Well, I suspect that there are some Holmes fans that would take exception to that claim. While he doesn't have the instant name recognition that Holmes enjoys, Nick Carter does have a year of seniority, having first appeared in print in 1886. In this incarnation, he was your typical strong-of-body, strong-of-mind dime novel hero, the likes of which would be seen later with Doc Savage. After approximately a thousand written stories and several movies (both silents and talkies), Nick Carter finally came to radio in 1943 and lasted until 1955. Throughout the whole run, Carter was portrayed by Lon Clark while his assistant Patsy Bowen (who was a man in the dime novels) was done by Helen Choate until mid-1946 and by Charlotte Manson thereafter (the episodes starring Choate are marked with an asterisk). Carter was a very methodical investigator. In the epilogue of each episode, he would explain what each clue meant and how they connected together.

A Cat Brings Death*

Nick has a hunch that the theft of a Persian belonging to the police commissioner's aunt is connected to a recent series of jewel robberies.

An Angle of Murder*

A banker hires Carter to help take in a possible embezzler discretely. But before they can get to a meeting with his partners, he gets shot in a dimly lit corridor.

An Eye for an Eye*

Nick heads upstate to the family of a cop killed in the line of duty to inform them of it and finds the place a hotbed of hatred and murder.

The Barefoot Banker

The Body on the Slab*

Carter is hired to search for a businessman who was last seen at a seedy joint. Further investigation reveals that it wasn't a simple case of being mugged by the establishment's disreputable owner.

The Bull and Bear

When an attempt to pass a phony hundred is botched, the store detective is shot dead, but not by the bill passer. In fact, the bullet may have been intended for him.

Candidate's Corpse

A politician wishes to hire Carter to protect him during a rally. But he declines as his potential client refuses to give any details of the alleged threat.

The Case of the Disappearing Corpse

The Case of the Last Old-Timer

The Case of the Magic Rope

The Case of the Missing Street

Nick helps out a man starting out as a contractor who got swindled out of what little cash he had by an agency which was supposedly going to hire him.

The Case of the Perfect Alibi

A gangster is able to evade a charge of murder against a prosecutor who got his brother sentenced to the chair since he can prove his whereabouts from a traffic ticket he received in a town some distance away.

The Case of the Phantom Shoplifters

The Case of the Policy Makers

A State Senate candidate hires Nick to help him against some blackmailers who have framed him for a fake hit and run.

The Case of the Unwritten Letter

A man is found shot at a converted office building and the only clues Nick has are a race form and an unmarked envelope containing a blank sheet of paper.

The gimmick writer Al Bester features in this story is also used by him in The Brief Fame of John Copper (The Shadow).

The Case of the Wrong Mr. Right

Corpse in the Cab*

The body of a history teacher is found in the backseat of a taxi. Nick heads to the place he got into the cab in hopes of finding a link to the murderer.

Dead Witnesses*

A gangster gets gunned down in broad daylight by a rival. This seemingly straightforward case is complicated not only by the suspect being hard to find, but also by the witnesses dying in "accidents".

Death After Dark*

Nick investigates a series of killings in a park where the women attacked are completely drained of blood.

Death Behind the Scenes*

A temperamental actor is victim to several near miss accidents during the rehearsal of a play.

Death by Ricochet*

When a friend of Nick's is practicing his pistol in an old quarry, one of the bullets ricochets and kills a man on a nearby property. Carter's investigations reveal that his friend's activities may have been used to cover up murder.

Death Goes to the Post*

Nick believes that a jockey riding a long shot that was winning was killed by a high-powered rifle while in the home stretch, but with the body badly trampled he'll have a hard time proving it.

Death in the Pool*

Things look bad for a divorced friend of Patsy's when her ex-husband is found stabbed and floating in the pool in front of her apartment building.

Death Plays the Lead*

Nick investigates the murder of the leading lady of a touring troupe which had been performing near an Army base.

Demented Daughter

Dictaphone Murder

The Double Disguise*

Carter meets an unemployed salesman who had received a hundred which was from a burglary that resulted in murder. A bit of digging leads Carter to believe that the man wasn't given the bill merely because he was a handy dupe.

