X Minus One - A Pail of Air (#44)

[@joewinters1533]

I quit my job for a 3 a week vacay. I live in ks. I originally went for Colorado and Utah.. me and the dog in the back of a jeep or in the pop up tent.. that three week vacation turned into almost 5 months camping and draining my savings account... I camped in the middle of nowhere... In fact my phone broke the day I left ks . I wasn't able to contact anyone. But I had a tablet so I had email.. I would occasionally pull into a McDonald's parking lot to use the free wifi or a koa once every few weeks to do laundry and download old time radio shows. X minus one and gunsmoke were my favorite to listen to by the fire.... the night I heard this story for the first time, I was sitting in Idaho by coeur d'alene lake by a fire with my best friend..no TV for months but every night had some old time radio shows.,.. My dog got to see every western state and live in the back country for months with me.. he chased elk, barked a brown bear and ate fish, rabbit, squirrel mixed in with his food.. I lost him 2 months ago and I'm missing him that why I looked up tgis episode. Next is some old gun smoke episode.. we spent 14 days in the kibab national Forrest listening to old gunsmoke radio shows... Just reminiscing... It the stone oven I built for us by the fire ring is still there on Google earth.,.. we went 10 miles into the forest and forged our own spot.. so who knows... I'm rambling... I just miss my best friend.. we loved life in the middle of nowhere

[@blackholeentry3489]

Back in the 50's I used to quit playing outside so I could come into the house, turn on the radio and listen to Gunsmoke. My mother thought it was terrible that I would listen to a radio program packed with so much shooting, violence and general mayhem.

[@johnburt7935]

@@blackholeentry3489 When the TV series *_Cannon_* was on the air in the 1970s, someone pasted a cowboy hat and gunbelt onto a TV still of William Conrad and asked viewers of the TV version of *_Gunsmoke_* if they could imagine Conrad playing Matt Dillon. Conrad might not have been a good physical match for Marshal Dillon (I, at least, could never imagine Dillon growing a mustache), but that *_voice_* . . . !

[@blackholeentry3489]

@@johnburt7935 Well....James Arness was 6' 6" and towered over most actors of the day.....except Miss Kitty, who was, in reality, 4" taller than Matt. It took a lot of film manipulation to hide this fact.....also, she was a redhead

[@johnburt7935]

@@blackholeentry3489 Plus, of course, it took a lot of makeup to conceal her mustache.

[@janetrulesable]

A beautiful story, thank you for sharing

[@alexandermacdougall7873]

For 40+ years I've been listening to old time radio shows. This episode is my all time favorite episode of any show of any genre. Never tire of hearing it.

[@kurtb8474]

When TV was becoming popular, a little boy asked which he liked most, TV or radio. He said radio because ''the pictures are better."

[@johnburt7935]

Reminds me of when one of my kids said, "Black and white movies are fun, even though there's no colors - actually, there ARE colors - black, and white! If there was no colors, it would be radio." Can't argue with that.

[@factsoverfiction7826]

Here near the 65th anniversary of the original broadcast, March 28, 1956. Thanks, algorithm, from an old-time sci-fi fan. (March 24, 2021)

[@Quenstedt]

Heard this rebroadcast on the radio when I was a child. Wonderful to hear it again.

[@blackholeentry3489]

As did I.

[@antwan1357]

Finally a happy ending in a show that usually pulls no punches.

[@johnburt7935]

And this, in a story which was crafted to be made to not strictly require an upbeat ending.

[@jimmybritt9537]

Good episode 😁👍👍🇺🇸

[@richardpeterson1398]

Monitor take you everywhere this weekend on the NBC Radio Network. N B C .. ..

[@TheJanster100]

A magical show...

[@donaldwhittaker7987]

Great stuff; long live fritz

[@shezzbeckstowers7923]

Made me cry…it was written and acted so well..This type of story writing is currently nonexistent

[@richardpeterson1398]

Nice ending with the N B C “Guitar” Chimes.

[@claycoates5056]

this is very interesting

[@derrekOTR]

If there was a Greatest OTR List, or Top 100 episodes ever aired “A Pail of Air” would easily fit in with the best. Suspense has Sorry Wrong Number and The Hitchhiker. X-1 has this 👆 *btw, the Science in this episode is not far fetched, quite the contrary. There is a wonderful short 10 minute video on youtube about what would happen if Earth was kicked out of the Solar System. Everything in the episode is actually theoretically possible. Even A bucket of Air!

[@fromthesidelines]

As heard on Wednesdays at 9:30pm(et). Day and time change, however, announced at 29:33.

[@fromthesidelines]

Here's the May 1956 issue of "Galaxy" promoted at 28:37- archive.org/details/galaxymagazine-1956-05/mode/2up

[@davidarundel6187]

A lost one found . 👍🎊🎉

[@paulsarnik8506]

Aw! No Elroy in this one!😮. 🤓😎✌🏻🚀

[@richardpeterson1398]

N B C , on the Guitar Chimes . . . . . . .

[@richardpeterson1398]

Guitar Chimes, Guitar Chimes, I’m gonna hear that “Guitar” Chimes, N B C . . . . . . .

[@tomphillips2608]

Actually, the General Electric Corporation either owned or was an advertising partner. So, the notes were G, E, C. Heard this on WAMU, public radio, Washington DC.

[@johnburt7935]

@@tomphillips2608 NBC was indeed created by General Electric. I love that those "G" "E" "C" notes are still played with the NBC TV logo, and that the NBC "Big N" logo, though less often seen in favor of the "living color" peacock, is in red and blue, in honor of the red and blue networks. I'm a sucker for honoring history.

[@blackholeentry3489]

So, they were bringing in pails of air to keep the fire going. WHAT were they burning? I recall reading this tale in the 50's when it was first printed. It was an unusual story and captivated my attention so much that I still remember the plot after all of these years. However, with a little disecting in to it, it quickly falls apart. While they may have a virtual unlimited supply of frozen air, what were they using for fuel and another big issue...food? To add to that, their clothes were NOT going to last a lifetime.

[@MichaelZed789]

Anything not bolted down

[@JanPeterson]

Coal from the boiler room in the basement.

[@johnburt7935]

They were burning coal from boilers in the basements of the buildings all over downtown (you can see the welded-shut coal chutes in older buildings in any downtown). They were eating frozen food from the grocery stores, obviously: frozen meat, frozen vegetables, frozen canned peaches, frozen Butterfinger bars, frozen Birdseye Frozen Dinners. If they got bored, they could go to the zoo and butcher a frozen muskox or a frozen elephant. Any other questions?

[@blackholeentry3489]

@@johnburt7935 Yes.....When does the 9/11 train arriveth?

[@chazzwozzio]

Coal. Were ya not listening?

[@JamesKlas]

Ìt is important that i know. Were these aired in the UK, amf iif so, whn¿

[@OTRR]

It was broadcast on the US Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS), so it was probably available in parts of the UK (as well as Europe). If any UK stations broadcast it, you would have to do that research.

[@richardpeterson1398]

Guitar Ringing N B C . . . . . . .

[@richardpeterson1398]

NNNNN. BBBBB. CCCCC. N. B. C. ON THE “GUITAR” CHIMES. N B C. .. .. The N B C Chimes sound like a Guitar.

[@OTRR]

They do, but they were an all-electronic system by this point, with the Rangertone chime machines having been replaced in the 1940s. For everything you ever wanted to know about the NBC chimes, there's a good Wikipedia article. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC_chimes