------------------------------
The Old-Time Radio Digest!
Volume 2004 : Issue 243
A Part of the [removed]!
[removed]
ISSN: 1533-9289
Today's Topics:
Paper on the floor [ "welsa" <welsa@[removed]; ]
"The Lone Listener" [ "Philip Railsback" <philiprailsback ]
7-26 births/deaths [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
radio logs [ "dick g. wamser" <snapp@[removed]; ]
BILL RANDLE [ Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed]; ]
LSMFT [ BH <radiobill@[removed]; ]
FOTR Convention [ Jim Widner <jwidner@[removed]; ]
Old folks [ "Roby McHone" <otr_alaska@[removed] ]
Re: Mary Livingstone, Professional S [ "Brian L Bedsworth" <az2pa@[removed]; ]
Sam Edwards [ JJLjackson@[removed] ]
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 15:08:23 -0400
From: "welsa" <welsa@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Paper on the floor
My, that sure is a lot of paper on the floor of that 1924 shot. Almost too
much to be scripts. Me thinks, since the actors seem to be "acting" more
than was required in radio, that the paper may be there for sound effects.
Shuffling feet through the sand, or grass, or whatever.
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 15:08:49 -0400
From: "Philip Railsback" <philiprailsback@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: "The Lone Listener"
Finally, I am stumped in trying to find a name for my new OTR based
website.
"The Lone Listener", I like. And here's another one for wordplay, and
definitely off the wall -- "Amos and Randy".
- Philip
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 15:12:41 -0400
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: 7-26 births/deaths
July 26th births
07-26-1896 - Charles Butterworth - South Bend, IN - d. 6-13-1946
comedian: "Fred Astaire Show"
07-26-1899 - Danton Walker - Marietta, GA - d. 8-8-1960
broadway columnist: "Forty-Five Minutes on Broadway"; "Twin Views of the News"
07-26-1902 - Gracie Allen - San Francisco, CA - d. 8-27-1964
comedienne: "Burns and Allen Show"
07-26-1903 - Donald Voorhees - Allentown, PA - d. 1-10-1989
conductor: "Show Boat"; "Cavalcade of America"; "Telephone Hour"
07-26-1907 - Galen Drake - Kokomo, IN - d. 6-30-1989
commentator: "Galen Drake"
07-26-1909 - Vivian Vance - Cherryvale, KS (Raised: Independence, KS) - d.
8-17-1979
actress: Ethel Mertz "I Love Lucy"
07-26-1911 - Buddy Clark - Dorchester, MA - d. 10-1-1949
singer: "Your Hit Parade"; "New Carnation Contented Hour"
07-26-1918 - Stacy Harris - Big Timber, Quebec, Canada - d. 3-13-1973
actor: Jim Taylor "This is Your [removed]"; Carter Trent "Pepper Young's Family"
07-26-1922 - Blake Edwards - Tulsa, OK
writer: "Lineup"; "Richard Diamond, Private Detective"
July 26th deaths
05-04-1927 - Terry Scott - Watford, England - d. 7-26-1994
actor: "Junior Choice"; "Great Scott, It's Maynard"; "Hugh and I"
05-07-1919 - Eva Peron - Los Toldos, Argentina - d. 7-26-1952
actress, hostess: "Radio Argentina"; "Radio Belgrano"
11-18-1901 - Dr. George Gallup - Jefferson, IA - d. 7-26-1984
statistician: "Living 1948"
--
Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 15:13:04 -0400
From: "dick g. wamser" <snapp@[removed];
To: "otr" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: radio logs
Hello all: haven't posted in a right smart while, as I've been busy. (so,
who hasn't?) I've got nearly three years' worth of saved and unread OTR
digests to go through some day? <G>
I've started with yesterday's issue and came across the item about attempting
to find radio logs in the newspapers. A memory popped up concerning my
1950's childhood in Ohio, near the town of Panesville. That city contained a
newspaper, the Painesville Telegraph. (now defunct) We lived near Cleveland
as well as nearby other towns with network affiliated stations. In many
ways, equal distant from many. As I remember, the Telegraph carried logs
from stations in Cleveland, Youngstown, Detroit and Akron. I'm pretty sure
they listed programs and times as well as stations. WGAR in Cleveland, WKBN
in Youngstown and WJR in Detroit were all CBS radio affiliates as most of you
know.
