Subject: [removed] Digest V2004 #89
From: <[removed]@[removed]>
Date: 3/11/2004 8:46 AM

To: <[removed]@[removed];

    ------------------------------

                                The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                                  Volume 2004 : Issue 89
                             A Part of the [removed]!
                                     ISSN: 1533-9289

                                     Today's Topics:

      3-11 births/deaths                    [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
      Re: Bob and Ray and Tom               [ Sheryl Smith <sheryllsmith@earthlin ]
      King for a Day                        [ JackBenny@[removed] ]
      Benny/Burns vs. Stern                 [ JackBenny@[removed] ]
      Information Request                   [ Steven Kelez <otrsteve@[removed]; ]
      Jim Cox update                        [ chris chandler <chrischandler84@yah ]
      Lone Ranger creed                     [ "James Nixon" <ranger6000@[removed] ]
      Lone Ranger Creed                     [ Jim Widner <jwidner@[removed]; ]
      Reply to Martin Grams Jr/Groucho      [ "noho1" <noho1@[removed]; ]
      Building radios                       [ vigor16@[removed] ]
      Martin Gram Jr's Lights Out List      [ George Aust <austhaus1@[removed] ]
      The Clock                             [ "Austotr" <austotr@[removed]; ]
      SFX staff as Actors?                  [ "Nancy Hudson" <hudson@[removed]; ]
      Re: King for a Day                    [ Dixonhayes@[removed] ]

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 19:34:44 -0500
    From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
    To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  3-11 births/deaths

    March 11th births

    03-11-1898 - Dorothy Gish - Massillon, OH - d. 6-4-1968
    actress: Texaco Star Playhouse"; "[removed] Steel Hour"; "Lux Radio Theatre"
    03-11-1900 - Andy Sannella - Brooklyn, NY - d. 1961
    bandleader: "Campbell Soup Orchestra"; "Gillette Community Sing"
    03-11-1903 - Lawrence Welk - Strasburg, ND - d. 5-17-1992
    bandleader: "Lawrence Welk Orchestra"
    03-11-1907 - Jessie Matthews - London, England - d. 8-20-1981
    actress: Mrs. Dale "Mrs. Dale's Diaries"
    03-11-1909 - Ramona - Lockland, OH - d. 12-14-1972
    singer, pianist: "Kraft Music Hall"; "Paul Whiteman's Musical Varities"
    03-11-1934 - Sam Donaldson - El Paso, TX
    talk show host: "Live in America"
    03-11-1952 - Douglas Adams - Cambridge, England - d. 5-11-2001
    writer: "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy"

    March 11th deaths

    02-02-1912 - Stefan Schnabel - Berlin, Germany - d. 3-11-1999
    actor: Herbert Yost "Joyce Jordan, [removed]"
    06-09-1910 - Joseph Julian - St. Marys, PA - d. 3-11-1982
    actor: Sandy Matson "Lorenzo Jones"; Archie Goodwin "Advs. of Nero Wolfe"
    07-17-1889 - Erle Stanley Gardner - Malden, MA - d. 3-11-1970
    creator, writer: "Advs. of Christopher London"; "Perry Mason"; "Life in Your
    Hands"
    10-25-1888 - Richard E. Byrd - Winchester, VA - d. 3-11-1957
    explorer: "Admiral Byrd Broadcasts"
    --
    Ron Sayles
    Milwaukee, Wisconsin

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 20:49:48 -0500
    From: Sheryl Smith <sheryllsmith@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Re: Bob and Ray and Tom

>     I am puzzled more than disturbed I think by the assertion in the Sperdvac
>     newsletter that as much of their material as was claimed was not spontaneous
>     but written by Tom Koch. I really don't argue with this since I don't know
>     the answer, but somehow the sheer volume of attribution in the column
>     bothers me.

