The Big Story: The Ugly Story of a Man (EP5087)

0:03 THE END.

0:28 Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho. This is your host, Adam Graham. In a moment, we're going to bring you this week's episode of The Big Story. But first, I want to encourage you, if you're enjoying the podcast, to please follow us using your favorite podcast software.

0:53 And I want to encourage you to check out our other podcast. And today, I'm highlighting the great adventurers of old-time radio. Twice a week, bringing you great adventure stories from old-time radio, currently featuring Tarzan and Counterspot. But now, from October 6, 1954, here is the ugly story of a man.

1:17 The big story. Tarzan!

1:28 The Mendocino National Forest in Northern California, July 8th. A deer crackles through the dry underbrush close to the road. He lifts his head, freezes, alert, listening, then bounds back into the forest. A car is approaching. The car stops. The man gets out. He looks up and down the road.

1:55 Nothing. He strikes a match, applies.

1:59 It to the brittle underbrush, which instantly ignites. The man watches as a gentle breeze fans the flames. He jumps back into the car and drives off fast. In 30 seconds, the fire begins to roar through the forest.

2:21 The Big Story. The story you're about to hear actually happened. It happened in Willows, California. It's authentic and is offered as a tribute to the men and women of the great American newspapers. From the front pages of the Willows Journal, the story of a reporter who went out to cover one of nature's ugliest catastrophes and came back with something even uglier about a man. Willow's, California. The story as it actually happened. Charles Gleason's story as he lived it.

3:15 The signs on Route 99W north out of Willow's say 50 miles per hour. The speedometer on the dashboard says 70. But you, Chick Gleason, aren't worried about getting a ticket. The big man beside you at the wheel is on official business. He's Frank Edwards, supervisor of the Mendocino National Forest, and he's speeding toward a forest fire in the Alders Spring section. It's a routine assignment, this first fire of the season, which you cover annually. And you're a little bored.

3:43 I'm getting smart, my old age, Frank. Well, pack my fishing tackle right along with the camera.

3:49 Fine, Chick.

3:50 Maybe you'll get to use it.

3:52 Last report I had, the blaze wasn't too bad.

3:54 Here, hand me the phone.

3:56 I'll check again.

3:57 Right.

3:57 Hello, Jeff.

3:59 This is Edwards. How does she look?

4:02 Well, we're making progress now that the bulldozers have gone to work. Should have things under.

4:06 Control in a couple more hours.

4:07 Well, what about the spot blaze at Powder Point?

4:10 Well, it's worse than we first suspected.

4:13 I've sent Stowe over there with 24 missionaries to handle it.

4:16 But it's more than a brush fire, Mr.

4:17 Edwards.

4:18 A lot more.

4:19 Must have started about the same time as this one at the springs.

4:22 It did, huh? That's strange.

4:24 Well, have the missionaries try to hem it in from the north. I'll be with you in an hour.

4:30 Who are these missionaries, Frank? Oh, a fine group of men.

4:35 They maintain a camp near Alder Springs for training as jungle missionaries. You know, getting used to the rugged outdoor life. They've helped us.

4:42 Before with fires, and they're good. How bad is Powder Point? Could be trouble, Chick. What do you mean?

4:50 Alder Springs and Powder Point are within ten miles of each other. Two fires in the same area starting about the same time.

4:57 Very peculiar.

4:59 We'll be fishing all right, but not for trout. What are you talking about, Frank?

5:04 Arson.

5:09 As Edwards turns off the main highway onto a back road where the fire has begun to encroach, your feeling of boredom quickly vanishes. The smoke rising from the burning brush takes on a sinister quality. It could be arson. You watch the men along the road darting here and there to beat out sparks or choke off a creeping ribbon of flame. At one point, Edward slams on the brakes and shouts at you to follow.

5:34 Come on, Chick.

5:35 That man, his clothes are smoldering.

5:39 Hey, what's up, kid? Let me go.

5:40 Hey, stop.

5:41 You're closer, Enquirer man.

5:43 Stand up.

5:44 See if you're okay now.

5:46 Gosh, they were.