The point is, if you live in a limbo town as we did, perhaps the newspaper
morgue might be morgue fruitful than one in a big city. Worth looking?
Dick, Donna, Clayton, Bart, Mizzie and Ginger
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:04:30 -0400
From: Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: BILL RANDLE
The most influencial DJ of his time. Worked for WERE in Cleveland,
Ohhoho.
BILL RANDLE 1923-2004
DJ legend Bill Randle dead at 81
July 10, 2004
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:05:35 -0400
From: BH <radiobill@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: LSMFT
Doug writes:
In the opening of some of the later Lucky Strike programs there is an
announcer who says "[removed]" We all know what that means, but between
the lines we hear what sounds like some kind of mechanical device clicking.
And Laura comments:
I believe that's a telegraph key. I don't know Morse code, but the
inference to me has always been that it's repeatedly transmitting "LSMFT"
much as someone might transmit "[removed]" or "[removed]".
It is just random clicks of a telegraph key that seems to be tapped in
time with the words LS-MFT. If you listen there are two groups of five
clicks each, two quick clicks for "LS" short pause, then three clicks
for "MFT".
Morse code for LSMFT is: L= dot dash dot dot - S=dot dot dot - M= dash
dash - F= dot dot dash dot and T = dash.
Since the telegraph uses clicks instead of tones, a dash is represented
by two quick dots. So to spell out LSMFT with the telegraph would take
19 clicks.
"([removed]) Lucky Strikes/Mean Fine Tobacco"
"([removed]) Lucky Strikes/Means Filter Tips."
"Light up a Lucky Strike, it's light-up time."
"Luckies taste better. Cleaner, fresher, smoother."
"Do you inhale? Of course you do! Lucky Strike has dared to raise this
vital question because certain impurities concealed in even the finest,
mildest tobacco leaves are removed by Luckies' famous purifying process."
"Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet."
Bill H.
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:05:53 -0400
From: Jim Widner <jwidner@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: FOTR Convention
Looked over Jay's latest update for the Friends of Old Time Radio
Convention in October.
Glad to see Jack Bivans as one of the guests. Jack and I have emailed each
other over the past few years about his role in Captain Midnight, which is
featured on my web site
[removed]
Jack provided a number of photographs that I have on the pages plus some
background information.
Hopefully, he will be able to make it and I can finally meet him in person.
Jim Widner
jwidner@[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:06:20 -0400
From: "Roby McHone" <otr_alaska@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Old folks
In the latest OTR Digest Mark Kinsler noted "I'm pretty sure that their
dress and hairstyles make them look a good deal older than the were." I had
to laugh at that because it is true. Last year my high school had a
re-union, I mean the every class that graduated from there because it was a
very small school. The largest class was 1966 (26) the smallest was 1954
(1). My daughter, who is 20, was going through the 1966 year book and
thought the senior class was the teachers section until she saw my picture.
She said that we all looked to be in our late 20s or early 30s. She was
right, compared to her friends we did look much older and more mature.
Maybe the fact that the pictures were in black and white as well as dress
and hairstyle had something to do with it or maybe no piercings or tattoos.
Roby McHone
Fairbanks, Alaska
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:07:17 -0400
From: "Brian L Bedsworth" <az2pa@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Re: Mary Livingstone, Professional
Script-Dropper?
Jer51473@[removed] reminds us that:
Mary Linvingston was a professional
radio performer. She did the show for years and im sure she got paid.
Are you? Other than any prescribed AFRA minimums (which =anyone= with a
speaking part on a scripted series received, amateur or "professional"), it
would be a surprise if Sadye/"Mary" drew a regular salary, if only because
of the favorable tax treatment on income received through a corporation
(either the CBS-era "Amusement Enterprises" shell or whatever other entity
Jack's business manager used before that) in the (bad old) days of 90% top
marginal tax rates on personal income.
