. Now the script says that each bell was recorded by a stenographer, but it doesn't say it was the same one. And oftentimes they would have teens to do this sort of work. So I might get stack A back from Bob, Stack B back from Sharon, and Stack C back from Charles. Each worked through their own stack. Each bill was recorded by a single police stenographer, but not necessarily the same stenographer for each bill. Another thing to keep in mind is that this was from a very old case, most likely since it was also used on the 1949 episode of Dragnet. So it's possible the amount of the ransom may have been less in real life, but the five dollar bill was actually a bill and ball just because of the change in prices. So thanks for the question on that. And then Peter ask, I have a similar concern about the mark bills that ended up in circulation. How did the salespeople notify the police so quickly? Does anyone really believe that merchants are checking every single number of every single bill every time a transaction is made? That's not how it worked in real life police work. And the script doesn't really say that it was. Generally they would send this sort of information around to banks and also to large concerns. And so this would tend to be caught when banks were processing their deposits or a big store was doing their cash count. So we are told on the episode that the first mark bill showed up at a used car lot and then two hours later another at a department store. So reasonably, it may have been a situation where a bank completed its processing and reporting for the used car lot and let them know, hey, you have one of the bills that was given to the kidnapper. And then two hours later when this department store was doing its cash count and they were going through and they said, oh, we had one of these bills come through this person's department. And the police ask her, do you remember having seen this man? Then she recalls it. So it's not an instant process and but I think it is fairly realistic, if a bit simplified and maybe compressed a bit for radio storytelling time. And then we go to YouTube where reincer comments regarding the Big Canaries. I wonder if the Big Story did a version of this. That's actually a great thought. I'm not certain, but it would make sense of why the reporter was present in the story. It was something that I think some people wondered about. If there was actually a real life reporter who played a key role in that case, then that would make sense. Now whether there's actually a Big Story episode about this, I don't know. Looking at the titles, nothing stands out to me as being this story, but I've only looked at the episodes that are in circulation. The Big Story is a series where 90% of the radio episodes are not in circulation. It's possible. I'm not going to check through the 360 odd additional scripts just to find out, but possible. And of course there was the Big Story television show which may have adapted some stories that the radio series didn't cover. Now we turn to the notes actually sent along with the donations which I typically read first, but I, I, I forgot and got into the questions. But I do want to thank those who sent along notes with their donations. Ron and Nancy Wright, still listening and still loving all you do with your programs. Thanks. Then Sherry writes just a note to thank you again for your hard work producing your wonderful detective podcast. It is obvious that you love what you're doing. Your compassionate analysis of the sometimes bad boys like Sam Spade, Philip Marleau, Boston Blackie, make sure detectives come alive. It recognizes the dual nature of man and therefore brings them alive. Again, thank you and God bless you. Well, thank you so much, Sherry. I appreciate your support and your kind words. Now it's time to thank our Patreon Supporter of the Day and I want to thank Old Time Radio fan patreon supporters since September 2023, currently supporting the podcast at the Detective Sergeant level of $7.14 or more per month. Thanks so much for your support. And that will do it for today. If you're enjoying the podcast, please follow us using your favorite podcast software and be sure to rate and review the podcast wherever you download it from. We'll be back next Thursday with another episode of Dragnet, but join us back here tomorrow for yours truly, Johnny Dollar. Where Cats.
