Spacemens Luck

 

Where Tom Corbett, Captain Video, CMDR Corry and Other Spacemen Still Live

This is the legend of old time spaceman “Noisy” Rhysling a blind singer of the spaceways who lost his sight saving a ship and then spends the rest of his life bumming rides on spaceships singing his songs. He is the poet laureate of space, part Homer, part Robert Burns, and part Rudyard Kipling. The space-going songwriter and radiation-blinded spaceship engineer crisscrosses the solar system writing and singing songs.

The story begins when the aged Rhysling is signed aboard the Tramp Spaceship Gartalk as a Jet Man. There is an engine malfunction and and Rhysling looses his sight.

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In the future year of 1955 a mysterious visitor, named Graffious, to the Broderick Detective Agency, in downtown New York, hires Detective Broderick and his assistant “Iron Man” Doolan to find the Martian Embassy. Both Broderick and Doolan think Graffious is crazy and start to throw him out of their office. But Graffious flashes a $500.00 bank note and suddenly they are all ears.

Grafiius explains that he is an eccentric that believes that if the Martians were on Earth they would be here only as a prelude to an invasion. That if they are indeed on Earth they would have their “Embassy” in New York the center of economic and political activity. Their Embassy would act as a listening post to gather intelligence for their planned invasion.

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Based on the short story by Frederick Brown the story starts and ends with “The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door…”

The show’s announcer begins by saying “a sweet blood curdling story that is only two sentences long. The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door…” The story goes on and elaborates on those two sentences and builds a more complete story around them.

The story is about Walter Phelan, the last man on Earth. An Immortal space faring race calling themselves the Zan have invaded the earth and have killed off all life other than pairs of animal specimens for their zoo.

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Sometime in the far future man is exploring the galaxies of deep space and on most every planet they explore they find only rubble and remnants of a long-dead space-faring civilization. Why did this “Lost Race” disappear? Whatever happened to them happened over 100,000 years ago.

The Space Freighter Corilla based out of Earth after having been traveling in overdrive for 103 days re-emerge in normal space in the vicinity of an uncharted solar system with a sun and 3 planets orbiting it.

After they go into a low orbit to investigate one of the planets they find ruins of the “Lost Race” only unlike the thousand other worlds where the ruins of the “Lost Race” were found these ruins were not totally destroyed. Part of the city of the “Lost Race” is still standing. This is unheard of. But before they can decide what to do there is an explosion on the power deck and they are forced to make a crash landing near the city of the “Lost Race.”

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In the far flung future of 1982, no kidding, Spacemen discover The Great Galactic Barrier. Manned space flights to the moon and mars are common. Now they are trying to travel to the planet Volta (not sure where this is or eve what solar system). Volta is beyond the barrier. The Great Galactic Barrier is a strange invisible barrier which is frustrating Man’s attempts to explore the depths of space. So far five ships have attempted the voyage, but none have ever returned, their fate a mystery since no signal can pass through the barrier.

On June 2, 1987 the rocket ship Star Cloud blasts off for Volta. To avoid the fate of the first five expeditions the Star Cloud’s hull has been lined in lead. The Star Cloud is the sixth ship to attempt the trip, commanded by Captain Lewis Thorson and his crew, who are plagued even before they lift off. First there is a stowaway (Charlie who had been grounded for acceleration bends) aboard who is discovered and removed just before lift off. Then several of the crew come down with the Space Blues, a malady that seems to only effect certain crew members.

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We find our self in the far distant future of 2006. A future where the Mark 3 Electronic Brain is the latest computer and is used in places like Harvard University. Soon there will be the next generation computer the Mark 4 Electronic Brain.

First we meet Harry Underhill, manufacturer of domestic robots who finds his livelihood threatened when a new competitor appears on the market. Humanoids, which are vastly superior to his, which are inefficient and clunky, are devoted to the protection and service of mankind. Their “prime directive” is to serve man.

The first time Harry speaks to one of these new robots he calls it a robot and he is promptly informed that they are mechanicals and not robots. The mechanical offers a service contract to him but Underhill immediately declines with disgust.

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This is the first episode in the then new (1950) science fiction anthology series Dimension X. The show begins in the distant future in the year 1965 (April 15, 1965) and were standing beside the giant concrete runway of a desert testing ground somewhere in the American Southwest. Test pilot Steve Weston is getting last minute instructions from his boss Hanson and well wishes before he is to lift off in an experimental Strato Rocket the RJX-1 and fly higher than any man had gone before—to the outer reaches of earth’s atmosphere.

Once in flight everything is working according to plan when Weston suddenly reports sighting something large and shiny above his plane. Weston gives chase to the mysterious object and then disappears from ground controls radar screen with only ten minutes of fuel left. Search planes are sent out but find no sign of the downed plane.

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The Dimension X Radio Show ran from April 8, 1950 to September 29, 1951 for a total of 50 episodes. The first 13 episodes were broadcast live, and the remainder were pre-recorded. Dimension X was Radio’s early 1950’s premier series of adult science fiction tales. The series opened with The Outer Limit, an Ernest Kinoy adaptation of Graham Doar’s short story from The Saturday Evening Post (December 24, 1949), about alien contact. This story was very popular and over the next few years aired on several other Old Time Radio Shows such as X-1, Escape, Suspense, Beyond Tomorrow, Exploring tomorrow and probably others. A week later (April 15, 1950), the program presented Jack Williamson’s most famous story, With Folded Hands, first published in the July 1947 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.

Below is a list of all 50 episodes with their broadcast dates. Over time I will be adding each and everyone of these episodes to the Spacemen’s Luck website so you can hear these excellent programs yourself. You will be able to add your comments about each of these episodes and rate them using our star rating system.

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Dimension X, was an NBC radio program broadcast on an un-sponsored weekly basis from April 8, 1950 to September 29, 1951 for a total of 50 episodes. With a five-month hiatus from January 1951 to June 1951, the series spanned 17 months. All 50 episodes of the series survived and will over time be added to the Spacemen’s Luck website for your listening enjoyment. The first 13 episodes were broadcast live, and the remainder were transcribed (pre-recorded). These stories were not kiddie space shows like Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon. They were thoughtful and sometimes down beat stories based on more serious science fiction stories.

Dimension X, was the first science fiction series to use stories adapted from Sci-Fi pulp magazines of the day like Amazing Science Fiction, Thrilling Wonder and Astounding Science Fiction Magazine (which eventually sponsored the show). Classic tales by Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Bloch and Isaac Asimov were brought to life in the minds eye of numerous listeners.

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