Speaker 1: Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho.
This is your host, Adam Graham. In a moment, we're
going to bring you this week's episode of The Big Story.
But I want to encourage you to check out our
other podcasts, and today I'm highlighting the great Adventurers of
Old time Radio. We're some of old time radio's most
daring adventure heroes. Currently we are featuring Tours and and
Counterspot and you can check that out at Great Adventures
Dot impo or wherever you get your podcast from. But now,
from June eighth, nineteen forty nine, here is the bitterest
man on Earth.
Speaker 2: Hell now present The Big Story.
Speaker 3: Good he did?
Speaker 4: Sweet baby?
Speaker 3: Oh man? Yeah, hey baby, you ain't got your mind
on it. Come on, we dance know what.
Speaker 4: Oh listen to?
Speaker 3: Don't that send you?
Speaker 4: No, that just get you.
Speaker 5: That's him right there, sitting there.
Speaker 4: See he's getting up.
Speaker 6: Now stop that man, stop him.
Speaker 5: Get killed my best friend. That man wanted for murder.
That's him.
Speaker 2: The Big Story here is America. It's sound and its fury,
its joy and its sorrow, as faithfully reported by the
men and women of the Great American newspapers, Richmond, Virginia.
The story of a murder and of a man convicted
for that murder, who became the bitterest man on earth,
for his contribution not only in writing a great story,
but in reaffirming a great truth, that every person on
earth is a human being and has a right to
human dignity to report a Julian C. Housman of the Richmond,
Virginia Newsleader, for his big story goes the Pellmell Award.
Now the story as it actually happened. Reporter Julian Husband's
story as he lived it, Richmond, Virginia.
Speaker 7: It began with a letter from a woman in Harlem
at twenty five eighty one, Saint Nicholas Avenue, New York
to the postmaster at Brodnack's in Mecklenburg County, Virginia.
Speaker 8: Dear mister Dawson, Sir, I got to make myself known
to you, and maybe you remember me Daniel Greene's daughter,
Mamie now name of Goodwin. Since I'm married, I hope
you'll not think me beIN forward to write, sir, mister Dawson.
But my son Jamie got himself in trouble. He's in Richmond,
in the Henricot County Jail accused of murder and sent
us to forty year hard labor. Now the man who
did that crime is name Author Tenney, and some swear
as my Jamie is at Author Tenney, which he is
not here is my son and never might have know one. Now,
mister Dawson, you know my family when I wait for
your wife twenty years ago and then moved from broad
Axe to New York and Jamie come with me. He
never killed no one, But I can't come and prove it.
Speaker 9: So would you please I.
Speaker 8: Get in touch with the sheriff, mister Rae and tell
them that Jamie ain't this Author Tenney and help him
get off. I'd be so grateful, mister Dawson, sir, and
thank you in advance your humble servants.
Speaker 9: Maymick Grain goodn.
Speaker 4: It began for you.
Speaker 7: Julian Housmann, reporter for the Richmond knows lad when Postmaster
Dawson of Broadnax happened to have some business in Richmond,
happened to have a spare half hour, and happened by
accident to walk into the newspaper office.
Speaker 10: Mister Housman, Yeah, that's right. Her name's Dawson, Postmash and
broad Knights. I got something here might be of interest.
The girl outside it says that you handle this kind
of thing.
Speaker 9: What is the crime story? I don't know.
Speaker 10: Is it any kind of story? Just the letter I
got old woman he used to know twenty odd years
ago up Mecklenburg County where Broaden Axes I used to
do washing for my wife.
Speaker 9: Well, I'm on a story right now, mister Dorston.
Speaker 10: That's all right, It won't take your time. Just why
don't I leave the letter? You think it's anything where,
go ahead and do what you like. If not, it
gets the wastebaskets, go to place as any place.
Speaker 7: Three hours later, after you've finished work, you read the letter.
It moves you strongly. The woman's plight, her dependence on Dawson,
the helplessness, and every line. Could it be as she
had written? You call Sheriff Jeff Ray a good friend
out at Henrico Cardy prison.
Speaker 11: Then there's nothing in it Jeff about his being Goodwin
and not Tenny, No nothing.
Speaker 12: I had that boy in jail one day six years ago,
right after killed his wife.