5:48 Yeah, yeah, I'm okay. Gee, thanks a lot, Mr.

5:52 Mr.

5:52 Edwards, Forest Supervisor.

5:54 What's your name? Rusk. Alan Rusk, sir.

5:57 I used to know a Stanley Rusk. He was in the Forest Service for years.

6:01 That's my father.

6:02 Oh, he was, huh?

6:04 Then you should know enough not to get sparked. Are you a regular member of the crew?

6:08 No, sir. No, temporary. Taken on this morning as a cook at Alder Springs.

6:12 Then what are you doing in the fire line?

6:14 Oh, helping out during my rest period.

6:17 You're old Stan Rusk's son, all right.

6:20 But for Pete's sake, keep doused by the water truck when sparks are flying around like this.

6:24 Yes, sir.

6:25 All you men, make sure the water truck shoots you every 15 minutes. And watch your left flank. Don't get caught in the horseshoe.

6:34 Come on, Chick.

6:35 We better get up there.

6:39 You creep along the older Springs Road toward the heart of the blaze, closer and closer.

6:44 Flames all around you, choking smoke, and the weird sound of explosions rumbling through the forest.

6:52 What's that, Frank?

6:53 Oh, they're dynamiting to set back the blaze. You really think someone started this thing, Frank? Well, I'll know more when we get to the control point.

7:04 Why?

7:04 A forest fire brings profit to no one. Well, I can tell you why a tree grows crooked. But human beings, well... That's a reporter's specialty, isn't.

7:19 It?

7:20 You push on to the control point at Alder Springs. Here at the center, green leaves and pine needles burn like gas. Huge bulldozers like prehistoric monsters in the ghastly glow make clearings trying to hem in the blaze. You'll check Gleason, a reporter who went out on a routine assignment.

7:39 Stand transfixed.

7:41 Chief Ranger Jeff Carey comes running over to Supervisor Edwards.

7:46 Bulldozer's ever hemmed in on three sides, Mr.

7:48 Edwards.

7:48 Well, how's the wind? Duncan's just going up the tree to check.

7:51 Where, Jeff?

7:52 It's always a good picture.

7:53 You newspaper guys, nothing stops you. Over there, that big pine.

7:57 You focus your camera on the treetop. Presently, a man appears in the uppermost branches among the swirling smoke and sparks.

8:05 He holds out a flag.

8:07 You've shot it before, the way a veteran firefighter gauges the wind from a treetop with his little flag. You've clicked the shutter. From where he stands, Cary reads the flapping flag like a precision instrument.

8:20 Fourteen miles an hour from the southeast, sir.

8:22 I'm dying. Well, that's a good sign.

8:24 Unless the wind rises again after a lull, then it'll.

8:27 Be twice as bad.

8:28 What's the situation at Powder Point, Jeff?

8:30 Stubborn spot lays down there, sir. So far, the missionaries have been holding their own.

8:35 You'd better go down there yourself, Jeff. And make sure the fire doesn't get behind them.

8:39 Yes, sir.

8:39 Are you mind if I go along, Frank?

8:41 I'm all for it. Those boys deserve.

8:43 A good write-up.

8:49 Those boys deserve a good write-up. Words which come back to haunt you, Chick Gleason. But mean little now as you set off behind Jeff for Powder Point. It's a long, grueling hike. And the only way to get through is on foot.

9:05 Night falls.

9:06 You're a reporter, a trained observer, sometimes an artist. You can't help seeing an eerie beauty in the shades of rose, red, and orange created by the blaze. The crawling fingers of flame which catch the tops of the bigger pines. The boiling pools of fire that change with each new puff of wind. The wind is rising again when Jeff comes to a halt.

9:28 Don't wait here, Gleason. The missionaries are in a canyon about a quarter of a mile away. I want to check the lay of the land first. There's no wind. I don't like it.

9:36 Okay. Holler.

9:38 Things are all right. I'll catch up.

9:39 Right.

9:40 But I don't like this wind.

9:46 And you wait.

9:47 From your vantage point, you can't see into the canyon. But you can see black areas in the distance suddenly turning into acres of jewels.

