Showing results by narrator "John Rayburn" in All Categories

This book has all the ingredients of cowboys, horses, boots, and spurs, in a period of lawlessness that often brought on gunfights in those days. The cowboy hero is Panhandle Smith, known as Pan, as he grew to be wild and free virtually from childhood. The tale prompts seeing, hearing, and feeling what it was like in those bygone days.

Some of the stories by Arthur B. Reeve seem more plausible today than to some skeptical readers back in the early twentieth century. The primary character, University Professor Craig Kennedy, used forensic methods before such criminalistics were commonplace. These include DNA analysis as well as studies of such topics as fingerprints, blood stain patterns, tool marks, and toxicology (poisons used alone or administered in non-lethal potions).

Seeing justice done in your own way of thinking is not the wisest path to follow. However, it was indeed how one individual managed his life. He did it in such a way that criminals at all levels feared him, as did Scotland Yard as they tried to put a halt to his actions. The Yard itself hadn’t the slightest idea of what he looked like because this man, who came to be known as The Ringer, had a baffling way of disguising himself.

The contents of this book stem from a series of short stories originally in Cosmopolitan magazine in the early twentieth century.

Written nearly a century and a half ago, this book was the first major animal story in children’s literature, although the author had intended it for adults. Anna Sewell had been crippled at a young age, but could still drive a horse-drawn carriage. She often drove her father to the station to go to work and later picked him up to bring him home. During those times, she saw there was often inhumane treatment of horses and was inspired to write about it in order to, as she said, “To induce kindness, sympathy, and an understanding treatment of horses.”

Throughout the stories here is information on how places, cities, and states got their names. However, questions arise because Native American tribes of the day didn’t yet have a written alphabet, and none of those came along until Sequoyah invented one in 1821, one that was actually more of a syllabary with symbols that stood for consonant/vowel sequences and could make words, basically just a writing system.

This book is an example of Alternative History. That, in essence, is asking what the future could be like. It suggests the US could have become a Dominion of America. Call this standard history with a twist, or even mythology in part. It is certainly historical material, told in fictional fashion.

This is a kind of history, or at least remembrances. It’s primarily personal but overall takes a look at the way things were many, many decades ago. Details may get a little out of whack from a chronological order now and then, but the gist of the way things in some desperate personal and national times will be fairly well put in place. It begins a trifle before the outset of the 1929 stock market crash that led to the Great Depression. Then, it points to the difficulties, financial and otherwise, that confronted individuals and the beleaguered nation overall.

Here is a story of a young man of eighteen who wandered for years after an accidental shooting of his brother. He felt as though he was a counterpart of the Biblical killing by Cain of his brother Abel. It was written by Zane Grey, one of the greatest Western novelists. It takes us through a lonely land of prospectors and hermits as it tells of surviving searing Death Valley heat, an area that many consider the deadliest land in the world. Listen now and hear a highly surprising finish.

A young veteran of WWI in poor health heads to Arizona to try and recover. He meets young Flo Hunter, who successfully nurses him. However, life gets more complicated when his fiancée, Carley Burch, comes to him from back east. She winds up not liking life in the west and goes back to New York. Flo gets badly injured in an accident and vet Glenn Kilbourne wants to repay her for her assistance and proposes marriage. As wedding day approaches, Carley decides she made a mistake and returns to Arizona looking for him. Flo realizes they’re still in love and calls off the marriage.

Here is a meeting with George and Marion Kerby, a couple of free-wheeling ghosts, who meet up with respectable banker Cosmo Topper. This was noted by the New York Times, claiming: “Thorne Smith created the modern American ghost story, ghosts with style and wit; ghosts that haunt us still.” Others pointed out, “Smith was a master of urbane wit and sophisticated repartee.” The overall mood has a touch of silliness, but it provides lighthearted reading and listening, a matter of nonsensical escapism. For Topper it meant relief from a nagging wife with ongoing indigestion.

The story you’re about to hear is the second Charlie Chan novel, and it features a parrot named Tony who is witness to a crime. The unusual bird spoke Chinese and had a less-than-perfect use of English grammar but was killed by the criminals as a precaution. Chan himself was a friend of a family selling jewels and agreed to deliver them on his first trip to mainland California. While there he masquerades as a pidgin-speaking cook during his undercover investigation. His profound and original intelligence offers genial humor and witty dialogue.

It wouldn’t be out of line to call this book a great world of pretend. It is actually eight short stories that are clever and magical, as well as frightening at times. The storyteller, Edith Nesbit, was born in 1858 in what is now Greater London. She had the imaginative foresight to concoct tales that often found her called the creator of modern children’s fantasy. Her imagination attracted children of her time and involved them in what seemed to be a real world filled with unexpected adventures. Her powers of invention brought us the magical stories we’re about to hear.

Dick Martin is leaving Scotland Yard. His final job, investigating a stolen book, takes him from a conversation with librarian Sybil Lansdown to a meeting with a Doctor Stalletti, who will become a key figure. Along the way, Martin becomes involved with a small-time crook—an expert at picking locks—who tells him about a recent lock-picking job that has made him quite nervous. But before he can pass along details, the lock-picker is murdered.

The story began when the lord of Erl was told by his people they wanted a magic lord to rule them. That took some doing, but he sent his son, Alveric, to retrieve Lirazel, daughter of the king of Elfland, to be his wife and thus fix the situation. At first, the king was angered and sent guards to kill Alveric, but the young man of Erl fought them off, and Lizarel fell for him and decided to leave with him. Later, under a spell, she decided she wanted to see her old home again.

A 17th-century writer named Charles Perrault was sometimes called Mother Goose, an imaginary author of fairy tales. His early material was inspired and derived from earlier folk tales that he greatly embellished and improved. This collection includes "Cinderella", along with other such known favorites as “Sleeping Beauty", “Little Red Riding Hood”, “Blue Beard”, and “Puss in Boots”, along with such lesser known fairy tales as “The Ridiculous Wishes”, “Little Thumb”, “Ricky of the Tuft", “Griselda,” and “Donkey Skin”.

When writer Frank Theydon emerges from a London theater, he notices an attractive young woman and an older man waiting for their car. He arrives home after a short delay and notices the older man, whom he’d overheard tell his companion he was stopping at his club, outside the building.

Of all the forms of theater, radio drama commanded the most effective stage. No medium - not theater, not film, not television - had more sheer space in which to achieve the basic goal of drama, telling a story. Theater is bounded by the bare boards and the footlights and the flats, film by the white screen, and television by the comparatively tiny tube. But radio...radio played itself out in boundless space...the listener’s mind...your mind.

Broadcasting veteran John Rayburn presents a historic reenactment of the classic 1946 World Series championship games between the St. Louis Cardinals and Boston Red Sox. In Game 7 Enos Slaughter of the Cardinals scored the winning run from first when Boston shortstop Johnny Pesky seemed to hesitate on the relay throw. Southpaw pitcher Harry Brecheen won three games for St. Louis, including the deciding game in relief.

Broadcasting veteran John Rayburn presents a historic reenactment of the classic 1956 World Series championship games between the New York Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers. Don Larsen’s perfect game, the only in World Series history, was in Game 5, Monday, October 8, 1956. This was the final Series for the Dodgers while still in Brooklyn. Their next Series appearance came after moving to Los Angeles. The Dodgers scored only one run in the final 28 innings of the Series. Mickey Mantle and Yogi Berra each hit three home runs for the Yankees.