Speaker 9: He escaped that first day, but I remember him couldn't
you compare his prince?
Speaker 12: Now, I tell you a little secret, Julian, I never
did get a chance to take his prince. I was
going to do that second morning. But if he didn't
escape that night, we got him. Now, had a fair trial,
got convicted. And that's that. Ah, Julian, he ain't pulling
the wool over your eyes now, is he with that
story of being someone else?
Speaker 4: Oh, Julian, you hear me.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I hear you. Jeff No, he isn't. That's so long.
Speaker 3: Oh that's right, mister houseman. My name is Jamie Goodwin.
But what's the difference. Ain't nobody gonna believe me? Ain't
nobody care? But what proof do you have proof? What's
that proof? I say, who I am? I got papers
from the Merchant Marine. Duriy say, that's off a tenny,
forty years hard labor.
Speaker 9: That's your proof. And you're not off a tenny. You're
Jamie Goodwin.
Speaker 3: Mister he's gone away. Who cares if a backwards boy
like me live or die?
Speaker 4: Going away and leave me be.
Speaker 7: For a moment, do you think, oh, what's the difference?
And then you stop? He's a man, his name, a
human being, with the same hopes and desires and fears
as you or anyone else. Do you think suppose I
spend a little time on this find out. He starts
with Bertha Javis, the girl who identified him.
Speaker 9: I was up there New York visiting friends.
Speaker 6: We went dan Soon That's where I saw him.
Speaker 9: Tenny, You're sure it was Tenny?
Speaker 6: Sure, I'm sure.
Speaker 9: How do you know?
Speaker 13: His wife was my girlfriend?
Speaker 6: I grew up with her, my best friend. He promised
to love honor and Cherisher Steady killed her. She was
a good girl, Marie, and he's bad.
Speaker 4: How I know? Well, Marie's dead.
Speaker 6: That's how I know.
Speaker 9: You are Marie's mother.
Speaker 4: Who are you?
Speaker 9: I'm a reporter. Nny was your son in law?
Speaker 8: Right, I've got nothing to say about him except they
should electrocuted him.
Speaker 9: Not to give him forty years. You identified him at
the trial, sure, saying his.
Speaker 14: Name is Goodwin.
Speaker 13: I ain't Kenny.
Speaker 4: I Goodwin?
Speaker 9: Liar? Know what a liar that boy was? Come in?
Speaker 8: Look what's that bible? Look her here rode on the inside.
Turned my darling sweetheart, Marie. Give it it's Tuo same
day killed her. That's how bad he was.
Speaker 9: Sure there couldn't be any mistake.
Speaker 8: I swore in the courtroom, and I'll putting my hand
on this book.
Speaker 9: Now, God's my witness.
Speaker 8: That boy in jail kill my daughter.
Speaker 14: God's my witness.
Speaker 7: You wonder about him, now, Jamie Goodwin or off At Tenny,
You wonder that to go on? Other witnesses say the same.
And then after searching a week, you find the Tenny family.
A woman second bed who can't talk, and a bent
old man who listens to your mission and shakes his head.
Speaker 15: He's my son. But don't talk about him.
Speaker 11: But you weren't at the trial, Well you, mister Tenny,
you didn't see him what I wanna see.
Speaker 15: Boy disgrace his family, mister, since he'd done that six
years ago, his mama and me ain't been out of
this house living disgrace, that's all. Don't want to talk
about him.
Speaker 9: But this man may not be your son. Killed his wife,
that's all I know. Maybe he didn't do it.
Speaker 11: I don't say your son didn't kill his wife. I
say maybe this man isn't your son.
Speaker 9: What you want me to do, come down to the
jail see him.
Speaker 11: You may be able to set an innocent man free.
You wouldn't want an innocent man to pay for your
son's crime, would you.
Speaker 15: Well enough trouble in the world at out some poor
boy pend for something my son done. I'll go.
Speaker 11: You know this man Jamie, No, sir, never seen him
before in my life. Well, mister Tanney, mister Tenney, this
is Arthur Tenny's father.
Speaker 15: Well it looked like him, talk like him, even stand
like Arthur. Look enough to be him. Eltis twin. He
ain't my son, He's somebody else.
Speaker 7: Read all about it men sentencing and Rico County Jail
for murderers.
