Unshackled!

Unshackled! is a radio drama series produced by Pacific Garden Mission in Chicago, Illinois that first aired in 1950. It is the longest-running radio drama in history, and one of very few still in production in the United States. The show is aired over 6,500 times around the world each week on over 1,550 radio outlets and is translated and re-dramatized into seven languages on six continents. As of March 2008, over 3,000 episodes have been produced. Each is 30 minutes in length. Unshackled! is produced in the same way that shows during the Golden Age of Radio were produced. An organist provides live incidental music, and a sound effects person provides sound effects in real time as the show progresses. The show has retained a consistent and distinctive quality throughout its years of production. Shows are transcribed (recorded) live before a studio audience.

Each episode dramatizes the testimony of someone who converted to Christianity, sometimes involving a visit to Pacific Garden Mission or through hearing Unshackled! on the radio. All of the scripts are derived from actual testimonies and actual events, in the same way that Dragnet (a radio series that began its broadcasts around the same time that Unshackled! began broadcasting) is based upon actual police reports.

Beginning in the 1950s, comic book versions of Unshackled! stories have also been produced, and they, along with the radio shows themselves, are said to be highly influential on the works of Jack Chick.

Radio episodes include the life stories of baseball great turned evangelist, Billy Sunday, who is a Pacific Garden Mission convert, and international banker turned homeless vagabond overnight, Dominic Mance. The cast and crew are comprised of popular personalities from the Golden Age of Radio, such as Bob O'Donnell, Jack Bivens and Russ Reed.