Drama - Old Time Audio · Various Authors

Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar - The Hartford Alliance Matter

March 1, 2026·28 min·1 clip

The young suspect pleads guilty to arson and says he wants no trial.

1. Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar follows the Hartford Alliance matter, starting with a four-alarm fire at the Hartford Alliance Loan Company. 2. Edmund O'Brien plays Johnny Dollar, and Barton from Cosmopolitan All Risk brings him in because a city fire inspector has reported possible arson and an arrest has already been made. 3. The episode asks who set the fire, why the suspect refuses his name, and what the Hartford Alliance companies have to do with the blaze. 4. At police headquarters, Sergeant Broderick says the arrested boy will not give a booking name and appears unwilling to defend himself. 5. Johnny notices a ring mark on the boy’s hand and tells Broderick the suspect looks well-bred and not like a hardened fire-setter. 6. Clarence Pickett, the owner of the building, is shown at the charred remains and says his office was the corner one on the third floor. 7. Pickett denies knowing the young suspect, rejects Johnny’s questions, and bristles when Johnny brings up losses on the stock exchange. 8. Dr. Herbert later describes the boy as greatly troubled, confused, and withholding some secret that he fears and hates. 9. A return trip to the ruins reveals two safes, one from the Hartford Alliance Loan Company and one from the Hartford Alliance Employment Agency, which sharpens the investigation. 10. A workman in the damaged building is struck by the cave-in, and Johnny later learns that the workman dies of his injuries. 11. A woman in Pine Orchard identifies the suspect as Billy Brandon, a summer resident whose family lives in Chicago. 12. Mrs. Landry says the Brandons used the Hartford Alliance Employment Agency for a maid, and the maid’s name turns out to be Bell Muir. 13. Back at police headquarters, Johnny and Sergeant Broderick check the files and find Benjamin Price listed with suspicions of fraud in 1930, receiving stolen goods in 1944, and fraud again in 1948. 14. Johnny visits Bell Muir, who says Billy Brandon was almost too nice and that she still works for the family through the agency. 15. Bell Muir tells Johnny that Price is very nice, but she reacts when Johnny says Price has been questioned by police. 16. Johnny later hears her place a phone call and say, "he was here," which strengthens the blackmail theory. 17. Johnny confronts Benjamin Price, who warns him to drop the matter and insists he never lit the fire. 18. In a hospital room, Billy Brandon breaks down while his father explains that Billy was acquitted after a Chicago drunk-driving death because a witness was paid to perjure himself. 19. The episode is a hard-boiled radio detective story with clipped narration, expense-account framing, and a steady chain of interviews and file checks. 20. Fans of old-time radio mysteries with insurance investigations will likely follow it closely; listeners wanting a contemporary, spoiler-free pace may skip it.

As heard by us

A four-alarm fire turns into a tense insurance mystery with a hard-boiled edge.

The episode opens on a four-alarm blaze and keeps circling the wreck until the insurance matter feels bigger than a routine loss. Barton gets the call moving, a city fire inspector starts the arson alarm, and a man is picked up after that tip.

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Why you'd press play

You want a smoky arson case that turns an expense-account investigation into a hard-boiled chase.

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