Speaker 14: Arthur Tenny says, that's not his name.
Speaker 7: Read all about it is shut down the facts as
you've got them, the assertions and other niles. And the
next morning you get a call the Commonwealth's Attorney, George Dallas,
the man who tried the case, tells you to come in,
tells you you'd better come in.
Speaker 13: That's a great story, you wrote, great public service.
Speaker 14: What's the matter, mister Ballas you think I try cases
and send men to prison for forty years for the
fun of it, I don't, But I wrote that. I
suppose you listen, houseman and I talk eight witnesses and
the sheriff of this county identified this man as Tenny.
One witness, the man's father, and of course the man
himself say he's not Tenny. Now, I ask yourself this,
Does the Tenny family stand again by lying? Does Tenny
stand again by sticking to his story that he's Goodwin?
Of course?
Speaker 9: But I saw them together, Tenny's father, and.
Speaker 14: I saw Bertha Jarvis and the murdered girl's mother and
all the rest. I suppose you were accused of being
someone you're not. Could you prove who you were? Would
it be so difficult?
Speaker 9: And what about the papers from the Merchant Marine.
Speaker 14: Look I walk into a shipping office in New York
and say my name is Goodwin. Do they ask for proof? No,
they issue papers in the name of Goodwin. Does that
make me Goodwin?
Speaker 9: No? No? I see all that. But there are no butts.
Speaker 14: No, if Sir Anne's are butts. That boy raised the
noise that he was Goodwin.
Speaker 9: In court we proved who he was.
Speaker 14: Now, if he hadn't raised that doubt that he was
someone else, he'd have been sentenced to death, not forty years,
instead of an innocent man being unjustly jailed. I tell
you a guilty man has gotten off easy.
Speaker 9: You think that I know it?
Speaker 14: Now, Why don't you go back to your paper and
write the second part of that story that Tenny is
Kenny No ifs and buts.
Speaker 9: No.
Speaker 11: I can't do that, mister Bout. I can't because after
all you've said, and all the other witnesses have said, I.
Speaker 9: Think I'm right. I think I can prove that Jamie
Goodwin is not the murderer.
Speaker 16: This is Si Harris returning you to your narrator and
the big story of Julian Houseman as he lived it
and brought it.
Speaker 7: The fact seem all against you, Julian Housman, reporter for
the Richmond Newsleader. Witnesses swear that the man who says
he's Jamie Goodwin is really off Tenny murderer. The sheriff
says so, Commonwealth's attorney Ballast insists so. And all you
have to go on is the word of the man himself,
the murderer's father, and your own stubborn belief. You go
back to Henrik Cardie jail, to the innocent man or
the murderer.
Speaker 9: And talk Jamie. I need to know more. I've got
to know more about you now, you've got to talk
to me. What for, mister horsman, don't sit there like
that so we can free you. Don't you want to
get out of prison?
Speaker 3: Don't I want to get out? Don't I want to Breathe? Look, mister,
you've been good, real good, taking time, but nobody cares.
What happens to me? That old man say I wasn't
his son? Anybody listen to him? The sheriff listen, mister Ballace,
he listened.
Speaker 11: No, Oh, what's a good I tell you, if we
can get profe, you can be free.
Speaker 3: They put me away. They treat me good in here,
and I ain't complaining. Food's good and all like it.
But they put me away and they ain't gonna bother
take me out.
Speaker 9: I tell you you're wrong. Ballas is an honest man.
Speaker 3: I ain't say he's not honest.
Speaker 17: I oh, mister, look, I want to get out, getting
the sun, get on a ship, maybe see a girl,
get married, have kids.
Speaker 4: Sure, sure I.
Speaker 3: Want that, But I ain't gonna let you come in
here and stuff my hopes and made me get me
to think that that's what I'm gonna have. I ain't
gonna let you do that. I'm gonna run in here.
It ain't nothing you know, nobody in the whole world can
do to help me. That's why I say leave me alone. Please,
I'm begging you. Leave me alone, mess me up, and
then dash me down more hard than before.
Speaker 9: You're wrong, Jenny, You're wrong? How can I make you
believe you're wrong? Jamie?
Speaker 11: I'm gonna write a story about what you just told me.
