About this season
An anthology series adapted from the radio program of the same name. Like the radio program, many scripts were adaptations of literary classics by well-known authors. Classic authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, Agatha Christie, and Charles Dickens all had stories adapted for the series, while contemporary authors such as Roald Dahl and Gore Vidal also contributed.
Episodes (51)
1. Paradise Junction
Aired 1 September 1953
The story of a traveling circus and its unhappy owner.
2. Reign of Terror
Aired 8 September 1953
An innocent woman is sentenced to death during the French Revolution.
3. The Darkest Night
Aired 15 September 1953
Murder and blackmail ruin a bride-to-be's bridal shower.
4. The Riddle of Mayerling
Aired 22 September 1953
A dramatic adaptation of the famous and true story of a commoner's ill-fated romance with the Archduke Rudolph of Hapsburg.
5. The Sister
Aired 29 September 1953
The tragic tale of a pair of recluses whose lives are brought into focus for the first time after years of frustration and jealousy.
6. Death at Skirerud Pond
Aired 6 October 1953
The story of a tense trial in Norway when a jury was asked to remember what it was like in their homeland during the war. The actual verdict is revealed at the end of the program.
7. The Accounting
Aired 13 October 1953
The story of a corrupt supply captain, son of an illustrious military hero, and a fiercely loyal major who challenges him to a duel to preserve the family's honor.
8. The Valley of the Kings
Aired 20 October 1953
The tense story of an archaeological expedition searching for the tomb of King Tutmose. They finally find it and its treasures untouched; but then the curse of the Pharaoh on anyone defiling his tomb's sacred precincts begin to strike.
9. The Others
Aired 27 October 1953
10. The Interruption
Aired 3 November 1953
An English gentleman gloats over the murder of his wife only to learn that his evil housekeeper knows his secret.
11. Needle in a Haystack
Aired 10 November 1953
The behind-the-scenes story of how the U. S. Navy ferreted out the secret of Communist minefields in Wonsan Harbor, enabling minesweepers to clear the way for the safe landing of 22,000 Marines.
12. The Newcomer
Aired 17 November 1953
A story of a brash stranger in a small Western town who changes his ways when arrested for the murder of a local belle.
13. My Short Walk to Freedom
Aired 24 November 1953
When a fugitive from a Russian concentration camp is cornered in his Budapest home, he disguises himself and his brother to try a get beyond the Iron Curtain.
14. Laugh It Off
Aired 1 December 1953
A kindly young man believes a girl's story that she is marked for murder and risks his life to save her, despite warnings from friends that she is a habitual liar and thrill-seeker.
15. The Dance
Aired 8 December 1953
This episode is a remake of an episode previously shown on the series. This episode and the previous one were both shown live and featured different casts.
16. Cagliostro and the Chess Player
Aired 15 December 1953
A dramatization based on the life of the 18th Century Italian magician, Count Alessandro di Cagliostro. The cunning magician inveigles King Stanislaus into a chess game with his mechanical genius. That, in the end, becomes his downfall.
17. The Gift of Fear
Aired 22 December 1953
A little boy in a department store and a night watchman who likes toys better than people are featured in this odd Christmas tale.
18. Mr. Nobody
Aired 29 December 1953
A wealthy, vicious woman turns a goodhearted but naive tramp into a pawn in her evil plans.
19. Diamonds in the Sky
Aired 5 January 1954
A gang of smugglers, diamonds and a beautiful woman add up to trouble for the pilot on a trans-Atlantic flight.
20. The Scrap Iron Curtain
Aired 12 January 1954
The true story of Baclav Uhlik, a Czech machinist who built an armored car and last July transported his wife, two children and four friends 40 miles through the Bohemian forests to the town of Waldmeunchen in the western zone of Germany.
21. The Haunted
Aired 19 January 1954
The second wife of a ski-lodge owner suspects her husband of the murder of his first wife.
22. An Affair With a Ghost
Aired 26 January 1954
A dead French underground leader returns to save a band of hostages when a Nazi collaborator goes back on his promise.
23. The Man Who Wouldn't Talk
Aired 2 February 1954
A drama based on the hoax of Canadian George DuPre, who claimed service in the French underground as a British intelligence officer during World War II.
24. The Moonstone
Aired 9 February 1954
A precious stone taken from India is coveted by many parties.
