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A Heart of Gold

Description

Miriam Purcell, an elderly woman obsessed with gold, is confronted by an artist who exposes her twisted visage. As she recalls her past betrayals, she wrestles with the decision to mint coins for a library or redeem herself and leave the wealth to it undivided. Finally, she chooses the latter, showing a change in her heart.

An old woman named Miriam Purcell loves gold more than anything else. When an artist shows her how ugly her greed has made her, she remembers all the bad things she did to people. She must decide whether to turn her gold into coins for a library or give all her money to the library without keeping any for herself. In the end, she gives everything away, proving her heart has changed.

Miriam Purcell, an elderly philanthropist, decides to have her remaining gold melted down and made into commemorative coins, with her image on them. While sitting for her portrait, draped in her gold jewelry, she recalls how she betrayed her friends—even at the expense of one’s life—to accumulate her gold. But when the coins are completed, she is shocked to find they reveal all of her past.

CBS Radio Mystery Theater is a radio drama series created by Himan Brown that was broadcast on CBS Radio Network affiliates from 1974 to 1982, and later in the early 2000s was repeated by the NPR satellite feed. In New York City it was not aired by the then all-news WCBS but by its originating station, WOR, which produced and announced it as simply Radio Mystery Theater.

Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Updated Jul 16, 2026.

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