Heartbeat Theater - The Seventy-Second Christmas

Heartbeat Theater (1956 - 1985) was the last live, regularly
scheduled radio drama produced in Hollywood. The first one was
produced in December of 1955 and released in March, 1956. I think
Preston Foster was in the first one. Raymond Burr did some, Greer
Garson--everyone's done a 'Heartbeat' at one time or another. All
sorts of famous people appeared on the show. The Salvation Army
saved "Heartbeat" in 1977 with its plan to update sound effects
and dramatize social issues. After the 1977 transformation,
Hills' new "Heartbeat Theater" wallowed in prostitution, incest
and homosexuality with the regularity of a 1980s TV sitcom. At
one point, Hills had to discourage an overenthusiastic would-be
TV writer from submitting "Heartbeat" plays with a Kojak-like
Salvation Army captain climaxing final acts by chasing down
villains in a squad car. The final show, featuring Daws Butler
and hosted by "Days of Our Lives" soap-opera doctor MacDonald
Carey, was taped Oct. 10, 1985 at Studio House in Hollywood, just
after producers George Galbraith and Don Hills got word that the
Salvation Army had written them out of their 1985 budget. Hills,
who cranked out 52 morality tales a year for the show, said the
Salvation Army spent half its annual media budget on keeping the
half-hour drama alive for the 500 U.S. radio stations on the
"Heartbeat" distribution list.