    The problem of sorting out what contributions Tom Koch made to various
    Bob & Ray shows will, indeed, be a pretty piece of radio research.  It's
    going to require combing through a lot of written and auditory evidence
    to determine Tom Koch's contribution--and the fact that 1,800 of Tom's
    reported 2,980 submitted scripts no longer exist won't make it any
    easier.  The surviving scripts will need to be compared with surviving
    post-1955 airchecks, and different versions of the auditory material
    will have to be compared with each other, before we can begin to
    separate Tom's material from the rest.  I believe that the late-'50s CBS
    shows are all still around, as is most, if not all, of the WOR material
    from the '70s-and Larry Jacobson's PBS show from the '80s.  A lot of
    this is in circulation in one way or the other.  The Monitor material is
    also reputed to exist:  but I've heard of very little of it circulating,
    and I don't think it's even available right now for auditing.  There are
    also gaps in the auditory record between the CBS shows and the '70s WOR
    shows:  I've heard one or two Bob & Ray airchecks from the '60s, but so
    far I haven't even been able to find out when and where they worked
    during that whole decade-and believe me, I've tried.  ;-)

    Luckily, the pre-1955 Bob & Ray is pretty well represented.  There are
    250-odd surviving shows from their earliest team-up at WHDH in Boston.
    They worked there together from 1946-1951, and ET's seem to have been
    made of almost all of this.  Thanks to the diligence of local
    collectors, who found a trove of this stuff in a transmitter before it
    was discarded, consecutive swathes of these shows are still around:  and
    they improvised there, you betcha.  A half-hour a day, six days a week,
    and sometimes more:  and the sustained quality of the improv, IMO,
    leaves Second City and Saturday Night Live in the dust.  First
    Generation Radio Archives has released, or is preparing to release, much
    of this material in either newly-digitized or low-gen copies:  check it
    out, it's a real treat.

    Another trove of pre-1955 material has been preserved at the Library of
    Congress:  a number of 15-minute shows and a few longer ones.  It's
    catalogued and taped, and by this point it may be possible to go there
    and listen to them.  But a researcher would need to have copies to
    figure out what's going on there, and I don't know of anyone who has yet
    got that kind of access (I tried.)  Only a few of these shows seem to be
    in circulation, and if we're to understand Bob & Ray (and Tom),
    knowledge of these is crucial.  By the end of the WHDH shows, only a few
    of their continuing characters and routines and parodies were in place.
      By the late-CBS shows, they had developed most of the routines and
    parodies and virtually all of the characters:  the Giant Overstocked
    Warehouse, Wally Ballou, Kent Lyle Birdley, the McBebe twins, the whole
    menagerie.  Clearly a lot was happening there, and we need to find out
    what we can about it (there was also a WOR show from the mid-'50s, but
    most of that seems to be AWOL.)  I can't tell what we'll uncover until
    we uncover it-and it would be good to find out whether Tom Koch invented
    routines for them, or whether he contributed to routines that were
    already in existence.  Assuredly he might've done both.  But I suspect
    we'll find that there was still a fair bit of improvising, even in the
    later shows:  those characters and their scrappy relationships with each
    other would be tough to fit within the confines of anybody's scripts.

    Sheryl Smith
    Testing Geek/Guerrilla OTR Researcher

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 20:50:40 -0500
    From: JackBenny@[removed]
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  King for a Day

    A. Joseph Ross writes:

> >     Do not do this effect if you're actually wearing the zippper, lest you
> >     create a "King for a Day" moment.

>     What's a "King for a Day" moment?

    Sorry, you run a fan club for a while and start to assume that everyone knows
    about certain classic episodes.  Jack appeared on the Fred Allen program, and
    Fred said that people are only interested in shows that give away stuff.  The
    scene eventually segues into Fred's own quiz progam, "King for a Day".  Jack
    masquerades as contestant Myron Proudfoot, a man who puts wings on angel
    cakes.  When Jack ultimately wins the quiz, Fred starts rattling off a
    ridiculous
    list of prizes, which culminates in a Hoffman pressing machine on the stage to
    press Jack's pants.  There is a long-standing question of whether Jack
    actually lost his pants during the episode, but the enormous audience screams
    would
    infer that he did.  The show ends in chaos, with Jack trying to get his pants
    back.  The classic capper was Jack saying, "Allen, you haven't seen the end of
    me!" and Fred retorting, "It won't be long now!"

    --Laura Leff
    President, IJBFC
    [removed]

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 20:55:42 -0500
    From: JackBenny@[removed]
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Benny/Burns vs. Stern

    Sean Dougherty writes:

>     This article on Howard Stern mentions that Jack Benny and George Burns
>     boosted early television when they agreed to join it in the same way that
>     Stern might if he moves his show to Satelite radio.