She was
a household name. Because she was nervous certainly doesnt make her a non
professional. Ive heard many actors, performers, athletes, etc. testify to
being nervous, uneasy or whatever, but that does not make them unprofessional.
Its well known that Mary was nervous, but to the public only because we have
been told such by Mary and others close to her. She sure didnt come across on
the air, to me, as being anything but an entertaining performer and just as
professional as many others that were better known or not as well known as
she was.
She was also well known for being, shall we say, a bit on the, ah, "odd"
side. (Biographical sketches of Benny by both George Burns and Milton Berle
go into great detail on these matters, but sympathetic treatments by Irving
Fein -- and even Jack & Joan's book -- allude to them, but only if you know
how to fill in some of the gaps.) Based largely on her, um, personal
idiosyncrasies -- presuming the words of those in the industry who knew Jack
best are to be trusted -- Sadye Marks Kubelsky was in the business =solely=
because she was "Mrs. Jack Benny" (a title and persona she would eventually
assume in place of either Sadye or "Mary" for the last two decades of her
life), and not because of any level of "professionalism" she may have
projected or may have been attributed to her.
The determining factor as to whether she was a professional or not sure
wasnt "did she drop paper on the floor or not?".
Think of it as a "window on the soul", then. If, indeed, it was considered
by the vast bulk of the industry to be "unprofessional" to drop script pages
to the floor, what does it say about someone who continues to do so?
(Presuming, again, that the Camp Hahn video shows Mary dropping pages to the
floor rather than, say, on a table out of camera range.)
Don't take this to be saying that Sadye was untalented or did not perform
well in the role of "Mary Livingstone". =Do= take it to be saying that
there's more to being a professional in =any= field than just talent.
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 19:56:47 -0400
From: JJLjackson@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Sam Edwards
It is with great sadness I have to share some news.
Bill Edwards, Sam and Bev's son, called me on Sunday afternoon (7/25) to say
that Sam is dying. He has a hole in his heart, which can't be mended, and he
will slip away tonight. Sam has had a quadruple bypass 12 years ago, and they
deteriorate after 10 years. The family is gathering around him in Durango as
he slides. Bill said that Sam was alert and aware of everyone up until the
very end.
Bill will be composing the obit for the LA Times, and I promised that we'd
take care of getting it to the Seattle papers. I've asked Paul Feavel if he
has a photograph that would be good to accompany it.
We were fortunate to have Sam as part of our REPS family, and such an
integral part of Showcase 2004. He continues to live on in the Showcase
recordings. Those of you who were able to attend Sam's tribute as well as the
rest of Showcase 2004 saw the man in his last public appearance.
I was proud to be able to call him a friend, and share some time with him in
the Green Room, listening to him talk about being in Chabua, India, during
World War II, an area and a time that figured in my play Skyway to Hell.
I will miss his quick wit as he ad-libbed to cover a mistake in a rehearsal,
like the time in the Cold Read when Herb Ellis got confused with the pages of
the script and couldn't find page 15. Sam handed him the page, and said, "He
can have [removed] can't read it anyway." The whole room of people listening
came apart.
Or the time in our recreation of "The Game", when the gun went off, and Sam
and Gil tried to cover a sound effect that shouldn't have been.
Sam had great timing and skills, that he shared with us at Showcase. He
donated boxes of scripts to REPS, from both Sam's and Jack's careers,
original scripts with Jack's drawings on them. They form a significant part
of the 800 scripts that REPS safe-guards.
He was Chester Proudfoot in last year's "They went That-away"--his final
performance.
So lift a glass to one of the Greats. We will miss him. Our best thoughts
and wishes fly to Bev, Bill and the rest of the family. May he find safe
passage.
joy jackson
Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound
[ADMINISTRIVIA: I have a photo of Bill playing for Sam as he, "sings for his
supper" during REPS Showcase 2004 at [removed] --cfs3]
--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2004 Issue #243
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