Maybe somebody will read it and come forward and say
who you really are? What else should I say in
that story?
Speaker 4: I told you all?
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say you.
Speaker 9: Asked who cares?
Speaker 11: I care, Jamie, and I think others will care when
they hear your story.
Speaker 9: The truth, honest, the true Jamie.
Speaker 3: All right, say this, Jamie Goodwin's got a bad name,
Jamie Goodwin Robert Carr and stole money for food. But
he didn't kill no woman.
Speaker 4: He didn't kill no wife. He never was married. Say that.
Speaker 3: Say if he got married, he treated this woman right.
You ain't gonna help maybe, but.
Speaker 4: That's the truth.
Speaker 9: Anything else, Yeah, yeah, you know, mister Haan.
Speaker 3: Say that. Say Jamie Goodman worked lots of places Broad
n Next, Detroit, Baltimore, Boston. There must be some folks
knowing must be one man somewhere stop what he do
and take a day out and come down here to
prove I ain't no murderer. Prove I just claimed, Jamie Goodwin.
Speaker 14: Reg your story. Mister tim thought. Maybe I knew that
man you wrote about two years ago. Let him seventy
five dollars he paid me back to here's the newdy sign. Heee,
Jamie Goodwin, maybe you can use it.
Speaker 15: I just come from the jail, mister haslan Well. I
saw that man. The man they says author Tenny Funny.
I remember when I talked to Tenny, knew him years ago.
He used to have to look up to that man tall.
This one I didn't have to look up to. Now
he must have got shorter, because I ain't got no
taller less, of course, like I think, he ain't author Tenny,
but someone else.
Speaker 9: You're a houseman, that's right.
Speaker 4: My name C. B. Sega. I'm a planter broad next way.
You had not in the paper. I read it.
Speaker 12: I spoke the postmaster in our town about this good Win.
Tenny Feller says, come see you say here I am.
Speaker 9: What do you think about it?
Speaker 12: Thinking something? I don't go in for much here is.
I'll tell you what I believe in. I believe in facts.
I live in broad Next all my life. Know everyone
man worked for me. Name a Goodwin years back. Maybe
that's the boy you've got in jail here. If it is,
i'll prove it. I'll ask that boy six questions about Broadnecks.
He answers him he's a Goodwin. He don't let him
stay in jail. I ain't got all day.
Speaker 4: Let's go.
Speaker 9: I stand still, you man, what's this?
Speaker 4: What you got all these men here for?
Speaker 9: Can you pick out one you ever saw before? Mister
Sega testing me?
Speaker 4: Eh? Well, I'll be sure there he is. You're Goodwin? Right, yes?
Chasing me? All right?
Speaker 11: The rest of you, man can go, Jamie, this man
is Let me do the talking, son, Okay, I look
at me, Jamie.
Speaker 4: Where am i?
Speaker 3: I remember? You say you mister sake?
Speaker 4: That's right now? Where am I from? By broad Next?
When did you last see me?
Speaker 9: Let me see seven years ago?
Speaker 4: So last July?
Speaker 14: Why did you say July when.
Speaker 3: You fired me July the first and then you hired
me back July to fourth?
Speaker 4: He says he was being patriotic about how I never mind?
What's my brother in law's name.
Speaker 9: What is the doctor, doctor Payne?
Speaker 4: What did he tell you last time he saw you?
He said, I think it was the last time.
Speaker 3: He says, don't you go walking on no more rules,
because next time you fall off, you and I might
not be lucky and.
Speaker 4: Just break one lead.
Speaker 12: That's him, that's him, that's Jamie with no furious facts.
I swear for heck, I don't need to swear now, Jamie.
When he let you out, you come on back to
broad next. I got a good job with him.
Speaker 7: But it's not so simple. There are eight witnesses and
a sheriff to shake. There's a decision of a judge
and a jury the reverse, and there's an attorney Ballast,
the commonwealth attorney. You bring the new information to him.
He looks it over lessons, then says, I take back
some of what I said. Housman, your story was not irresponsible.
Speaker 9: Thank you.
Speaker 14: I take back some of what I said. There's still
the testimony of eight enough. But you think, nevertheless, that
this information warrants a new trial.
Speaker 9: Yes, mister Ballas I do. What do you think, husband?
