In Radio’s Golden Age, there was really only one crime drama that depicted the daring exploits of the agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and was officially endorsed by the agency’s director, J. Edgar Hoover. That program was This is Your F.B.I., an ABC series that ran from 1945-53. But the most durable and far-more-popular FBI anthology answered to the name of The F.B.I. in Peace and War—which debuted over CBS Radio November 25, 1944 and ended a nearly fourteen-year run on September 28, 1958.

The F.B.I. in Peace and War was adapted from the “copyrighted book” of the same name by author Frederick L. Collins, and though Collins had been allowed to visit the F.B.I. academy while writing his soon-to-be best seller, director Hoover wasn’t particularly enamored of Collins’ book—nor the program either, for that matter. However, in the Hooper ratings wars, Peace and War usually came out ahead of its more favored sibling (This is Your F.B.I.)—no doubt due to its well-remembered marching theme song, the jaunty Love For Three Oranges by Sergei Prokofiev. The show—when it was originally sponsored by Procter & Gamble from 1944-50—also featured a memorable commercial for Lava soap, with a deep-voiced male (accompanying by a bass drum) booming out of an echo chamber: “L-A-V-A! L-A-V-A!” In later seasons, Peace and War’s bills would be paid by Wildroot Cream Oil, Wheaties (breakfast of F.B.I. champions!), Lucky Strike, Nescafé and Wrigley’s Gum.

The program’s scripts—penned by the likes of Louis Pelletier, Jack Finke, Ed Adamson and Fred Collins—had a sort of a run-of-the-mill predictability to them, and I’ve always thought it cheating a bit when you claim that the stories are actual depictions of F.B.I. cases at the beginning of a show and then yank the rug out from under the listeners with the “any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental” disclaimer at the end. Still, the writing was aided tremendously by a virtual Who’s Who of New York radio talent, including Jackson Beck, Walter Greaza, Ralph Bell, Rosemary Rice, Robert Dryden and Charita Bauer. John Archer, one of the many actors who played radio’s man of mystery The Shadow, was heard in the show’s early run as F.B.I. Agent Andrews, but for most of its history Peace and War starred Martin Blaine as Field Agent Adam Sheppard and Donald Briggs as his supervisor. The show was originally produced and directed by Max Marcin—famed for creating radio’s Crime Doctor—but in 1949 the reins were turned over to Betty Mandeville who, for a while, was the only female producer-director of a nighttime crime series, according to Jim Cox’s Radio Crime Fighters.

I listened to an August 2, 1951 broadcast last night entitled “Unfinished Business”; it’s a darn good entry, in which a hood named Joe Ryan (Ed Begley) enlists his moll (Elspeth Eric) to seduce a recently released con named Eddie Jackson (Frank Readick) into revealing the whereabouts of $100,000. (Ryan, it seems, paid Jackson the sum to take the rap for a robbery engineered by Ryan.) The script—by Pelletier and Finke—is pretty standard stuff, but the trio of Begley, Eric and Readick make it seem much better than it is. Begley, best remembered for his roles in films like Patterns (1956) and Sweet Bird of Youth (1962, for which he copped a Best Supporting Actor Oscar), had an equally lengthy career in radio, including playing the part of famed sleuth Charlie Chan!

It’s sort of difficult to compare The F.B.I. in Peace and War and This is Your F.B.I.; they’re both pretty much cut from the same bolt of cloth, featuring dedicated agents determined to jail evildoers week after week. Unfortunately, there are only about forty-some episodes of Peace and War extant today, so I’ll give This is Your F.B.I. the slight edge (having Stacy Harris in your cast helps a bit, too). Whichever one you choose, I’m certain that you’ll be pleased with two fine examples of a time that has since passed us by.
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