The Drug Ring Murder

The Echo of Death*

Nick goes to an isolated hunting lodge to investigate the disappearance of a financial columnist who was on the verge of discovering the man behind a stock swindle.

Eight Records of Death

The Flowery Farewell

The Flying Duck Murders*

Carter is sent to investigate the shenanigans at a Montana gold mine, even though two other private detectives had met with "accidents" while doing the same.

The Forgetful Killer

The sales manager of a respectable publisher is being blackmailed by a petty crook about his sordid past. The next day, the crook is found dead and the evidence points to the manager, even though he doesn't recall doing it.

The Funeral Wreath*

Nick investigates a murder where the killer was dressed as an undertaker and had left behind a funereal wreath.

The Glass Coffin

The Haunted Rocking Chair*

Nick is asked to look into a matter where a rocking chair that had belonged to a dead matriarch of the family who was alleged to be a witch starts rocking on its own when one of the family is to die by the end of the year.

Jeweled Queen

The Make Believe Murder

Carter is invited to join an exclusive club where he must solve a pretend murder for the initiation. But the fun turns sour when the member playing the corpse turns out to be actually dead.

The Man Who Lived Too Long*

An amateur inventor claims to Nick that a corporation who he has refused to sell the patent of his potentially profitable development to is trying to kill him.

Mind Over Murder*

An amnesiac asks Nick to help him find out if he's committed a crime, as his suit is covered with blood and he's carrying a large amount of money.

Missing Harold Ascourt*

Nick is hired by the Ascourts to find their son who was kidnapped by a gang who have it in for Carter.

Monkey Sees Murder*

A professor in Boston asks Carter to come over for help concerning a problem that's been bothering him. But when he arrives, he finds the professor murdered.

Murder by Fire*

During a factory fire, Carter hears a scream from inside. By the time he gets her out, she's already dead. It looks to be a combination of arson and murder, and Carter is keen to find out who's behind it.

Murder Goes to College*

The dean of a women's college calls in Carter to investigate the apparent suicide of a student by sleeping pill overdose. But the more he digs, the more it looks like murder.

Murder in a Decanter*

During a New Year's Eve party Nick and Patsy are attending, the hostess is found in the library with her head smashed in.

Murder in the Night*

While on vacation upstate, the sheriff of a small town asks Nick to help him solve a murder discovered by the milkman.

The Mystery of Hangman's Wood*

Nick goes to an archaeological dig site on the Potomac to investigate the shadow of a hanging man with no apparent source that has a mundane, though still sinister, explanation.

The Numbers Murders*

When a person who scored big in a numbers game is found shot and his winnings stolen, Nick figures that a rival racketeer is trying to muscle in on the competition.

Ready for Murder*

Nick investigates the curiously timed deaths of the heirs to an inheritance where there's no obvious proof that they were murdered.

Shakespeare's Ghost

A collector of rare books hires Nick to trace a man who swindled him out of his First Folio Shakespeare only to find the culprit with his head severed.

The Slingshot Murder*

A newsboy with a stand near a bank tells Nick about some strange actions he's seen that suggest that a robbery is imminent.

State's Prison Evidence

The Substitute Bride

The Sunken Dollar

A dealer in rare coins is found murdered in his shop, but the only item missing is an 1804 silver dollar worth ten grand.

The Unexpected Corpse

The Unwilling Accomplice*

Carter believes that the murderer of a bank president is the same person who is behind a recent series of safecrackings.

The Vanishing Lady*

Nick is hired to find out what happened to a man's pregnant wife who had disappeared when she had arrived at the hospital.

Webs of Murder*

A woman who is harvesting spider webs for military use is killed and her stock of webs stolen. Nick traces the theft to a petty crook, but he gets shot before he can tell who committed the actual murder.

Witch of Donderburg Mountain

The Witness Saw Nothing

Nick looks into a case where a vacuum cleaner salesman has experienced several potentially fatal near misses in one day.