RAYMOND BURR COLLECTION

OLD TIME RADIO - 3 CD - 124 mp3 - Total Playtime: 61:09:57

Burr was born Raymond William Stacey Burr in New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada, to William Johnston Burr (1889–1985), an Irish hardware salesman, and his wife, Minerva (née Smith, 1892–1974), a concert pianist and music teacher, who was of English and Scottish descent. After his parents divorced, Burr moved to Vallejo, California with his mother and younger siblings, Geraldine and James Edmond. He attended a military academy for a while and graduated from Berkeley High School.

In later years Burr freely invented stories of a happy childhood. He told the Modesto Bee in 1986, for example, that when he was twelve and a half years old, his mother sent him to New Mexico for a year to work as a ranch hand. He was already his full adult height and rather large and "had fallen in with a group of college-aged kids who didn't realize how young Raymond was, and they let him tag along with them in activities and situations far too sophisticated for him to handle." He developed a passion for growing things and, while still a teenager, joined the Civilian Conservation Corps for a year. Throughout his teenage years he had some acting work, making his stage debut at age 12 with a Vancouver stock company.

Burr may have served in the Coast Guard, but never in the United States Navy as he and his publicists later claimed. Nor was he seriously wounded in the stomach during the Battle of Okinawa in the latter stages of World War II. Other invented biographical details include years of college education at a variety of institutions, world travel, an acting tour of the United Kingdom, and success in high school athletics. Such claims were accepted as fact by the press during his lifetime and by his first biographer.
In 1937 Burr began his acting career at the Pasadena Playhouse. In 1941, he landed his first Broadway role in Crazy with the Heat. He became a contract player at RKO studio, playing a film noir villain in Raw Deal (1948).

Burr appeared in over 60 movies between 1946 and 1957. In 1976 Richard Schickel cited his performance in Pitfall (1948) as a prototype of film noir in contrast with the appealing television characters for which Burr later became famous. He received favorable notice for his role as an aggressive prosecutor in A Place in the Sun (1951), co-starring Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift and Shelly Winters. Perhaps his best-known film role of the period was that of a suspected murderer in the Alfred Hitchcock classic Rear Window (1954), starring James Stewart and Grace Kelly. He played the part of reporter, Steve Martin, in Godzilla, King of the Monsters! (1956).

Burr emerged as a prolific television character actor in the early to mid-1950s. He made his television debut on the April 24, 1952 episode "The Tiger" of Gruen Playhouse on the DuMont TV network. (At about the same time, Burr guest-starred on an episode of The Amazing Mr. Malone on ABC.) This part led to other roles in such programs as Dragnet, Chesterfield Sound Off Time, Four Star Playhouse, Mr. & Mrs. North, Schlitz Playhouse of Stars, The Ford Television Theatre, and Lux Video Theatre.

During this time Burr's distinctive voice also could be heard on network radio, appearing alongside Jack Webb in the short-lived Pat Novak for Hire on ABC radio, as well as in early episodes of NBC's Dragnet. He also made guest appearances on other Los Angeles-based shows, such as Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar and landed a starring role in CBS's Fort Laramie (1956), which depicted 19th-century life at old Fort Laramie. One year later, Burr became a television star as Perry Mason.

