This episode presents the first installment of the Radio Diaries series "Orson Welles and the Blind Soldier," hosted by Michael Loewinger. It details how Orson Welles used his 1946 national radio show to investigate a violent crime against a Black veteran. The story centers on the brutal beating and blinding of Sergeant Isaac Woodard by a white police officer in South Carolina.
On February 12, 1946, Isaac Woodard, a 27-year-old Army veteran recently discharged, was traveling home by bus. A dispute began when Woodard asked the bus driver for time to use a restroom, and the driver cursed at him. After Woodard cursed back, the driver left the bus to find a police officer at the next stop. The arresting officer struck Woodard in the head with a billy club when he tried to explain himself. Woodard was then taken toward the town jail, where the officer beat him repeatedly during the journey. The officer deliberately drove the end of his baton into both of Woodard's eyes, causing permanent blindness.
Corrine Johnson, who was 18 at the time, witnessed the beating from a railroad track near a drugstore and theater. Woodard's niece, Laura Williams, explains her family's initial confusion as they did not know his location after the attack. Activist and reporter John McCray learned of a blinded Black veteran at a VA hospital and brought the story to the NAACP. James L. Felder Sr., then executive director of the NAACP in South Carolina, says the organization saw the case as a galvanizing force for the civil rights movement. The NAACP believed the story would capture Orson Welles's imagination due to his support for civil rights.
Welles dedicated an episode of his ABC radio program, "Orson Welles Commentaries," to the case, reading Woodard's affidavit on air. He framed the incident as a fundamental injustice, asking, "What does it cost to be a negro in South Carolina? It cost a man his eyes." Welles's daughter, Beatrice, notes that such explicit discussions of racial violence were rare on national radio in 1946. With the officer's identity and the exact town still unknown, Welles addressed the perpetrator directly as "Officer X." In a dramatic monologue, Welles told Officer X he could not wash away the "blood of a blinded war veteran."
Welles promised to "blast out your name" and vowed to remove all refuge for the unknown officer. The episode presents this radio campaign as a pivotal moment that lifted a local crime into a national story. The tone is narrative and investigative, blending historical documentary with dramatic archival audio. It is educational and revelatory, reconstructing a forgotten chapter of post-war America.
Listeners interested in civil rights history, investigative journalism, and narrative podcasting will find this episode compelling. Those seeking light entertainment or contemporary news analysis might choose to skip it.
