Secrets of Scotland Yard Radio Program

Background

London's Bow Street Runners were perhaps the original predecessors to Great Britain's famous Scotland Yard. Founded in 1749, the original eight civil agents worked out of the Magistrate Court located at No. 4 Bow Street, serving in the capacity of what we'd currently refer to as process servers or bounty hunters. Indeed, one of the few references to The Bow Street Runners is immortalized as an episode of Secrets of Scotland Yard by the same name, that we have only recently discovered among our own holdings and digitized from tape. [UPDATE: We are informed by our friends at History By The Yard that:

"There were also uniform police patrols organised from Bow Street, but the Bow Street officers (or Runners) wore plain clothes and worked under the instructions of the magistrates. Your description of them as process servers and bounty hunters is not wrong as such, but they executed search warrants and investigated crimes and thefts at the behest of magistrates who were applied to by losers and victims. Some were even sent to protect royalty. There were other inner london courts that had adopted the same system for some years before the Metropolitan Police were established in 1829.

For the first ten years of the Metropolitan Police, the Bow Street officers and the Bow Street horse patrols still continued their work (but not the uniform patrols). The mounted patrols were then amalgamated into the Met Police. The Runners in their role as investigators were not actually replaced until in 1842 the Metropolitan Police finally established a detective branch."

Great Britain's world-famous Scotland Yard has been a fertile source of Mystery and Crime drama plots almost since it's inception in 1829, when it was implemented with The Metropolitan Police Act. Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel, with the help of France's legendary Eugène-François Vidocq (the fabled Monsieur Vidocq) of the Sûreté. Vidocq had already demonstrated the value of plain-clothes detectives, or 'civil agents' to combat crime in France. It was Sir Robert's hope to emulate the French Sûreté's initial successes in England.

Great Scotland Yard itself, was a road within the Whitehall area of London, adjacent to The Thames, and dating from the 17th Century. Equally shrouded in legend, Great Scotland Yard was variously purported to be the 17th Century London residence of the Kings of Scotland, as well as the primary stagecoach artery exiting London in the direction of Scotland. Whatever its actual derivation, with the implementation of the Police Act, the building bounded by 4 Whitehall Place and 1 Great Scotland Yard was seconded to the Metropolitan Police. The entrance at 4 Whitehall Place was the ostensible main entrance to the offices of its two Comissioners, Sir Charles Rowan and Sir Richard Mayne, and the quarters near the back of the building on the Great Scotland Yard side were secured for 'Scotland Yard', the 'civil agent' force envisioned by Sir Robert.

Over the course of the 18th Century, both the cases and the legend of Scotland Yard slowly evolved--as did the size of the force. By the late 1800s the size of the force had outstripped the utility of the building at Great Scotland Yard. By 1890, a new headquarters on the Victoria Embankment of The Thames--or Thames Embankment--had been designed and constructed by famous architect Richard Norman Shaw. A far more imposing edifice, the building served New Scotland Yard until it was once again expanded out of Thames Embankment--and Whitehall--to it's present location at Victoria Street.

The Black Museum

While clearly worthy of its growing reputation--and legend--New Scotland Yard and its new building also housed an equally legendary collection of artifacts of evidence that it had accumulated from many of its more noteworthy or infamous cases--The Black Museum.

The initial accumulation of artifacts was informally begun simply as a training exercise. An Inspector Neame had gathered together a small collection of burglars' tools and paraphernalia to be employed as training exhibits for young police constables and inspectors. It had been the Prisoners Property Act of 1869 that had empowered New Scotland Yard to retain or store items of prisoners' property for instructional purposes. While not nearly as colorful a name as The Black Museum, the original Central Prisoners' Property Store was officially inaugurated in 1874 for that purpose. As Inspector Neame, assisted by a Police Constable Randall, grew their collection, it became increasingly apparent that these crime artifacts should be cataloged and housed in a secure area more appropriate for their safeguard, preservation and training utility. Inspector Neame and P.C. Randall were appointed in 1875 as caretakers of the Central Prisoners Property Store for that purpose.