9:56 Fires are all around you. But for some reason, you feel safe. You wait.

10:02 Minutes, hours, you never will be sure. And then it starts to happen. It starts with Jeff frantically rushing back to you. Gleason!

10:11 Gleason! Yeah? Get out of here. What's the matter? You're in the horseshoe. Come on, head north, fast. What about the missionaries?

10:16 They're trapped.

10:17 The fire jumped their lines, blowing down over the canyon. Come on, get going.

10:19 What about you?

10:20 I gotta try and help those fellas. Oh, me too.

10:29 You, Chick Gleason, are a reporter on a story. You're also a man, and other men are in trouble.

10:36 You plunge down toward the canyon behind Jeff. You lose him in the thick, blinding smoke. You start to choke and sob for air. And then suddenly you're blocked by a curtain of flame, behind which you see struggling shapes.

10:49 You hear their anguished cries. You'll always hear them. Peter! Peter!

10:54 This way, there's an opening!

11:02 Peter!

11:03 You, Chick Gleeson. I'm one of the lucky ones. You get back.

11:10 And you're Johnny on the spot when the first group of surviving missionaries staggers into the control point at Alder Springs.

11:17 You know your job.

11:19 You do it.

11:19 Do you mind if I ask a few questions?

11:23 I'm a reporter.

11:24 No. Go ahead.

11:27 Oh, your name? George Trimble. Can you remember much what happened, George?

11:33 A little.

11:34 A little?

11:36 We'd just finished saying grace when the fire flashed into the canyon. Peter Beach and I ran together.

11:41 I made the top of the ridge.

11:44 And I looked around. He.

11:45 He was a human torch. His hair, his clothes.

11:51 It was horrible. Horrible.

11:53 I'll take it easy, Johnny. Sorry to bother you.

11:57 No, no.

11:58 Wait a second.

12:00 Is it true?

12:01 Did somebody set this fire? possible? I can't say for sure. Yet. You've been a reporter for 25 years. Even though you know better, you were beginning.

12:24 To hope the rough ones were all behind you. But this assignment is the roughest yet. The night was bad enough. The day is worse. The dreadful aftermath. The search for the 15 missionaries still unaccounted for. And you find them where everyone expected, in the canyon.

12:55 We stand on the ridge with Edwards and the rest of the search party and look down.

12:59 The canyon walls are covered with a powder-like ash studded here and there with charcoal black stumps. On the canyon floor are the black, twisted bodies of men, 15 of them, burned beyond recognition.

13:12 The missionaries are accounted for.

13:16 Gleason? Uh-huh?

13:18 Got your camera? Yeah, right here, Frank. Use it.

13:22 It may be the only evidence we get. It shatters your nerves, Chick Gleason. It turns your stomach, but you photograph every detail. You shoot it all, sustained through the terrible hours by one thought. If the fire is the work of an arsonist, your pictures may help get him. Only when you run out of film, you quit. Edwards joins you as you stare down on the ghastly scene from a scarred hillside.

13:54 All done, Chick. No more film. Seven of them were married.

13:58 Guy hurt.

13:58 Mr.

13:58 Edwards! Mr.

13:59 Edwards!

14:00 What is it, Jeff?

14:01 Forest Service investigators have picked up two suspects.

14:20 Howdy, folks.

14:20 This is Art Baker.

14:22 You know, the heritage that you and I share as Americans has been given to us by many great men. One of these was Francis Scott Key. During one of the great battles of the War of 1812, he was a prisoner aboard a British ship that had opened fire on Fort McHenry. Night fell, and the cannon continued to thunder.

14:41 By their flashes, this man could now and then see the stars and stripes flying over the fort. As he watched, he took an old envelope from his pocket and he began to write the words, Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave? At sunrise, the flag of freedom was still flying, and Francis Scott Key had completed your national anthem.

15:03 It is part of your American heritage.

15:18 This is Cy Harris returning at your narrator and the big story of Charles Gleason as he lived it and wrote it. As you walk back through the burned-over forest to get a look at the two suspects, Jake Gleason, your story begins to take shape in your mind. No matter what you've been through, you're a reporter. The only reporter in this case. And you have to meet your deadline.