    It's an interesting comment.  I don't know of any figures that can directly
    correlate the start of Jack's or George's programs to an uptick in purchase of
    TV sets, but would like to see them if anyone knows of any.  On the other
    hand, it's a sort of odd comparison considering that Jack stayed on radio
    through
    1955.  So someone could still enjoy Jack Benny on a weekly basis without a
    television (and, in fact, Jack's television show didn't go weekly until 1960).

    Would you invest in a television to see Jack for half an hour once every
    three weeks?  That's his greatest frequency through May of 1954.  Although a
    lot
    of people were on spending sprees at that time, I don't think that Jack's show
    alone would have compelled millions to ante up for a Dumont.

    Probably a more accurate scenario would have been Jack, George, and others
    moving to the new medium and making it a more compelling and solid medium.
    Even
    back to the 1930s, Jack's show had comments about "This isn't TELEVISION!"
    So the medium had been around for decades in the public knowledge but had
    never
    gotten traction as a viable radio competitor.  There's a story that Fred
    Allen, after doing a television show, exhaustedly told Hilliard Marks (Jack's
    brother-in-law), "Don't let Jack get into television."  But if the big names
    were
    making the jump, then it probably would have compelled more stars to take
    television seriously.  With more shows available, then it makes a more
    compelling
    case for the consumer to invest in a set, to enjoy Jack's show and all the
    others.

    Here's a peripherally-related question for those more well-versed in Edgar
    Bergen.  Initially, the thought of a ventriloquist on radio seemed
    ridiculous.
    However, Bergen was highly effective in creating his cast of characters as
    entities separate from himself.  Was there ever any fear of Bergen being able
    to
    make the jump to television, because seeing Charlie, et al as dummies rather
    than real people would ruin the illusion created on radio?

    --Laura Leff
    President, IJBFC
    [removed]

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 21:44:14 -0500
    From: Steven Kelez <otrsteve@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Information Request

    This request came in today so I thought I'd pass it on to one of the experts in
    this group.

    Judy Gainer wrote:

    I am looking for radio programs that aired on WGN and KMOX in the 1940's. My
    mother was a lesser known radio star and I am trying
    to find reproductions of her shows. Her name was Elmira Roessler. She also
    had the
    psuedomyn Lynn Lorraine. any help you have in
    assisting me with this search is appreciated.

    If anyone can help Judy she can be reached at this address:  jggainer@[removed]

    Steven Kelez
    RADIO SHOWCASE

    ------------------------------

    Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 21:44:51 -0500
    From: chris chandler <chrischandler84@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Jim Cox update

    Saw Jim [removed]'ve moved him back to the CCU,
    but even so he seemed markedly improved--much more
    alert, and slightly cantankerous, which is a good sign
     :)  He will still be in the hospital for the
    foreseeable future.

    He and his wife really appreciated all the get well
    messages.  A couple people asked about a mailing
    address to send cards:  it's Norton Suburban Hospital,
    4001 Dutchmann's Lane, Lville, KY, 40207.  They keep
    moving him around, so there's no point in trying to
    put a room number.

    Will post more if there is news.

    chris

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 00:43:11 -0500
    From: "James Nixon" <ranger6000@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Lone Ranger creed

    Joe Salerno worries that some owlhoot might be pulling his leg over this
    creed.  Rest assured, Joe, these wonderful words were penned by Fran Striker
    himself to represent the values he felt were personified by his own
    creation, The Lone Ranger.  I'm unable to remember the original publication
    date of the creed, but I do vividly remember hearing Clayton Moore, who
    lived by it even in his personal life, proudly recite the words at the Lone
    Pine gathering that celebrated the 60th anniversary of the first radio
    broadcast of the Ranger.

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 00:43:42 -0500
    From: Jim Widner <jwidner@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Lone Ranger Creed

    It was asked about the Lone Ranger Creed:

>     On another list someone has posted the below "Lone Ranger Creed" which I
>     must honestly admit I have never encountered in either radio or TV shows. Is
>     this from the comix? Is some owlhoot pullin' my leg?

    I am sure Tony Tollin will jump in here, but this was, I believe, created
    by Lone Ranger creator (the other one) Fran Striker. On what occasion, I am
    not sure.