I want you to know I'll fight you.
Speaker 14: I mean you and Tenny or a Goodwin and his attorney.
I'll fight you with all I've got. You know I'm
a funny duck. I'm one of those throwbacks to another
period when people had a sense of duty and a
sense of honesty. If you win this case, you'll know
you've been in a fight.
Speaker 13: You'll get a new trial, as the lord's my witness.
Speaker 4: Jedge.
Speaker 6: That man sitting right over there was married to my
girlfriend Marie.
Speaker 13: That man is author Tenny. I swear he killed my daughter.
Speaker 9: That Tenny, I swear he don't decide to live.
Speaker 15: Yes, So mister lawyer us respects what that foreman said
about Marie, and I ain't forgetting Marie was my daughter
in law. But that man sitting down ain't my son.
He looked like him, all right, but he ain't my boy.
Speaker 12: My name is Sega, I say, any man answer my
six questions? Way that boy done? I know he's who
I say is? He's Jamie Goodwin.
Speaker 8: I'm the boy's mother, Sir, Yes, sir, No matter what
I say, I know few people ain't gonna think I
ain't sticking up for my son.
Speaker 4: I am. But I said this.
Speaker 8: How come that poor woman understand whose daughter got killed?
Speaker 4: N't know me.
Speaker 8: How come the man who say he's author to his
father never seen me before? If I'm the mother of
this man, then there's my kinfold. And how come my
kinfolks don't know me? Reason Neils, he's Jamie Goodman.
Speaker 9: That's why I am a handwriting expert.
Speaker 10: I've testified in many trials in professional capacity, including the
Lindbergh case. I have also examined a sheet of paper
torn from a Bible on which Arthur Tenny wrote a
few words. I have also examined a note admittedly signed
by Jamie Goodwin. In my honest and positive opinion, the
possibility of Tenny writing like Goodwin or Goodwin writing like
Tenny is so highly unlikely that it becomes almost a
practical certainty that they are very different people. In short,
that's Goodwin your honor, not Tenny.
Speaker 4: Jamie Goodwin.
Speaker 9: Yes, so your honor.
Speaker 15: He's dismissed.
Speaker 9: Sir, You're a free Jamie.
Speaker 7: You're afraid, Please, mister Housman, a little respect for the
dignity of this court.
Speaker 16: Jamie Goodwin, you are free.
Speaker 9: I don't know what the same as to help you
don't have to say anything.
Speaker 4: I got it somehow. I gotta thank you. You see,
I learned that people don't care.
Speaker 3: People like you and the postmaster from broad MAXI mister Sega,
here's mister Ballast too.
Speaker 9: Then folks on the other side they care too. What's true,
countful folks don't. That's right.
Speaker 18: It seem the something something else too, I mean something.
If you believe in something, you don't put your head
down and say no, they can't be you. Put your
face up and fight for what you believe. If you
do that, people cared because they see that you kids.
And that's what this show, now it was.
Speaker 9: That's what it shows, Jamie. That's just what it shows.
Speaker 2: In just a moment, we'll read you a telegram from
Julian Sea Houseman of the Richmond, Virginia Newsleader, with a
final outcome of tonight's big story. Now we read you
that telegram from Julian Cea Housman of the Richmond Virginia Newsleader.
Speaker 11: Day after try Goodwin visited the paper and said, I
just wanted to come to the people who got me
out of this. Jam I needed assistant sentence to the
Newsleader that I owe my freedom. Authorities are still searching
for the actual murderer in Tonight's Big Story. Thanks a
lot for Tonight's Pellmell Award.
Speaker 4: Thank you, mister Hosman.
Speaker 2: The makers of pell Mell Famous Cigarettes are proud to
present you the pell Mell five hundred dollars Award for
notable service in the field of Journalism.
Speaker 16: Listen again next week, same time, same station, when pell
Mell Famous Cigarettes will present another Big Story. A big
story from the front pages of the Columbus, Ohio Dispatch
Byeline bill Foley, A big story about a phantom killer
and a reporter who didn't believe in ghosts.