15:42 When you arrive at Alder Springs Control Point, County Sheriff Bert Hanna and Chief Ranger Jeff Carey are questioning the first suspect, Sam Snyder, a man with a record of petty larceny.

15:54 You drive a blue Ford, that right, Snyder?

15:56 Yep, blue Ford with white walls. Right over there, Sheriff.

16:00 What were you doing on the Alder Springs Road at 5 a.m.

16:03 Yesterday morning?

16:04 Oh, just driving around, Mr.

16:06 Carey.

16:06 Doing what?

16:07 Just looking out the window at the scenery.

16:09 If you'd seen any signs of smoke, you'd have reported it, I suppose.

16:12 Well, you bet. I know my duty as a citizen. Then why didn't you? The fire was going in, and you drove right past.

16:19 I didn't see no smoke.

16:20 Maybe you didn't want to. Maybe you started it.

16:23 Oh, now, look. Why would I start a forest fire? What's in it for me?

16:27 Better tell the truth, Snyder. Fifteen men died. You're a murder suspect.

16:32 Murdered?

16:34 Okay. So I was there with three other guys.

16:38 It was deer hunting.

16:40 I got witnesses.

16:40 Who?

16:41 Gus Roberts, Levi Eastman, and Sid Calhoun.

16:44 It was all along. And the deer's in my meat locker.

16:48 Hunting, not a season. Yeah, I admit it. That's why when we seen the smoke, we didn't report it.

16:54 We just took off fast.

16:55 Well, if your story checks, you can go, Snyder. You'll get a summons for hunting out a season later.

17:00 Okay. But it ain't murder.

17:06 Snyder's story checks.

17:09 You, Chick Gleason, are standing by when Sheriff Hanna takes down the report via radio phone. You're not a vengeful man, but you feel a vague twinge of disappointment. Now that the Forest Service investigators have definitely established the fires as the work of an arsonist, you have an overwhelming compulsion to see it brought to justice.

17:28 When the second suspect is brought out for questioning, you're startled to see who it is.

17:33 He's got no business holding me, Sheriff. All you have to do is answer a few questions to clear yourself, Rusk.

17:38 Tell him how crazy it is to try and pin this forest fire on me, Mr. Carey. My father was in the Forest Service 30 years.

17:45 You know him.

17:46 Sheriff, this boy was brought up in the traditions of the Forest Service.

17:49 You own a green Buick sedan, don't you, Rusk?

17:52 Yeah.

17:52 Is that a crime?

17:54 It was seen on the Alder Springs Road early yesterday morning at the time the fire started.

17:58 Well, I can explain that. I was squirrel hunting.

18:01 Another hunter. Was anybody with you?

18:04 No.

18:05 I can vouch for the boy's background, Sheriff.

18:07 His father was the best.

18:09 Thanks.

18:10 Now, Rusk, your car was seen on the Alder Springs Road at 5.45 a.m.

18:15 Where were you a.

18:16 Half hour before? Heck, I wasn't even on the Alder Springs Road.

18:20 I remember the sun was just dipping out of the canyon and I glanced at my watch.

18:23 The canyon, Rusk?

18:25 The canyon near Powder Point?

18:27 I didn't say that.

18:28 No, no, you didn't, Russ. But there's no other canyon within a half hour's drive of all this spring. I'm taking you in.

18:40 You and Jeff Carey go along with the sheriff as he drives Alan Russ back to the county jail at Willows.

18:46 But under hours of questioning, Russ stands his ground. I tell you, I was squirrel hunting. That's all, just squirrel hunting.

18:54 We found kitchen matches in your car.

18:56 Well, then you better arrest every camper in California. He has a point, Sheriff.

19:00 Most people carry kitchen matches when they camp.

19:03 Thanks, Sheriff.

19:04 I was fighting a blaze on the lines myself, wasn't I?

19:07 Mr.

19:07 Gleason here saw me when my clothes caught on fire. Mr. Edwards was with him.