    Jim Widner
    jwidner@[removed]

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 00:44:06 -0500
    From: "noho1" <noho1@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Reply to Martin Grams Jr/Groucho

         Very late with this reply! As a paige on You Bet Your Life TV Show
    (56-57) Groucho said a lot of things to contestants and audience that I
    thought would never pass the censors. This wasn't the Groucho they expected.
    It was not a problem since the show
    was filmed (using three cameras). The "hot stuff" was cut out but the
    audience sure reacted when he said things. Groucho didn't use obscenities,
    that would be too easy. He used a lot of double meanings as he spoke.
    Another fact is that each show was about an hour and a half of filming. The
    TV version was just a 30 minute show.
    Regards, Ray Markham - watching the dial glow.
    noho1@[removed]

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 01:48:20 -0500
    From: vigor16@[removed]
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Building radios

    Hi all,

    A program I was listening to refered to making your own radio with an
    oatmeal box, a piece of wire and an earphone, which, I take it, was what
    amatuers did to hear radio transmissions before or in the early days of
    commercial broadcasting.  I'm sure you all been here before, but it may
    have been before my time.  Apparently, according to some OTR listening
    I've done it was something many boys did durring the early part of the
    20th century, maybe some girls, who knows?  My questions are related to
    that subject.
    1. Is it possible to do that these days and would it be significent given
    the frequencies today?
    2. Are there any diagrams, like they built from in those days, or do you
    start with prefab kits?

    Tell me if you guys get this feeling. My real concern about hobbies these
    days is that, some people see them as "work" and don't have a desire to
    extend much energy toward them.  .   Personally, I find my many hobbies
    quite interesting and enjoyable.

    thanks,

    Make a new friend every day
    Deric

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 02:40:28 -0500
    From: George Aust <austhaus1@[removed];
    To: OTR Digest <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Martin Gram Jr's Lights Out List

    First of all I'd like to thank Martin for taking the time to post the
    lengthy list of "Lights Out", "Arch Obler Plays"," Everymans Theater",
    and "Plays for Americans". It surely is a great help to straighten out
    my collection.
    But I do have questions!  For example the show "Special To Hollywood",
    Martin shows that it was broadcast on 7-19-45 on "Arch Obler Plays"
    despite that all listings elsewhere have a 2-17-41 date on "Lights Out".
    But Martin say's that in 1964 Obler created a short-run syndicated
    revival of "Arch Oblers Plays" (Not Lights Out!) using some old scripts
    and some new scripts.
    Well I have three recordings of "Special to Hollywood" all seemingly the
    same, and all introduced by an obviously *old* Arch Obler saying "listen
    now as a few light years and generations ago as I introduce to a very
    patient "Lights Out" audience, my peculiar play "Special To Hollywood!
    And then, a recording (not a script redone) from 1941 or 1945 is played
    with the introduction by a much younger Arch Obler asking the audience
    to, if you haven't already done so, turn off your lights and listen to
    "Special To Hollywood"!
    I would think that this may have been a 1964 rebroadcast of an earlier
    "Lights Out", not an"Arch Obler's Plays".
    In listening to this recording I found it interesting that since the
    1945 date was during WWII that there would be a chartered flight, what
    with gas rationing and that the plane was returning to the Glendale
    Calif. airport. The Glendale Grand Central Airport had been closed to
    all civil flights since the begining of the war. Now of course I am not
    taking into account "literary license" here, but I wonder if it is not
    posible for this to have actually been a 'Lights Out" episode from 1941.

    Likewise "Revolt Of The Worms" is listed only under 1964's Arch Obler's
    Plays. Here again in addition to the normal opening to a "Lights Out"
    the announcer actually says turn out your lights and listen to "Revolt
    Of The Worms. I will say that I am not at all sure that it is Arch Obler
    himself saying this. In faking some of these "Lights Out" cassettes did
    they go to the trouble of inserting a new recording of an announcer
    saying the name of the episode?  If they did wow! They were really
    serious about the whole scam weren't they?  I haven't listened to all of
    these tapes yet to see if they all are introduced the same way.

    Anolther thing that I noticed, I have a show entitled "Miss American",
    that I did not see on the list. I have a date of 11-25-39 for that one.
    Is there an alternate title for this show?  Similarly I have a show
    entitled "I Have No Prayer" dated 2-27-43 that I don't see on Martin's
    list. That date would seem wrong since Martin has a "Lights Out" episode
    dated 2-23-43, unless he had different shows running simultaneously,
    which it doesn't appear that he did.

