Blair of the Mounties - Single Episodes
Colonel Rhys Davies
Blair of the Mounties is the story of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, a fictional series based on the work of the Northwest Mounted Police before World War I. This fifteen-minute weekly serial aired every Monday for 36 weeks, beginning January 31, 1938, and running through October 3, 1938. It may have been on the air as early as 1935, although there’s no actual proof of this.
The series follows the exploits of Sgt. Blair of the Northwest Mounted Police and was likely the inspiration for Trendell, Campbell, and Muir's Challenge of the Yukon. The series was written by Colonel Rhys Davies, who also played Colonel Blair. Jack Abbot portrayed the Constable. According to Jack French, one of OTR’s best researchers, “Blair is not restricted to Canada, as other Mounties, as we find him, in a few cases, in Great Britain, solving cases.” Overall, the series is described as amateurishly written, with the actor playing Blair coming across as a bit stuffy.
This recording is part of the Old Time Radio collection.
Chapters
Reviews
Strange, but interesting
VTDorch
To answer the question below, I think the "Canadians" might be doing a "Canadian Dainty" accent, which was sort of the Canadian equivalent to the Mid-Atlantic accent. It confused me for a long time as well, not just in this show but also on other OTR - "why do these supposed Canadians sound like they're British?" Because that was the accent the upper and aspirational classes of Canada adopted for a while, is essentially the answer. You can read more about it here - ttps://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/canadian-dainty-accent-canada-day-1.4167610 As for the bad guys sounding American, well, there's a long tradition of American bad guys in Canadian culture. However, I would be interested in knowing more about this series, including if the Colonel Rhys Davies mentioned in this article is indeed the same Rhys Davies in this show - https://matthewkbarrett.com/2016/02/01/the-spy/ It's not the most amusing or well produced show of it's era by a long shot, but it's quite interesting pop culture-history-wise!
Good old-fashioned police detection in northern Canada
Donald Motley
This is a good, solid, series of crime and police detection in an extreme environment. The writing is old-school: straightforward and serious, with no hint of fun or irony. Having no special knowledge of this show, I wonder how Canadian it actually is, since the good guys sound British and the bad guys sound American--anybody know? I also wonder if there is an error in the episode numbers: at the end of ep 06, the announcer says, "You have heard chapter seven of Blair of the Mounties. The next chapter is The Cedar Lake Mystery ((which is listed as episode 07))." It's possible that it was the announcer that was in error.
Blair of the Mounties
lewagner
Comfortable old-time show with a lot of atmosphere, if you like to imagine a howling wind and snowy night in Canada.