19:11 Yes, that's true enough.

19:12 There you see, Sheriff.

19:13 But that was yesterday afternoon. We're talking about yesterday morning.

19:16 I was brought up in the forest, Sheriff. I'm the last person in the world to set a fire.

19:21 Your car was spotted at Alder Springs, and you yourself let slip that you were powder point a half hour before. Those are the starting points of both fires, Russ. And we know that they were set.

19:31 I told you I was squirrel hunting.

19:33 Well, until you come up with something better than squirrels, I'm keeping you in custody.

19:37 This way, Rusk.

19:38 What's the charge?

19:39 Suspicion.

19:41 Come on.

19:46 Rusk has a good name and a story that's hard to crack. But you can know that beneath his righteous indignation lies an undercurrent of fear. He decides to dig around in his background. After wasting time in several interviews that turn up nothing, you drive into the gas station owned by his best friend.

20:08 I'll fill her up.

20:09 Sure thing.

20:10 Check your oil?

20:11 No, no, it's okay. Hey, uh, you're a good friend of Alan Rust's, aren't you?

20:16 Yeah.

20:17 Terrible thing about him. They got the wrong guy for sure. Want me to drop some stuff in the tank that'll clear out your carbon? No, no thanks. I, uh, I hear you and Rust do a lot of squirrel hunting together. We never went squirrel hunting in our lives. Fishing, that's our sport. Hey, your left rear tire is mighty thin.

20:36 You could use a new one.

20:38 No, not today.

20:40 It's a funny thing, but a guy told me Rusk was great for squirrel hunting.

20:44 Not Alan.

20:46 That'll be 260.

20:46 Oh, yeah.

20:47 Here you are.

20:50 You're sure Rusk doesn't go squirrel hunting?

20:53 What is this?

20:54 You the squirrel's friend or something?

20:56 He don't hunt, period.

20:58 He's scared of guns.

20:59 Won't go near one.

21:00 So, Rusk lied. But you can't pin a forest fire on a man because he doesn't hunt. Besides, what would be his motive? You keep talking to people, hoping to uncover a possible motive. And finally, you locate his sister-in-law. She's in a laundromat doing the family wash.

21:23 Please, mister, no more questions.

21:25 I have washing to do for three kids.

21:27 You were saying Mrs. Rust didn't live with her husband anymore. Now, why?

21:31 Because she left him.

21:32 Well, why did she leave him?

21:34 Oh, have your nerve. All reporters is nosy.

21:37 Oh, they have to be to keep their jobs. Was he drunk or something like that?

21:41 Oh, no, no. Nothing like that. You mustn't write that.

21:44 What was it then?

21:45 Well, he was always in debt. Always owing everyone. A car not paid for. Once he came and took the furniture. Then when he got out of work, his wife couldn't stand it. Everybody's done in them. No food.

21:58 Things were desperate, so she left him.

22:03 Dire financial straits.

22:06 You found a motive for lots of crimes, Chick Gleason, but not for setting a forest fire that profits no one and time's running out.

22:13 Two days have passed since Russ was taken into custody.

22:16 With no real evidence against him, it's impossible to hold him in jail much longer. And you're more certain than ever, though, you can't prove it, that he's guilty. You go to Sheriff Hanna with a plan.

22:27 Mr.

22:27 Gleason here wants to show you some pictures he took at the scene of the fire, Russ.

22:31 Well, suit yourselves. I'm getting out of here today anyhow. My lawyer says so.

22:34 Well, maybe you'll want some as souvenirs of your stay. Thanks. This first one was taken on a ridge near Powder Point. Burned out stump, huh? No. Animals. It's hard to tell the difference, isn't it, Russ? Sort of. Well, this was taken at the point looking down into the canyon. Animals again. Now, men this time. Three men to be exact. Here's a close-up of one of them. His name was Lou Rutherford.

23:07 How'd they identify him? On the inscription on his wedding ring. Why take pictures of stuff like that? That ain't nice.

23:14 Nothing's nice about a forest fire, Russ. Take a look at this one.

23:18 Four devils trying to shield his eyes.

