For nine years (1943-1952) listeners were invited to ride a passenger train in the company of a mysterious stranger (Maurice Tarplin), who always had a dark and uncanny tale for a willing ear. Mysterious Traveler was popular enough to engender two 'spin-off' series-- The Sealed Book and The Strange Dr. Weird. Both spin-offs produced no originals, only remakes of MT stories. Sealed Book tended to deal with murder as its primary subject, while Dr. Weird (also hosted by Tarplin) leaned more toward the macabre. The Mysterious Traveler boasted about 400 episodes of which, sadly, only about 71 have survived. That being the case, I have decided only to list the shows known to still exist.
Currently this archive contains plots for 30 of 70 episodes
WEBMASTER RECOMMENDS:
The Most Famous Man in the World; SOS; Zero Hour
SEE THE CD COVER ART FOR THIS SERIES HERE
Behind the Locked Door
Genre: Horror
Available for Listening Booth: Y
An archaeological expedition into an Arizona cave to find the remains of a lost pioneer group uncovers a bizarre and deadly legacy left behind.
Reviews:
This episode plays upon the xenophobic tendencies all
people possess. My only complaint is that the descriptive language regarding the
star character leaves too much to the imagination. - Jennifer Morrison
Beware of Tomorrow
Genre: Robots
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A scientist responds to a job offer from a professor who claims to have invented an intelligent robot, but there are many different types of intelligence......
See also 'Almost Human' (Dimension X & X Minus One), 'The Automaton' (Hall of Fantasy) and 'The Doom Machine' (Suspense & 2000 Plus)
The Big Brain
Genre: Super Science
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A programmer uses a supercomputer to predict the winners of horse races, to the unwelcome notice of the track's underworld owners, who are curious about the secret behind his phenomenal stretch of 'luck'.
A version of this story was produced for an Australian series, Adventure into Fear.
The Black Door **LOST**
Genre: Horror
Available for Listening Booth: N
A legendary lost Mayan city of gold becomes a death trap for two men who discover its location - and a horror beyond description lurking in its depths.
A version of this story later appeared on Suspense.
Death at 50 Fathoms
Genre: Ghosts
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A remake of 'Death Comes for Adolph Hitler'.
Death Comes for Adolph Hitler
Genre: Ghosts
Available for Listening Booth: Y
As the Third Reich crumbles into ruins, a U-boat spiriting an escaped Hitler off to a safe haven in South America is haunted by the ghosts of Nazi war victims.
This episode was later remade as 'Death at 50 Fathoms'.
The Devil in the Deep Blue Sea
Genre: Supernatural
Available for Listening Booth: Y
Fortune hunters searching for a sunken pirate treasure ship find more than they bargained for when the treasure's original owner seems unwilling to part with it.
Fire in the Sky
Genre: undefined
Available for Listening Booth: Y
An apocalyptic tale of a couple who meet their ultimate destiny on a lonely road while a comet approaches Earth.
Five Miles Down *LOST*
Genre: Creatures
Available for Listening Booth: N
Geologists using a new super drill to reach the magma for geothermal energy hit an underground cave. Descending to explore, they encounter intelligent winged creatures like giant bats which kill off most of the expedition. The survivors must get back to the surface to blast the hole closed as below them the winged creatures are rising to overtake them and wreak havoc on the surface world.
Green Death
Genre: Super Science
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A chemist, obsessed with getting rich, sprays an acre of cropland with an experimental formula for accelerating plant growth, with catastrophic results.
Reviews:
Good old-fashioned corny B-movie, end-of-the-world fun. - Seth Gaines
The Haunted Trailer
Genre: Ghosts/ Humour
Available for Listening Booth: Y
In this comical tale, a man traveling
cross-country discovers that a ghost of a former street thug is haunting the
trailer he is pulling.
If You Believe
Genre: undefined
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A reporter who believes the printed word can shape truth engenders a public belief in the existence of a monster being created in a laboratory. Well , if faith can move mountains....
