The Mysterious Traveler (1943-52) aired “They Who Sleep” on January 6, 1945. It tells the frightful tale of a plain-looking woman’s jealousy of her beautiful sister who she believes stole her husband from her. Her plot to get even and win her sister’s husband involves convincing a retired hypnotist/magician to provide her with a potion to switch souls with her sister for ten days, but her own Machiavellian schemes are too clever by half and the horrific consequences… Well, you’ll have to give this one a listen to find out just what fate awaits her, as Robert Arthur and David Kogan lay it out in “They Who Sleep.”

1945 would see the end of World War II, and it proved to be an interesting year in other ways, in and out of the science fiction world. Conrad Hilton opened the first of his self-named hotels in Chicago, the Coca-Cola company registered “Coke” as a trademark, George Orwell published Animal Farm, President Franklin D. Roosevelt died on April 12, the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6th, Donald A. Wollheim edited the Portable Novels of Science, A. E. van Vogt’s The World of Null A was serialized in Astounding, and C. S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength saw print.

Jack Vance and Rog Phillips saw their first SF stories published in 1945. Born the same year were Michael Bishop, Dean R. Koontz, George Zebrowski, M. John Harrison, Rob Chilson, Karl Edward Wagner, Jack Dann, Ed Bryant, Charles Platt, Gordon Eklund, and Vincent Di Fate.

Play Time: 27:09