23:20 Fire must have blinded him before he died.

23:22 And this man, he was caught trying to scramble over.

23:28 The... You show the pictures for a solid hour, Chip, please. One by one. You have them.

23:33 Carefully arranged in a sequence of mounting horrors. And as you present the last and most gruesome of them, Rust starts to show signs of cracking. You pour it on. You recall word for word the reports of the nine missionaries who lived. You describe with the precision of a good reporter what you yourself had witnessed.

23:51 And the sweat breaks out on Rust, and he turns white. And finally he shudders and breaks.

23:57 No. I'm not. I can't look anymore. You can't make me.

24:02 Only a few left, Rusk, this one and two others. See, he's trying to claw his way into the earth, and the man next to him is praying. Did you ever hear the Lord's Prayer shrieked.

24:09 In agony, Rusk? You would have if you'd been at Potter Point.

24:12 I said stop, stop! I ain't gonna listen.

24:15 Now, the next to the last one, Rusk, a mummy. A man mummified by smoke and fire.

24:20 Sit down to my side.

24:21 I won't look.

24:21 Sit down, Rusk.

24:22 No, no.

24:23 You'll look.

24:23 No, no, Sheriff, please.

24:25 Show him the last picture, Chick.

24:27 All right, all right. I set the fires. Don't show me anymore.

24:36 Are you willing to sign a confession?

24:37 Yeah. But I didn't mean for anyone to get killed.

24:44 Why did you do it, Rusk?

24:45 Why?

24:47 I needed work. I was broke. I owed money. I was desperate. You mean you started the fires to get a job fighting them?

24:56 Yes.

24:58 I needed a job. The Forest Service pays good, a dollar ninety an hour. I didn't think anyone would get hurt. I swear, all I wanted was a job.

25:09 You got your job.

25:11 Fifteen men dead, twenty-four children fatherless, seven women widows, and a thousand acres of timber burned over.

25:18 You got your job.

25:19 I'll take him out, Chick, if you don't have any more questions.

25:22 Just one, Sheriff. How much do you make, Russ?

25:25 $ 36. 10. And so ends another big story.

25:40 In order to protect the names of people actually involved in tonight's authentic big story, the names of all characters in the dramatization were changed, with the exception of the newspaper reporter.

25:59 The Big Story has been a presentation of the United States Armed Forces Radio Service.

26:05 The Big Story.

26:32 THE END.

27:17 Welcome back. All right, now let's go ahead and, as usual, go through the cast. Our reporter, Chick Leeson, was played by Joe Helgeson. And then also in the cast, Dean Almquist. Carl Swenson played Alan Rusk. And then we have Earl George, Michael O'Day. Ed Fuller, and Chelsea Garrett. And of course, we need to address the change in narrator. That was not Bob Sloan, who we've heard throughout the series. Rather, it's Norman Rose. Legendary voice behind a lot of narration, most notably the opening of Dimension X. as well as the Juan Valdez coffee commercials. And he's got a great voice, no complaints with Norman Rose. I will say that I miss Bob Sloan, and it's kind of hard to put into words what he contributed, but there was a sense

28:26 with his voice. While I don't think it was as technically as pleasant as Norman Rose's to listen to, There is just such a sense of, you can just imagine an old journalist as your narrator.

28:41 There's just this.

28:42 Perfect world weariness that Sloan brought to the announcing duties. And from what I can gather, Sloan had actually moved to Hollywood. He was a writer as well as a producer on one of the series that we featured on video theater a few years back. Treasury Men in Action, also known as Federal Men in Syndication. Rose certainly brings many fine qualities as a narrator, and I think I'd grow to appreciate it if we had more than two episodes with him. But since next week is our last episode, to me, Bob Sloan is the voice of the bank story. Now, this was a fairly recent event. It had occurred with a fire that started on July 9th, 1953, the Mendocino National Forest. The actual locations, Powerhouse Ridge and Rattlesnake Ridge,

29:45 and this was known as the Rattlesnake Fire. The missionary group was also real, with 13 missionaries losing their lives. The group they belonged to was known as New Tribes Mission. And today it's known as Ethnos 360. The arsonist in the story in real life was a man named Stanford Patton. And quoting from stories behind the big story, he was known to have problems, according to his father, always embellishing stories and disappearing into the countryside for days at a time.