    I spent the best part of a day changing all the labels on my cassettes
    as well as the listings in my log, but what do I do about the tapes
    themselves?  I suppose that I could just erase the fake intros and then
    list them as incomplete shows without intros or endings.  Any suggestions?

    Once again I want to say how great it is to have someone like Martin to
    turn to with these kinds of questions. I do want my collection to be as
    accurate as possible.

    George Aust

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 09:18:42 -0500
    From: "Austotr" <austotr@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  The Clock

    G'Day folks, I first raised the problems with logs on this series 3 or 4
    years ago.  Since then Jerry H has altered his log to reflect that the
    Aussie series was different from the [removed] series but Jerry is not alone in
    the dating woes.

    Most of the circulating episodes of The Clock are from the Australian
    series.  I am currently, with help from the other members of the Australian
    Group and Screensound, making a complete log of the series once and for all.

    I have the correct names and episode numbers as well as broadcast dates for
    all 52 episodes.  Currently the circulating eps all have incorrect names and
    episode numbers as well as broadcast dates.  The main reason for the
    incorrect details is simply that whoever named the files has tried to match
    it to the [removed] series.  But this log will have the correct names and episode
    numbers because we are using the original Australian scripts and
    Transcriptions for the log.  All 52 episodes are covered.

    But and I guess there seems to always be a but with this series, what I do
    not understand is why 1946 (the year of the [removed] series) is the year attached
    to the Australian Series on say Dave Goldin's site [removed]
    It contains the correct details in regard to it being a Grace Gibson
    production, listing all the actors  and the correct episode numbers for the
    couple of the Australian episodes (unlike other sites that use the [removed] names
    and ep numbers), yet be 9 to 10 years or more out in the broadcast date.
    Where is the date information coming from that all these respected people
    are using?

    The Grace Gibson version was broadcast in Australia in 1955/6 and was known
    to be sold to the [removed] presumably after that, not 9-10 years earlier.
    Obviously it was broadcast in the [removed], hence the availability of the series
    in transcriptions there, but folks I need help in identifying when it was
    broadcast in the [removed]  The log uses the Australian Broadcast dates, but I
    would like to include the details of the [removed] Broadcast of the Grace Gibson
    version.

    I would appreciate any assistance to correct the documenting of this series.

    Ian Grieve
    Moderator
    Australian Old Time Radio Group

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 09:20:32 -0500
    From: "Nancy Hudson" <hudson@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  SFX staff as Actors?

    "Mark Kinsler" <kinsler33@[removed]; suggested that:

>     My guess is that some contract clause prevented anyone who wasn't an
>     official actor from speaking over a microphone, and that's why actors
>     played the sound men's parts.

    I just got through listening to an episode of "The Anderson Family," a
    Hollywood Broadcasters Syndication program done in the late 1940's, and
    one of the main characters was played by the show's SFX guy, Ray
    Erlenborn!  He played department store clerk [removed] Good, who set aside a
    football for himself to buy, but an unknowing clerk sold it to Mr.
    Anderson (played by Dick Lane) because she thought the marking on the
    football wrapping indicated the ball inside was "no good".....  The show
    (at least the episodes I have) was a cute little family sitcom, which
    also starred Louise Arthur as Mrs. Anderson and Walter Tetley as Junior.
    Ray may have also had an acting part in another "Anderson Family" which
    is not in my collection.

    Actor credits are given at the end of each episode.

    Russ Hudson

    ------------------------------

    Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 09:20:43 -0500
    From: Dixonhayes@[removed]
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Re: King for a Day
    X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: from multipart/alternative
    X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: Alternative section used was text/plain

    In a message dated 3/10/04 6:39:38 PM Central Standard Time,
    [removed]@[removed] writes:

>     The studio audience reaction to Jack having his pants
>     removed was such that I guessed it actually happened.

    Didn't I hear once that Benny had something funny stitched on his underwear,
    like perhaps "LS/MFT" or some other reference to his own sponsor, and Allen
    himself just about cracked up when he saw it?  Or was that some other instance?

    Dixon

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    End of [removed] Digest V2004 Issue #89
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