Speaker 2: The Big Story is produced by Bernard Parcter with music
by Vladimtslinski. Tonight's program was written by Arnold Pearl. Your
narrator was Bob Sloan. John Sylvester played the part of
Julian C. Hausman, and Canada Lee played Jamie. In order
to protect the names of people actually involved in Tonight's
authentic Big Story, the names of all characters in the
dramatization were changed, with exception of the report of mister Housman.
This is Ernest Chappel speaking for the makers of pell Mell.
Speaker 9: This is NBC the Nation, a broadcasting company.
Speaker 1: Welcome Back. In addition to mister Sylvester and mister lay in,
tonight's cast were Pauline Myers, Georgia Bury, John Marriott, Jim Bules,
Eric Dressler, Bill Smith, Scott Tennyson, and as usual, a
lot of doubles, including Canada Lee. Now on the Big Story.
It is a bit unusual for any co stars to
make it into the closing credits, but Canada ly had
a very significant profile that merited it. Lee kind of
stumbled into acting, I mean literally was looking for a
job as a laborer and ended up in an audition
for the Federal Theater, which was one of those sort
of new deal projects that kept people in work by
having them performed. According to Lee, the way he looked
at acting was this is interesting, and it's better than
going hungry. Then he got into a production of McBeth,
which we termine all black production, and Wells had them
rehearsed for six months and this just became a runaway hit.
And it really is a case where Wells's passion for
the theater and acting were caught by Lee, which I
think is one of the more incredible things that I've
ever read about mister Wells. Lee went on to do
a lot of stage work and in Hollywood he was
asked in Lifeboat, and he'd also served as an narrator
of the really interesting World War two era program New
World A Coming, So he brought some real star power
that you don't really hear a whole lot in the
big story. In terms of the episode itself, I think
it was well set out, and according to doctor Joe Webb,
it's pretty close to the truth. The murder in question
happened in nineteen thirty two, with the new trial occurring
in nineteen thirty eight. I do think that, as was
the case with other episodes in this sort of mold,
that there may be a little bit too much credit
being given to the prosecutors, who and I think in
real life, continued through a lot of evidence coming forward,
a lot of people saying this wasn't the same guy
until they were really Finally, I think by the way
of public relations and potential, he forced to go ahead
and have a new trial. Now that is not to
say in anyway that prosecutors or most prosecutors aren't concerned
enough with justice to try to do the right thing.
It's just kind of hard to see that this was
the case here all right. Listener comments and feedback now
and overall on Spotify Mechanics sixty six rights regarding the
episode's sixteen year old misfit kills out of Fear good one.
Speaker 3: Well, thanks so much.
Speaker 1: Now it's time to thank our Patreon supporter of the day,
and I wanted to go ahead and thank Die and
Patreon supporter since July of twenty twenty three, currently supporting
the podcast at the Detective Sergeant level of seven dollars
and fourteen cents or more per month. Thanks so much
for your support, Diane, and that will do it for today.
If you're enjoying the podcast, please follow us using your
favorite podcast software and be sure to rate and review
the podcast wherever you download it from. We'll be back
next Tuesday with another episode of the Big Story, but
join us back here tomorrow for Broadways My Beat, where.
Speaker 19: The shock was a thing composed of crowd and a
nighttime sky lit by flame, the elements later to be
noted in police and fire department records. Fire at Russell's
Chemical Company time four fifteen am.
Speaker 4: You're bringing somebody out now down.
Speaker 19: Strange What what'd you say? Said a strange mug of
m after four in the morning. Why should anybody be come,
Let's see put the stretches down here.
Speaker 9: Somebody better are they?
Speaker 13: Oh?
Speaker 3: Hello, Danny, he's too. I think that's always in there.
I just started to say, somebody better get a preach.
Speaker 4: They both said, this one is the other one.
Speaker 9: Anny, look at him, Ed Custer, do something for him.
Speaker 19: Don't knock Doc overhead, Ed Custer, hurry up, Doc, you
know I'm Danny.
Speaker 9: Yeah, he's a policeman.
Speaker 4: Policeman, what was he doing in there?
Speaker 9: Got do something for him.
Speaker 1: Hope you'll be with us then in the meantime, said
your comments to Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot man,
follow us on Twitter at Radio Detective, and check us
out on Instagram, Instagram, dot com slash Great Detectives from Boise, Idaho.
This is your host, Adam Graham. Sign and off.