EPISODES LIST

CBS Radio Workshop 560525 The Little Prince
CBS Radio Workshop 570421 The Son of Man
CBS Radio Workshop 570630 The Battle of Gettysburg
CBS Radio Workshop 570714 The Silent Witness
Dr Kildare 50-10-20 Eddie Jenkins And The Arsonist
Dragnet 49-06-17 Production 3 aka The Werewolf
Dragnet 49-06-24 Production 4 aka Homicide aka Quick Trigger Gun Men
Dragnet 49-07-07 The Helen Corday Murder
Dragnet 49-07-14 Red Light Bandit
Dragnet 49-07-21 Attempted City Hall Bombing
Dragnet 49-07-28 Missing Persons - Juanita Lasky
Dragnet 49-08-04 Benny Trounsel - Narcotics
Dragnet 49-08-11 Production 10 aka Homicide aka Maniac Murderer aka Mad Killer At Large
Dragnet 49-08-18 Production 11 aka Sixteen Jewel Thieves
Dragnet 49-09-01 Auto Burglaries - Myra the Redhead
Dragnet 49-09-10 Sullivan Kidnapping
Dragnet 49-09-17 James Vickers - Cop Killing - Tunnel Chase
Dragnet 49-09-24 Brick-Bat Slayer
Dragnet 49-10-01 Truck Hi-jackers - Tom Laval
Dragnet 49-11-24 Mrs. Rinard Albert Barry - Mother-In-Law Murder
Dragnet 50-08-24 The Big Chance
Escape 510718 Macao
Family Theater 49-08-24 Robert of Sicily
Family Theater 49-11-23 The Courtship of Miles Standish
Family Theater 50-01-25 Lodging for the Night
Family Theater 50-03-08 The Prince and the Pauper
Family Theater 50-06-28 Sir Lancelot of the Lake
Family Theater 50-07-26 Julius Caesar
Family Theater 50-11-15 Peter Zenger
Family Theater 50-12-06 Robert of Sicily
Fort Laramie 55-07-25 ep00 Audition
Fort Laramie 56-01-22 ep01 Playing Indian
Fort Laramie 56-01-29 ep02 The Boatwrights Story
Fort Laramie 56-02-05 ep03 Squaw Man
Fort Laramie 56-02-12 ep04 The Woman at Horse Creek
Fort Laramie 56-02-19 ep05 Boredom
Fort Laramie 56-02-26 ep06 Captains Widow
Fort Laramie 56-03-04 ep07 Shavetail
Fort Laramie 56-03-11 ep08 Hattie Pelfrey
Fort Laramie 56-03-18 ep09 The Beasley Girls
Fort Laramie 56-03-25 ep10 The Coward
Fort Laramie 56-04-01 ep11 Lost Child
Fort Laramie 56-04-15 ep12 Stage Coach Stop
Fort Laramie 56-04-22 ep13 The New Recruit
Fort Laramie 56-04-29 ep14 Capture
Fort Laramie 56-05-06 ep15 Never the Twain
Fort Laramie 56-05-13 ep16 War Correspondents
Fort Laramie 56-05-20 ep17 Gold
Fort Laramie 56-05-27 ep18 Sergeants Baby
Fort Laramie 56-06-03 ep19 Dont Kick My Horse
Fort Laramie 56-06-10 ep20 Young Trooper
Fort Laramie 56-06-17 ep21 Winter Soldier
Fort Laramie 56-06-24 ep22 The Loving Cup
Fort Laramie 56-07-01 ep23 Troopers Widow
Fort Laramie 56-07-08 ep24 Talented Recruits
Fort Laramie 56-07-15 ep25 Old Enemy
Fort Laramie 56-07-22 ep26 Spotted Tails Return
Fort Laramie 56-07-29 ep27 Nature Boy
Fort Laramie 56-08-05 ep28 The Massacre
Fort Laramie 56-08-12 ep29 The Assembly Line
Fort Laramie 56-08-19 ep30 Goodbye Willa
Fort Laramie 56-08-26 ep31 The Chaplain
Fort Laramie 56-09-02 ep32 The Return of Hattie Pelfrey
Fort Laramie 56-09-09 ep33 The Buffalo Hunters
Fort Laramie 56-09-16 ep34 The Payroll
Fort Laramie 56-09-23 ep35 The Woman at Horse Creek
Fort Laramie 56-09-30 ep36 A Small Beginning
Fort Laramie 56-10-07 ep37 Galvanized Yankee
Fort Laramie 56-10-14 ep38 Still Waters
Fort Laramie 56-10-21 ep39 Indian Scout
Fort Laramie 56-10-28 ep40 Army Wife
Lineup 501116 The Candy Store Murder aka Candy Store Killing
Lineup 501221 The Holsteder Case Hilston Brothers Robbery No Bank Robbed in Six Years Bank HoldUp
Lineup 510111 The Mad Bomber akaGeorge Hunter And The Time Bomb Lewis Black not same as 510626
Lineup 520610 Lobdells PoodleCut Tomato Case akaHit Run Accident Wife Killer
Lineup 520729 The Charles Crocked Clobbering Case akaThe Stanley Farmer Murder Man Beaten To Death In Alley
Lineup 521112 The Buggered Bunco Boys (aka-Grieving Families Cheated)
Lux Radio Theater 50-10-16 House of Strangers
Michael Shayne 48-12-18 Case of the Eager Victim
Night Beat 520717 Taste of Peaches
Pat Novak for Hire 49-02-20 Jack Of Clubs
Pat Novak for Hire 49-02-27 Marcia Halpern
Pat Novak for Hire 49-03-20 Rory Malone
Pat Novak for Hire 49-03-27 Joe Candono
Pat Novak for Hire 49-04-02 Father Lahey-Joe Feldman
Pat Novak for Hire 49-04-23 Rita Malloy
Pat Novak for Hire 49-05-14 Geranium Plant
Pat Novak for Hire 49-05-21 Envelope To John St John
Pat Novak for Hire 49-06-18 Joe Denine Story
Presenting Charles Boyer 50-06-13 The Adventure of the Queen of Sheba (audition)
Presenting Charles Boyer 50-09-21 The Adventure of Painting 137
Railroad Hour 52-05-26 My Maryland
Railroad Hour 53-08-10 Trilby
Richard Diamond 52 04 04 The Enigma of Big Ed
Richard Diamond 53 08 23 The Hollywood Story
Rocky Fortune 54-03-02 The Doctor's Dilemma
Romance 53-09-26 The Treadmill
Screen Directors Playhouse 49-01-23 The Exile
Screen Directors Playhouse 49-05-15 Hold Back the Dawn
Screen Directors Playhouse 49-10-17 Pitfall
Screen Directors Playhouse 50-03-24 Chicago Deadline
Screen Directors Playhouse 50-04-07 The Fighting OFlynn
Screen Directors Playhouse 50-12-28 Alias Nick Beal
Screen Directors Playhouse 51-01-04 Prince of Foxes
Suspense 481104 Death Sentence
Suspense 570310 The Paralta Map
Suspense 570728 Murder on Mike
Suspense 571027 The Country of the Blind
Suspense 581012 The Treasure Chest of Don Jose
Suspense 581221 Out for Christmas
Suspense 590607 The Pit and the Pendulum
The Silent Men 51-10-28 Case of the Rubber Gloves
The Whistler 52-02-24 A Matter of Time
The Whistler 52-03-09 Breakaway
The Whistler 52-09-07 The Secret of Chalk Point
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 500411 The Dead First Helpers
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 500509 The Harold Trandem Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 500720 The Henry J Unger Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 500810 The Hartford Alliance Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 501007 The Richard Splain Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 501028 The Joan Sebastian Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 501111 The Adam Kegg Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 530130 The Kay Bellamy Matter
Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar 561230 The Squared Circle Matter