In 1877, Commissioner Sir Edmund Henderson, K.C.B. , visited the Store with a few other government dignitaries for an official viewing of the project. That visit is considered the first official tour of New Scotland Yard's Crime Museum--The Black Museum. Quite understandably the soubriquet, 'The Black Museum' wasn't the Yard's preferred designation. The term The Black Museum reputedly owed itself to a disgruntled journalist who'd been declined a request to view The Crime Museum. Reporting on having been turned away from the facility that he'd coined 'The Black Museum', the appellation stuck, and so began the the legend of The Black Museum.

By the beginning of the 20th Century both Scotland Yard and its infamous Black Museum had been chronicled throughout the world in popular pulp fiction, popular crime novels and even in Film. Owing as much to Scotland Yard's own meticulous record-keeping, crime dossiers and The Black Museum itself, the Yard's extraordinary compilation of crime statistics and The Crime Museum's own growing catalogue of infamous evidence continued to grow. And as it grew so did the popularization of hundreds of its most famous and notorious cases, ranging from the elusive Jack The Ripper himself, to cases solved by items as innocuous as a simple hand-knitted yellow reticule, or string purse.

Scotland Yard's Secrets

The Yard's growing international popularity and fame was not lost on Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Harold Scott. In an inspired gesture, Sir Harold offered to 'lift the veil of secrecy' regarding the infamous reliquary within the walls of The Black Museum. And so it was that throughout the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, all manner of Black Museum and Scotland Yard-inspired Film, Radio and Television projects began to produce literally hundreds of highly popular chronicles of Scotland Yard's most famous cases--and their often sublime implements of infamy. Whether it was Sir Harold's clever intent-- or not--to further the reputation of Scotland Yard through these brilliant public relations moves will remain his own secret. But to the extent that the notoriety further extended Scotland Yard's already extraordinary reputation and legend is indisputable.

Enter Harry Alan Towers

Harry Alan Towers was a brilliant young entrepreneur who'd gotten his start as a child actor and Radio scriptwriter for The BBC. During World War II he'd joined the R.A.F. and was assigned to British Forces Radio, the equivalent of America's Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS), tasked with repackaging and distributing Radio broadcasts via electrical transcription to British Forces overseas. His resultant exposure to electrical transcription technology and distribution on a large scale formed the basis for his first entrepreneurial success after the War.

Upon his return to civilian life, Towers, with his mother's backing, formed Towers of London Syndications for the express purpose of producing popular Radio programming for independent syndication. There was one hitch. The state-owned BBC had long enforced a universal proscription against commercial broadcasting throughout the British Empire. So it was that Towers had to devise a commercial distribution and broadcast scheme that wouldn't directly violate the sanctions of The BBC.

Towers had already acquired international connections with both electrical transcription pressing houses such as Grace Gibson in Australia, and broadcast outlets in the furthest reaches of a war-torn world. As such, Towers was in a unique position to promote his syndicated programming for broadcast to British Empire audiences without specifically violating the rules of The BBC.

Secrets of Scotland Yard Syndication

Among Towers' many ambitious programming projects were Secrets of Scotland Yard, hosted and narrated by then American Film and Stage actor Clive Brook, and The Black Museum, hosted and narrated by young American Radio legend, Orson Welles. Although it remains unclear which project officially preceded the other, we have some evidence that Secrets of Scotland Yard preceded The Black Museum by as much as two or three years.

In an effort to obtain the most efficient mass distribution for his syndicated electrical transcriptions (E.T.s) Towers had turned to the transcription facilities of Grace Gibson of Australia to press the original sets of E.T.s of Secrets of Scotland Yard. Given the distance, logistics, and timing the project entailed, we can surmise that Secrets of Scotland Yard had been recorded some time during 1947. We infer this because by 1948 it was being broadcast from the Portuguese Colony of Mozambique via Lourenço Marques Radio, a 'pirate' station located in Mozambique. Its natural target audience was South Africa, which, given LM Radio's powerful transmitters, was easily reachable. South Africa had its own state-owned Radio broadcasting service, the South Africa Broadcasting Corporation or SABC with similar sanctions against competing commercial broadcasts to those of The BBC.

