Henry Box Brown and His Savior, Huckleberry Hound

I love radio theater. I first heard what is generally referred to as “old time radio” as a kid. A teacher had an album of “War Of The Worlds” which entranced me. I heard “A Christmas Carol” with Orson Welles as narrator and Lionel Barrymore as Scrooge Christmas Eve 1979 on WHEN-AM in Syracuse. And I eventually started ordering cassette tapes of old broadcasts–comedy, thriller, everything–from a catalog.

I was too young to be listening to radio in the evening during a brief renaissance for radio drama in the 1970s. CBS Radio Network had its “Mystery Theater” and in 1979 the “Sears Radio Theater”, which did a weekly rotation of comedies, westerns, thrillers, adventures and love stories each hosted by well-known celebrities. I’ve been listening to some of the latter series and am particularly interested in a western episode (hosted as were all the “westerns” by Lorne Greene) titled “Henry ‘Box’ Brown.” It, like the entire series, is posted on archive.org:

The episode, based on a true story, stars Don Blakely as slave Henry Brown. Unbeknownst to Henry, his wife is sold in a slave auction. It is made clear in the exchange of dialogue at the auction that she is pregnant. Brown, in speaking with a friendly white shopkeeper, devises a plan to encase himself in a box and be shipped to Philadelphia.

The program does a stellar job depicting the evil of slavery, the hubris of slaveowners, and the complicated means by which Brown’s plan was executed. (Blakely as Brown narrates the story in character which is an effective storytelling device, and essential to comprise elements of the events down to the 50-minute running time.)

As for Samuel Smith, the storekeeper who helped Brown escape to freedom? He is portrayed in this broadcast by Daws Butler. After a lifetime of cartoons, Stan Freberg records and the like, there are certain voices I can pinpoint immediately. Daws Butler is one of those.

I’m not going to lie…when Daws Butler performed his opening lines, speaking a Southern accent, sounding about 80% like Huckleberry Hound, it was a bit jarring. But it didn’t last. Daws Butler, like so many cartoon voice artists, was above all else a great actor. And he was fantastic in this show. The entire cast was quite marvelous. There are obviously elements in the scripting and performance that might be handled differently today. And Lorne Greene gives the standard disclaimer that some aspects of the story were fictionalized.

But Henry “Box” Brown did nail himself into a box and had himself sent to Philadelphia. A remarkable story.