Reviews:
This episode isn't played in a camp manner, packs loads of suspense, and it's
extremely well done.-- David Hassell
The Lady in Red
Genre: Supernatural
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A reporter investigates a series of killings in which the linking factor is that the same woman was present each time.
The Last Survivor
Genre: Space Exploration
Available for Listening Booth: Y
An account of the first mission to the Moon, and a terrifying revelation upon its return to Earth.
This story was also done as 'Rocket From Manhattan' on Lights Out.
Locomotive Ghost
Genre: Ghosts
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A man on the run is haunted by a train seen only by those about to die.
The Man in the Black Derby
Genre: Supernatural
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A woman becomes convinced that the man she keeps seeing is Death, and that her
own must therefore be imminent.
The Man the Insects Hated
Genre: Creatures
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A scientist who develops an infallible bug spray finds his house plagued by vengeful insects.
The Man who Knew Everything
Genre: Super Science
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A small-time but ambitious gangster gets hold of a formula that allows him to read minds, and he embarks on a series of blackmailings and threats to obtain world domination.
The Man who Tried to Save Lincoln
Genre: Time Travel
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A scientist invents a machine to allow someone to mentally travel back in time and inhabit the body of past individuals. He then encounters a historian who is convinced the world would be a better place if only Abraham Lincoln had not been assassinated.
The Man who Vanished
Genre: Super Science
Available for Listening Booth: Y
The inventor of a formula for invisibility
thinks he has discovered a means of committing a series of perfect crimes, but
nature has its own sense of justice.
The Most Famous Man in the World
Genre: Time Travel
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A couple take in a pair of enigmatic boarders who reveal themselves to be time travelers returning to the 20th century to prevent the rise of the man who would make himself the first Dictator of America.
Murder in 2952
Genre: SF
Available for Listening Booth: Y
Depressed over the being the loser in a love triangle, a man flees Earth for the jungles of Ganymede, only to find himself pursued for murder by his rival, a crooked detective with the World Police.
No Grave can Hold Me
Genre: Ghosts
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A magician is sentenced to be executed for murder. Before he dies, he
instructs his son-in-law on how he is to be buried so that he can come back and
kill the jury, the judge, and the district attorney.
Reviews:
An overall excellent story, marred only by several fluffed lines throughout
the episode. Harry Leshko
Operation Tomorrow
Genre: Time Travel/ War
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A time traveler discovers a future writhing in perpetual war; knowing the future, can he return to the present and prevent it?
The Planet Zevius
Genre: Space Exploration
Available for Listening Booth: Y
An expedition to an alien planet discovers a lost civilization, and the terrible secret of its demise.
Versions of this story appeared as 'Report from a Dead Planet' on Suspense, and as 'In Absence of all Intelligent Life' on Theater Five.
Queen of the Cats
Genre: Occult
Available for Listening Booth: Y
Obsessed by a hauntingly beautiful woman, a man sacrifices all to marry her, unaware that her uncontrollable jealousy and passion for cats can be a deadly combination.
S.O.S.
Genre: undefined
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A trio of criminals attempt to steal a shipment of uncut diamonds on a liner, but run into a bit of trouble.
Reviews:
Awesome ending - you won't see it coming. I won't give it away, except to say
that this show exemplifies the possibilities the audio medium has to offer.
- Webmaster
Strange New World
Genre: Creatures
Available for Listening Booth: Y
Two men stranded on a remote Pacific island near old nuclear test sites are horrified to find the the local fauna have undergone a frightening metamorphosis.
See also 'The Insect' (2000 Plus ), and 'The Crawling Thing' (Hall of Fantasy).
Stranger in the House
Genre: Ghosts
Available for Listening Booth: N
A young couple move into a charming old house, but the husband falls under the spell of a malevolent spirit.
The Woman in Black
Genre: Horror
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A newspaper reporter keeps sighting the same woman at the scene of several murders and suspects her of having an intimate connection to all of them - and countless more.
Zero Hour
Genre: Aliens
Available for Listening Booth: Y
A renowned professor travels to the West
with his biographer to investigate the supposed crash landing of a Martian
spacecraft.
NOT the same story as Bradbury's 'Zero Hour'.