After a healthy run over CBS as a five-times-a-week serial,
Renfrew of the Mounted returned to the air as a weekly half-hour adventure program over NBC-Blue. Launched on the evening of January 7, 1939, the network agreed to produce a 30-minute weekly program with the hope that a sponsor would be interested in signing on the bottom line. Producer Phil Goldstone of Criterion Pictures, responsible for the big screen adventures of Renfrew, created a momentary stir when he consulted the network about a clause in his contract that stipulated his rights to have a market tie-in with the cast of the motion pictures. To avoid conflict of interest with the movie studio, executives at NBC-Blue agreed to allow James Newill, the screen Renfrew, to play the starring role if the program moved to the West Coast. In the meantime, the new half-hour format would originate from the studios in New York City, known to all interests as “a substitute cast,” although House Jameson and Brad Barker were merely reprising their roles from the 1936–37 series.
George Ludlam was hired to write the scripts, based on 14-page plot summaries by Laurie York Erskine, who had no time to write two drafts of a weekly half-hour radio script. Ludlam, an experienced script writer with such credits as For Men Only and Spy at Large under his belt, would eventually go on to establish The Adventures of Superman for radio in early 1940. Without the continuation format of a daily serial, these half-hour stories were superior on many levels.
The adventures dramatized during the half-hour rendition of Renfrew of the Mounted consisted of both single-episode adventures and multi-episode story arcs. A number of recurring characters bridged continuity even when Renfrew was solving cases within one radio broadcast. Some of the half-hour adventures were adaptations of short stories written years prior by Erskine, others recycled material from short stories with revisions, and a number of them were originals. The episode “Redheads Won’t Stay Down,” broadcast February 18, 1939, was adapted from a story in Renfrew Rides North (1931). The episode “Signals in the Dark,” broadcast June 29, 1940, was inspired by the seafaring stories of the ships that mysteriously wrecked in the fog at San Francisco Bay — one in particular that disappeared without a trace but today is assumed to have wrecked and sunk.
Despite all the publicity, however, the radio program expired after the broadcast of October 12, 1940, with Renfrew riding the range on the silver screen courtesy of second-run theatres. The final movie in the franchise was released nationally back in July. On October 3, 1940, L.H. Titterton, manager of the Script Division at NBC, wrote to Douglas Storer with an official verdict: “Renfrew has been with us through thick and thin for several seasons now and much effort and time on everybody’s part has been expended to find a sponsor. We have not succeeded and for this we are very sorry. However, time is so precious on the air that we feel that we will just have to kiss Renfrew goodbye and make the last broadcast October 12. I want to thank you for your courtesy during the long months of the Renfrew programs and tell you that we want to be able to work out another program arrangement with you sometime in the future.”
According to production and call sheets in the NBC files, every half-hour episode was recorded. Sadly, like the fifteen-minute radio serial before it, recordings of the radio broadcasts were subject to the ravages of time. Fewer than half a dozen recordings from the 1939–1940 series are known to exist in collector hands, and the transcription discs for the remainder of the broadcasts are presumed “lost.”
The following are plot summaries gleaned from review of the radio scripts, filling in the gap that “lost” recordings would not be able to provide.
EPISODE #6, “CHIEF CALF ROBE’S HIDDEN TREASURE”
Broadcast February 11, 1939
CAST: Jackson Beck, Bill Boren, Walter Bryan, Harold de Becker, Peter Donald, Bob Dryden, Carl Eastman, Juano Hernandez, and James Monks.
PLOT: Inspector Renfrew and Constable Sheehan are on an exploring expedition to a strange country of high peaks and foaming torrents, where rivers flow north and east to join the greater rivers that empty into the Arctic Sea. There they stumble upon Klondike Peebles, beaten and kicked like a dog, who claims three years of prime silver fur was stolen by Chief Calf Robe and the Kachikas. When the Mounties arrive at the village, the medicine man quickly bewitches the Mounties’ guns, so they will never fire again — and if they do, they will never shoot straight. As the rifle champion of the force, Renfrew challenges the Indians to a duel in an effort to dispel the witchcraft, braving the best sharp-shooter in the village — and gets shot in the chest by the young competitor. Renfrew appears to use his own magic by removing the bullet which had torn at his tissue and throwing it with all his might in the face of the startled Indian. With pain in his chest, Renfrew shoots the bullseye in the white caribou hide, marked into circles. Having won the respect of Calf Robe, the concealed pelts are retrieved and returned. Later, as the men ride out of the Indian village, Renfrew confesses to his friends that no such magic exists — the bullet had hit the small mirror in his breast pocket, saving his life. Weak from the bullet wound, however, Renfrew confesses that such bluffs are not meant to battle Indian magic.