30:21 He lost his job, which rattled him greatly because financial difficulties were piling up and he could never find a job to hold on to. A newspaper noted his wife's comments. He wanted so badly to be a game warden and just did not have the education to make it. And he did get a job as a cook for the firefighters.

30:41 And he ended up getting sentenced to two consecutive two to ten year terms in prison for felony willful burning. Patton served three years in prison. and then received a Christmas pardon in 1965 from California Governor Pat Brown on the completion of his parole. And as much of a tragedy as it was 12 years previously, this three-paragraph article in the Sacramento Bee is kind of fascinating for what it doesn't say. After explaining... the initial pardon that none of the 28 people who were being pardoned were serving in prison currently, that they had completed parole. And they write, the two superior, and that's the area, Californians are Stanford Pete Patton of Willows, convicted in 1953 on two counts

31:54 of burning, growing, or standing grain. And then moved on to the second person who was convicted on a narcotics charge. Given the scale of the tragedy, it seems like a bit of a missed opportunity. Because there's an awful lot of context missing from the article. And it's somewhat ironic because the big story is all about those reporters who died.

32:24 Dig deeper. Who went beyond to find the story behind the story. This is like if you made an anti-Big Story about journalists who missed out on opportunities because they just couldn't be bothered. Now, obviously, the Big Story episode itself had a lot of embellishments. Particularly the dramatic confession where the reporter spends hours showing... the guilty party pictures of the burn scene. But I think it does reflect the emotional weight of what Mason went through. He went out there to cover your typical forest fire story. And he was an old hand at these. And according to stories behind the big story, he didn't even take a book with him. It was just standard wildfire books. And, you know, you could write those stories, you know, a

33:28 lot of things very similar said each time. And he ends up seeing all of these men killed. The episode reflects the ultimate sadness and anger over the pointless loss of life caused by one man, even if it didn't reflect how the case unfolded. Well, now it's time to thank our Patreon supporter of the day. Thank you to Cassandra, Patreon supporter since September 2025, currently supporting the podcast at the Shamus level of $ 4 or more per month. Thanks so much for your support, Cassandra. And that will do it for today. If you're enjoying the podcast, please follow us using your favorite podcast software and be sure to rate and review the podcast wherever you download it from.

34:21 We'll be back next Tuesday with another episode of The Big Story, but join us back here tomorrow for Broadway's My Beat, where.

34:28 She got shot. She must have stumbled around, Danny. Fallen against that book rack. Knocked it over. Who found her? Custodian.

34:34 Came in here with his mop and pail and dust rag. Grabbed a dime out of the cash box and called it in. It unsettled him. He says he can't work a lick today. I told him I'd fix it with his boss.

34:43 She's in bad shape, Muggerman. Have you... Yeah. I called for the ambulance, Danny. Be here any minute. Don't worry about it.

34:49 Know who she is?

34:50 Yeah, a custodian filled me in, Amelia Lane. She was working here as a librarian when he got this job. Told me she was kind, thoughtful, never yelled at him once. Had a stretch to hear her sometimes, he said. Said the staff gave her a birthday party around six months ago, her 50th. Said the cake was chocolate with marshmallow frosting on the shape of an open book.

35:08 You and the custodian got along real well, huh?

35:10 Yeah, a nice guy, Danny. He was real sorry about Miss Lane. He said people had to die this way.

35:14 It shouldn't be Miss Lane. She's not dead. Well, he told me she would be. Said he.

35:19 Just had a feeling because she was such a nice lady, a good lady. He said good people like Miss Lane don't happen often, don't last when they do.

35:26 I hope you'll be with us then. In the meantime, send your comments to box13 at greatdetectives.net. Follow us on Twitter at Radio Detectives and check us out on Instagram, instagram.com slash greatdetectives. From Boise, Idaho, this is your host, Adam Graham, signing off.