“No… No… stay where you are. Do not break the stillness of this moment. For this is a time of mystery. A time when imagination is free, and moves forward swiftly, silently…. This is — The Haunting Hour!”
The Haunting Hour aired “Nocturne” on September 15, 1945 (this date provided by one source for an unstated regional market’s broadcast date). Only 52 episodes were produced, of which it is estimated 41 have survived. This is the 10th The Haunting Hour episode we have showcased since the first in 2012 and the fourth since 2021, so we felt with the Halloween season close upon us it was high time for another.
Frustrated by not being able to pin down a definite date for this episode, I turned to Old Time Radio historian and friend of this weekly OTR feature Karl Schadow for help. Karl explains:
“As to dates and program numbers, The Haunting Hour was a transcribed, syndicated program which was available to stations and sponsors for some 15 years. There are no official broadcast dates for these episodes. I realize that some logs and vendors have to put dates on their products, but this may cause confusion down the road if an episode ends up with two different dates. My suggestion is that you state it was first broadcast in 1945 and could still be heard on various markets into the early 1960s.” … “Moreover, there were no official seasons of The Haunting Hour. Not all of the 52 episodes have extant audio.”
Once again, I would like to thank Karl for his help with his extensive historian’s background in such matters, as much OTR misinformation still floods both print and internet sources, some of which makes the phrase caveat emptor more relevant than ever for the unwary, novice buyer.
“Nocturne” is the strange story of two identical twins, Matt and Stuart, Matt born a scant ten minutes after his slightly older brother Stuart. Now grown, they are both in love with Mavis, though Mavis has expressed her love only for Stuart. As you might imagine, this doesn’t sit well with Matt. Matt has come to blame Stuart for his own failures in life. Though they look identical in every respect, their personalities couldn’t be more different. Matt is neurotic, sullen, and begrudges Stuart’s successes in life and in love, including his relationship with Mavis. At home, Matt confronts Stuart in what becomes a violent brawl, the result being that the house burns to the ground and only one brother escapes alive, but with a case of temporary, partial amnesia. Since both brothers have confessed their undying love for Mavis, she must decide if this surviving brother is her beloved Stuart or the unstable Matt. She is beside herself trying not to decide incorrectly and ending up with Stuart’s deranged brother, who may be performing the acting role of his life. Before the answer is revealed, see if you can figure out who you think it is.
Play Time: 25:00
{This episode of The Haunting Hour aired on the third Saturday of September 1945. Wanting to capture similar thrills from their favorite pulps, the neighborhood gang shed their Sunday finest after church the next morning, grabbed a quick bite of lunch (promising to be home well before dinner), and headed for the nearby newsstand-cum-bookstore. Popular Detective (1934-1953) owed much of its popularity and longevity to the fact that it was a meat and potatoes detective magazine that ran material of consistently high quality by (according to my favorite source) “most of the top detective authors of the period.” It was a bimonthly in 1945. Private Detective Stories (1937-1950) came to be known as the toned-down brother magazine of Spicy Detective, which ran borderline if not outright lurid covers to tease its stories, which also featured in many cases tales of questionable taste and characters whose psychopathology catered to a certain minority. Even toned-down, Private Detective Stories drew enough of a returning audience to keep the pulp alive for a respectable 13 years. It was a monthly in 1945. Thrilling Wonder Stories (1936-1955) was one of a triumvirate of SF pulps (the other two being Planet Stories and Startling Stories) that featured colorful adventure tales on other worlds, where scientific accuracy was chained in the basement and wild, unfettered imagination reigned supreme. Lots of evil villainry of all kinds, beautiful, scantily clad females waiting to be rescued, and a galactic bestiary of Bug-Eyed Monsters (BEMs) were the order of the day. Such adventures gave these magazines almost cult-like status as years passed, until today they are sold at premium prices in SF convention dealer rooms (if you can find them), for they held beloved stories by some of SF’s most popular authors, with a nostalgia factor no money can buy. TWS was a quarterly in 1945.|
[Left: Popular Detective, 10/45 – Center: Private Detective, 9/45) – Right: Thrilling Wonder Stories, Fall/45]
To view the entire list of weekly Old Time Radio episodes at Tangent Online, click here.