25. The Execution
Aired 16 February 1954
Her son's heroic death in battle unseals the lips of a mother about a 10-year-old tragedy involving her brutal husband.
26. Death on the Screen
Aired 23 February 1954
A frantic wife sits by her TV set, watching a public dinner where a deranged man is getting ready to kill her husband.
27. I Do Solemnly Swear
Aired 2 March 1954
The story of the first woman juror in the United States, in 1870 in Laramie, Wyoming.
28. Before the Act
Aired 9 March 1954
A young bank official is the intended scapegoat of a carefully designed plan to rob the vault of $100,000.
29. The Fourth Degree
Aired 16 March 1954
A psychiatrist makes a weird experiment in a last ditch attempt to get a key witness in a homicide case to talk.
30. The Tenth Reunion
Aired 23 March 1954
A college reunion crowd discover that one of the gang has been missing since graduation. Those present have had reasons to do away with her.
31. Torment
Aired 30 March 1954
Behind the Iron Curtain, a condemned prisoner's wife tries to save him by appealing to an old friend, the police chief.
32. Open Transom
Aired 6 April 1954
33. Operation: Barracuda
Aired 13 April 1954
Operation:Barracuda is a 1954 TV episode or short film directed by Robert Mulligan. "The heartless captain of a German u-boat crashes his vessel along the Atlantic coast at the close of WWII. Only the captain and his lieutenant escape the sinking vessel containing the personal fortune of Nazi leader Herman Goering. After eight years, the captain returns to salvage the loot and tries to recruit his former shipmate in the effort." - Episode Summary from TV.com
34. The Return Journey
Aired 20 April 1954
A window washer is tempted by an unguarded amount of money and realizes the error in his judgment all too soon.
35. The Terror Begins
Aired 27 April 1954
The story of how Stalin held a grip on the Russian people after assassinating S.M. Kirov.
36. Smoke
Aired 4 May 1954
The two sons of a disgusting and destructive old man stand to benefit as a result of his violent death.
37. Operation: Nightmare
Aired 11 May 1954
A dramatization of the heroics of nurse Ann Bernatitus during the Battle of Bataan.
38. Breakout
Aired 18 May 1954
A prison riot breaks out and a guard is taken hostage. The inmates want the keys to the main gate in exchange for the guard.
39. Fingerprints
Aired 25 May 1954
A true story taken from the cases of Alfonse Bertillon, chief of the Identification Bureau of the Paris Police in the early 1900's. Bertillon invented the first system of crime detection through the use of physical features.
40. Race Against Murder
Aired 1 June 1954
A young doctor leaves his practice to find a cure for polio after watching his patients suffer.
41. North Side
Aired 8 June 1954
The true story of the workings of a New York homicide squad as it goes about the solution of a brutal murder.
42. The Pistol Shot
Aired 15 June 1954
An Army Captain wants revenge on a fellow officer in 19th century Russia. The young Captain has bested him in cards and love.
43. String
Aired 22 June 1954
Thirty men in a secret unit, started by President Roosevelt during World War II, are captured and tortured at the Belsen concentration camp before escaping.
44. The Hunted
Aired 29 June 1954
An unethical hunter is caught shooting a tame animal on a wildlife preserve. The game warden delivers an unexpected punishment: three bullets and a ten minute head start.
45. The Girl in Car Thirty-Two
Aired 6 July 1954
An investigator puts his life in danger after he falls for the woman he is tailing.
46. Conversation at an Inn
Aired 13 July 1954
A bicyclist makes up fantastic tales of murder on "clues" she finds along her rides. When she finds a shoe and a lighter, she tells an elaborate tale that turns out to be very close to the truth.
47. Once a Killer
Aired 20 July 1954
A woman's faith in a hoodlum is destroyed when the police prevail upon her to get him to surrender.
48. Main Feature: Death
Aired 27 July 1954
A woman gets locked in movie theater by mistake and encounters a pair of killers who break in to rob the safe.
49. The Last Stand
Aired 3 August 1954
A would-be recluse's best friend discovers gold on his land. He realizes his only security is his friend's death, but he is thwarted in the effort of murder by some fast-traveling news.
50. The Iron Cop
Aired 10 August 1954
A policeman's niece is murdered. He resolves to find the killer but has to pit his wits against an "electronic brain" to do so.
51. Barn Burning
Aired 17 August 1954
A mentally incapacitated war hero seeks revenge against society.