Ralph Bell and Leon Janney

    The long title is "Ralph Bell and Leon Janney always messing with time machines." One of my favorite old-time radio actors, Ralph Bell, appeared in a very wide range of roles and shows. On two separate episodes of a show called "Mysterious Traveler," he costarred with Leon Janney in episodes about time machines. In one, "The Man Who Tried To Save Lincoln," he played a scientist sending Janney into the past to try to save Abe Lincoln. (Spoiler: he didn't succeed.) In another ("Operation Tomorrow"), a scientist sends Janney into the future to find out what happens then, and he meets Bell.
    I appreciate that a story only has to be internally consistent; a series need not be. Still I think there's a certain irony that the twist in the Lincoln story was that Janney couldn't save Lincoln because the time machine was supposed to send his mind into the mind of someone in 1865 who could stop Booth. That didn't work so well. In the other story, the time machine didn't work because Janney couldn't bring anything back to the past from the future, not even memories.
    In other words, the Mysterious Traveler couldn't make up his mind. If you wanted to take your time machine to the past, then your memory would work fine going backward, but your aim might not be so good. But if you wanted to take your time machine to the future, suddenly you won't be able to remember anything when you get back. Or maybe Ralph Bell and Leon Janney just weren't very good with time machines. By and large, they always seemed to need a bigger tube! (Not really an inside joke; just a plot point that sounds silly, retroactively.)