Escape (1947-1954) aired “The Golden Snake” on Friday, April 14, 1950 as the show’s 106th episode. Not surprisingly, we have aired many episodes (almost 40) of this top-shelf program over the past 16 years, the most recent coming just over a year ago in April of 2024. A spinoff and sister show of the highly popular radio program Suspense (1942-62), Escape produced (according to one source) 251 episodes of which 241 were unique stories, plots, or scripts. Escape concentrated on adventure tales, some with an SF/F theme, though the straight adventure tale set in exotic locales was its meat and potatoes. Escape soon established itself with an even more focused approach to action and exotic adventure, dramatizing literary classics (from such as Rudyard Kipling, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edgar Allan Poe, Ambrose Bierce, Nelson Bond, Ray Bradbury, Eric Ambler, Jack London, Joseph Conrad, and others) while at the same time treating its audience to many brand new tales, a fair number of which have become radio classics. In fact, some of Escape‘s original shows were so well written, acted, and produced they were later reincarnated for episodes of Suspense.

While strangely not consistently supported by its host network CBS, that rarely gave advance notice of upcoming program titles and moved the show to different times and days willy-nilly no fewer than 18 times over its 7-year run, the show found a faithful audience, and continued to produce well-written scripts with many of the finest actors in radio.

“The Golden Snake” belongs to those adventure stories set in the jungles of Central or South America, of which old time radio was rather fond, where a troupe of explorers or adventurers seek their fortunes (often illegally) locating lost temples, cities, or other hidden ruins believed to protect untold wealth in the form of gold, sacred artifacts thousands of years old, or other valuable treasure worth the dangers they will certainly encounter on their quest. The Mayan jungle provides the lush setting for this fine tale as the (future) 5,000-year-old golden snake of the title is the high treasure sought by our intrepid fortune hunters. Well written, with a fine score, well-timed dramatic sequences adding to the creeping supernatural atmosphere, and the usual legends and warnings to make the listener feel part of the adventure, “The Golden Snake” is worth this short audio visit to another place and time.

(The linked CD at top includes “The Golden Snake” as well as 11 other episodes in a 6-CD set.)

Play Time: 29:53

{“The Golden Snake” aired on the Friday evening following the 1950 Easter weekend. From Christ’s resurrection from his tomb almost a week before, now to a visit to an ancient Mayan temple in Yucatan, the neighborhood gang was primed and ready for a Saturday morning trek to the corner newsstand for even more exotic adventures, and they were in luck with their magazine selections. Fantastic Novels (1940-51) came about due to the enormous requests from fans for even more classic fantastic and scientific reprints like the ones editor Mary Gnaedinger had been resurrecting in Famous Fantastic Mysteries (1939-53) with much acclaim. Many of the stories were mined before there were science fiction or fantasy pulp magazines of their own and Gnaedinger wisely brought them before a whole new generation of eager fans. Fantastic Novels was a bi-monthly in 1950. Super Science Stories (1940-43 & 1949-51), while not the most stable of pulp magazines, nevertheless managed to attract many of the top names in the SF field. Popular talent the likes of George O. Smith, Murray Leinster, L. Ron Hubbard, Henry Kuttner, Poul Anderson and among others even Ray Bradbury saw their colorful action tales in the pages of this lively pulp.  It also was a bi-monthly in 1950. Thrilling Wonder Stories (1936-55) was one of a trio of popular space opera/planetary adventure SF pulps, the other pair being Planet Stories (1939-55) and Startling Stories (1939-55). Each featured rollicking romps with clear cut Good Guys and Bad Guys (or aliens), and though they played loosey-goosey with scientific accuracy the readers never cared, for the wildly imaginative, colorful escapism of the stories more than made up for it. Many of the stories are now beloved classics, most to be found now only in paperback collections (of which there have been many over the passing decades and which can still be located with a little luck). TWS was also a bi-monthly in 1950.}

[Left: Fantastic Novels, 3/50 – Center: Super Science Stories, 5/50 – Right: Thrilling Wonder Stories, 4/50]

To view the entire list of weekly Old Time Radio episodes at Tangent Online, click here.