NOTES: The announcer closes the episode revealing next week’s episode as “The Affair of Strawberry Bill.” This episode was adapted from “Meebles’ Magic,” originally published in the November 1932 issue of American Boy magazine, and later reprinted in Renfrew’s Long Trail (1933).
EPISODE #8, “THE LOST RIVER MINE”
Broadcast February 25, 1939
CAST: Fred Barron, Phyllis Creore, Milton C. Herman, William Johnstone, James Krieger, Joe Latham, and Ralph Locke.
PLOT: Far in the High North, where the Dead Bear River winds through the mountains of British Columbia, in the narrow canyon of the hills known as Dead Ghost Pass, three men had been mining for gold — and two of the men planned to kill the third. Red Greve and Harmon Blackwood, a.k.a. “Blackie,” masterfully executed premature dynamite, creating a landslide that also blocked the river and turned the canyon into a lake where the victim’s body would never be found. Joining Inspector Renfrew up north to investigate is Jeff Collins, a boy of 18, son of Steve Collins, the prospector and miner who had disappeared. Finding Steve’s duffle, the men examine a map that is accurate except for the man-made lake and Pulpit Rock, which is nowhere to be found. Finding the hat of Red Greve, floating in the water, Renfrew suspects the miners are upstream, keeping close tabs on the investigators. The crime, which had happened a year prior, is unearthed when the prospectors blow up a section of the lake so the water would drain, giving them access to return to the rich vein in the cave. Their guilty conscience gives themselves away, in the presence of the Mountie, when they swear they’d seen Steve Collins walking toward them. Imagine their surprise when they learn that the tunnels lead completely through the mountain, and out into a valley beyond — old volcanic craters full of berries and small game. Steve Collins had lived in the valley for almost a year until the recent explosion, then he came down to investigate, only to discover his only exit from the valley to be the tunnel that reopened into Dead Ghost Pass.
EPISODE #9, “BRASS KNUCKLES”
Broadcast March 4, 1939
CAST: Somer Alberg, Tony Berger, Joe Curtin, Roger DeKoven, Joe Granby, Jackie Kelk, Bennett Kilpatrick, and Wilmer Walter.
PLOT: Inspector Renfrew is sent to Saffron Bay, a small lumber shipping and fishing port on the coast of British Columbia, nicknamed “Brass Knuckles Town” by the captain of a schooner. Constable Allison insists Renfrew return to his post, following a deadly ambush in the streets, resulting in murder. When Renfrew makes note that the victim of the murder had been a gun-toter from the United States, this gives the crime International significance and puts the case within the jurisdiction of the Mounted Police. Allison reluctantly agrees to assist, only to discover that his son Jim, working for the Connolly Gang, is being used as bait in a failed trap for Renfrew. Late one evening the Mountie educates the lad with the law of the jungle, using him to help smash the illegal operations of Connolly, the foreman of the mill and claimant of Saffron Bay.
NOTES: This episode was adapted from “Brass Knuckles,” originally published in the August 1931 issue of American Boy magazine, later reprinted in Renfrew Rides North (1931).
EPISODE #13, “THE SHIP WITHOUT A MASTER”
Broadcast April 1, 1939
CAST: Somer Alberg, Horace Braham, Joe Granby, George Herman, Juano Hernandez, William Johnstone, and Chester Stratton.
PLOT: Buck Garrity, sailing for the United States with a cargo of furs he’d collected over the course of three winters of hunting, worth thousands of dollars, is the victim of piracy from the Folger mob, operated by a man known as Boss Folger. Under orders, Finn Gerson and Redeye Folger make sure the Jackdaw schooner is moored at the wharf, with Frank and Buck Garrity helpless against piracy of the seas. Inspector Renfrew happens to be cruising in the same waters, along with Irving Brewster, on a trip north toward Skagway. With the wounded body of Buck Garrity on board, the men tow the Jackdaw back to Prince Rupert to get the man to the hospital. Knowing the thieves would have to trade with the Indians — and with that much stolen loot, they would leave a trail even a blind man could follow — Renfrew questions an Indian Chief to learn that the bandits are traveling across the mountains along a trail haunted by spirits. After a day’s ride our heroes catch up with Frank Garrity, who explains that he had escaped the schooner with the best of the pelts and is being followed by the Folgers. Renfrew uses the pelts as bait to lure the outlaws into a trap, with Finn Gerson (who went straight years ago and tried to disassociate from the Folger gang) playing the role of an evil spirit to spook the outlaws into giving up.
NOTES: Muriel Pollock supplied the piano music for a sequence in this broadcast. This story was adapted from “The Cruise of the Jackdaw,” published in the October 1934 issue of American Boy magazine.
NOTE: Plots are reprinted with permission from Renfrew of the Mounted: A History of Laurie York Erskine's Canadian Mounted Franchise by Martin Grams, Jr.
