Yours Truly Johnny Dollar CBS · October 8, 1949

Ytjd 1949 10 08 020 The Racehorse Piledriver Matter

· GHOST OF RADIO ·
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# The Racehorse Piledriver Matter

When Johnny Dollar accepts a case involving a prize thoroughbred and a suspicious insurance claim, he finds himself navigating the treacherous world of track gambling, crooked handlers, and a fortune riding on four hooves. This October 1949 adventure pulses with the urgency of a ticking clock and the sultry tension of racetrack corruption—Dollar must unravel a tangled web of false identities and double-crosses before time runs out on both the investigation and the horse's racing season. With each clue he uncovers, the case grows murkier, populated by characters with motive, means, and a deadly determination to keep their secrets buried. Expect the crackle of authentic dialogue, the ambiguous moral terrain that made the show legendary, and a mystery that refuses easy answers.

*Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar* premiered on CBS in 1949 as the network's answer to hard-boiled detective fiction, but creator/writer Jack Johnstone crafted something uniquely suited to radio: a self-contained mystery each week with a genuinely complex protagonist. Unlike other insurance investigators of the era, Dollar was no straightforward hero—he was morally flexible, quick-thinking, and operating in a gray world where clients lied as readily as suspects. The 1949 season marked the show's inaugural year, before it became a beloved institution, making these early episodes rare documents of the medium's golden age, when radio drama commanded the nation's evening attention with nothing but voices, sound effects, and imagination.

Don't miss this vintage slice of American noir. Settle in with the crackle of the broadcast, the distant sound of the racetrack, and follow Johnny Dollar into *The Racehorse Piledriver Matter*—a case where everything you think you know could cost you everything you have.

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