Enter Percy Hoskins

Brilliant entrepreneur that he was, Harry Towers still needed compelling content for his syndicated programming projects. Percy Hoskins was a popular, widely read crime journalist and author with London's Daily Express. With both day-to-day crime reporting connections as well as influential connections with the leadership of New Scotland Yard, Hoskins was in a unique position to advise and consult both Harry Alan Towers and later America's own National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) in developing Radio productions derived from the annals of Scotland Yard.

In the case of Secrets of Scotland Yard, Percy Hoskins is credited with writing or adapting the stories and scripts for the vast majority of Secrets of Scotland Yard's estimated 110-plus syndicated installments. Hoskins later consulted with famed American Radio scriptwriter Wyllis Cooper for NBC's network-broadcast WHItehall 1212 series, which also showcased The Black Museum and its secrets.

Hoskins' prolific output of vignettes of Scotland Yard's most famous crimes enentually encompassed some 200-plus unique scripts or adaptations of The Yard's most famous cases--and by extension, The Black Museum's most fascinating artifacts.

Secrets of Scotland Yard Broadcast History

The only current evidence we have of Secrets of Scotland Yard's first commercial airing was via the Radio Listings for Radio Lourenço Marques dating from May 1950, combined with David Goldin's meticulously compiled database of Radio recordings from both electrical transcription and tape at his RadioGOLDINdex. Those E.T. numbers, combined with the publish date of the Lourenço Marques listing would tend to support the hypothesis of a unique run of at least 110 episodes which, if aired in E.T. order, might have begun airing over LM Radio as early as December 1948. Given their weekly scheduling, that would yield an approximate chronological run of just over two years.

The first 'sanctioned' broadcasts of Secrets of Scotland Yard were heard over Canada's CBC Radio station CJOB, from approximately May 24, 1950 through approximately November 30, 1953. The Canadian broadcasts appear to have been a somewhat smaller subset of the original set of transcriptions, comprising a run of some 106 episodes, versus the theoretical entire run of 110.

The first American broadcasts of Secrets of Scotland Yard were heard over The Mutual Broadcasting System (MBS) and its loose confederation of independent affiliates throughout the United States. The MBS run began airing as early as March 7, 1957 over a Florida affiliate and ran weekly through June 12, 1958 at varying times and days. The MBS subset of the series encompassed only some 66 of the original programs. Given MBS's notorious record of promotion of most of their programming, the vast majority of the details of these 66 episodes remain currently lost, except for the rudimentary and generic MBS program descriptions they distributed to most American newspapers.

The series was heard again in 1974 over the Longhorn Radio Network re-broadcasts emanating from The University of Texas at Austin Radio station, KUT. The Longhorn Radio Network often reprised Radio transcriptions from The Golden Age of Radio over their network to great success throughout the 1970s.

The Timelessness of The Secrets of Scotland Yard

It goes without saying that Scotland Yard and its secrets remain as fascinating and compelling today as they did throughout the period that the world was being inundated with their exploits through Print, Film, Radio and Television. Some of its most famous cases encompass common, everyday crimes--both gruesome and sublime--that virtually every society throughout the world has had to contend with throughout the history of civilization. The overarching message remains the same: no crime ever truly remains undiscovered. Hidden for years, perhaps. Even ostensibly unsolved in many infamous cases. But the underlying message is the same. Crimes of passion, cruel deliberation, or even accidental, all have their consequences.

Whether a crime that the perpetrator carries to his or her deathbed, or a crime for which society extracts its often inevitable justice, the evolution of the crime itself remains an object of almost universal fascination. And to the extent that the details of such crimes can be artfully and eloquently revealed, exposited or dramatized, there will always be a ready audience for their unraveling.

Series Derivatives:

Notes on Provenances:

The most helpful provenances were the invaluable logs of the RadioGOLDINdex and the Winnepeg Free Press listings.

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[Date, title, and episode column annotations in red refer to either details we have yet to fully provenance or other unverifiable information as of this writing. Red highlights in the text of the 'Notes' columns refer to information upon which we relied in citing dates, date or time changes, or titles.]