Jack Webb stars as Johnny Madero, a kind of private detective who has a boat shop on Pier 23 on the San Francisco waterfront. He rents boats and “does anything else you can blame on the environment”. The character came about when Jack Webb moved from San Francisco, where he had played the part of Pat Novak, to Hollywood and met up with Richard Breen who originally created Pat Novak For Hire. As Pat Novak was still being produced in San Francisco with a new actor and writer Breen and Webb got together to create Johnny Modero: Pier 23.

The similarities of the two shows are striking. Unfortunately Modero was short run and only 2 episodes are still in existence (if you know of any more let me know). However, Jack Webb did return in Feb 1949 to play the part of Pat Novak until June 1949 when he became Joe Friday in Dragnet.