MIKE HAMMER "That Hammer Guy"

A December 1952 to October 1954 Mutual Broadcasting System radio series titled That Hammer Guy starred Larry Haines then George Petrie and Ted DeCorsia as Mike Hammer and Jan Miner as Hammer's secretary Velda and the voice of other female characters on the show. It was written by Ed Adamson and was directed by Richard Lewis. This episode from 1953 features Larry Haines as Hammer. Michael Hammer is a fictional character created by the American author Mickey Spillane. Hammer debuted in the 1947 book I, the Jury. Hammer is a no-holds-barred private investigator who carries a Colt .45 M1911A1 in a shoulder holster under his left arm. His love for his secretary Velda is outweighed only by his willingness to kill a killer. Hammer's best friend is Pat Chambers, Captain of Homicide NYPD. Hammer was a World War II army veteran who spent two years fighting jungle warfare in the Pacific theatre against Japan. Larry Haines first became known in the 1930s as an actor on the radio crime series Gangbusters. Playing Joe Lincoln, he was the star of Treasury Agent on the Mutual Broadcasting System in 1947-48. He also was featured in The Chase, Cloak and Dagger, Inner Sanctum Mystery, The Man Behind the Gun, and This Is Nora Drake. It was estimated that he acted in more than 15,000 radio programs in the 1940s and 1950s. Four decades later, he would return to radio, starring in 82 episodes of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater. His best known role was that of next door neighbor Stu Bergman on the soap opera Search for Tomorrow.