Subject: [removed] Digest V2019 #31
From: [removed]@[removed]
Date: 6/22/2019 10:18 AM

To: [removed]@[removed]
Reply-to: [removed]@[removed]

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                                The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                                  Volume 2019 : Issue 31
                             A Part of the [removed]!
                                 [removed]
                                     ISSN: 1533-9289

                                     Today's Topics:

      "A Technical Guide To Collecting Old  [ Chad Palmer <[removed]@[removed] ]
      Old Time Radio Books                  [ <skallisjr@[removed]; ]
      Radio books                           [ Derek Tague <thatderek@[removed]; ]
      Essential OTR books                   [ Jack & Cathy French <otrpiano@veriz ]
      Re: Radio Books                       [ Don Shenbarger <donswiremail@comcas ]
      OTR BOOKS                             [ James Nixon <ranger6000@[removed] ]

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 10:40:40 -0400
    From: Chad Palmer <[removed]@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  "A Technical Guide To Collecting Old Time Radio
     Programs"

    Recently I've been going through old filing cabinets of papers I've saved
    over the years and scanning much of my old collection of articles, etc on Old
    Time Radio. While many of these are dated by today's standards they are still
    a great historical piece to read. During this clean up process I came across
    a reference to a booklet called  "A Technical Guide To Collecting Old Time
    Radio Programs". I remember reading about this booklet published many, many
    years ago.

    Does anyone by any chance happen to have a copy of this complete booklet that
    you could scan, or allow me to borrow so that I could make a good scan of it?
    I believe it was about 56 pages long based on what I've read.

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 10:41:16 -0400
    From: <skallisjr@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Old Time Radio Books
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    On the discussion of "OTR books," the ones cited are books concerning the
    medium of broadcast radio as a medium, and of thumbnails of some
    programs, through the period.  These books are pieces of nostalgia, which
    are interesting to those who lived through the era.  For academics, there
    are reference books.
    But most of the old show recordings got lost or are otherwise
    unavailable.  Recordings of some shows have surfaced, and many of the
    unearthed programs can be found on the Internet.
    But many of the stories have been lost.
    The one item that impelled me to write the book that I wrote on Captain
    Midnight was to preserve the stories that unwise would have mainly been
    lost. {Leonard Zane's /Captain id night's Post-War Radio Years covers
    stories broadcast through  the Spring of 1949)
    But not quite.  As I was researching the stories after having been
    granted access to the original radio scripts, I discovered that a few of
    the :lost" stories were already been preserved.
    Whitman  Publishers, whose target market was primarily schoolchildren,
    "novelized" stories from the Captain Midnight show.  These appeared in
    the pint-sized Better Little Books, and in one hardcover, /Joyce Of The
    Secret Squadron/,as on of its "Books For Girls" series.  One of the
    Better Little Books preserved in its volume, ?Captain Midnight vs the
    Terror Of The Orient? the`adventure where Captain Midnight and his team
    discovered plans for the attack on Pearl Harbor, which was broadcast
    weeks before the actual attack.
    Whitman didn't stop with Captain Midnight, though.  They also published
    Better Little Book stories from the Jack Armstrong and Tom Mix programs.

    Stephen A. Kallis, Jr.

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 10:42:42 -0400
    From: Derek Tague <thatderek@[removed];
    To: Old Time Radio Digest <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Radio books
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    In the same manner that Listmaster Summers refers to aforementioned books as
    the "Dunning" and the "Hickerson," I still refer to "The Big Broadcast" as the
    "Buxton/Owen."
    However, I wish I could add this seminal encyclopedia as an "essential." Yes,
    it (and its small-press forerunner "Radio's Golden Age") was a must in the
    nascent days of the OTR collectors' hobby but it is extraordinarily outdated
    by today's standards due largely to its incomplete programme entries.
    For example, B/O would print obscure entries on the order of "This serial
    aired for roughly two years in the mid-Forties over the Mutual Network" -- and
    such would be the entire entry without the benefit of personnel credits.
    In the mid-1990s, Scarecrow Press, a McFarland-type scholarly imprint,
    released a "2nd Edition" of "Big Broadcast." I compared both editions and soon
    discovered the the second edition was merely a new imprint of the down to the
    letter along with the vague entries that peppered the 1972 yellow edition; it
    wasn't anything that could be called an "update."

    My reaction at the time was "What's the matter with these guys?! The hobby has
    grown over the last two decades. There's more information out there and
    there's no excuse for programme descriptions sans air dates and acting
    credits!"
    Yes, the Buxton/Owen was indispensable in the early 1970s. The mid-1970s
    "Dunning" superseded it. Add the efforts of Jay Hickerson and log-keepers like
    Ray Stanich, Chris Lambesis, Terry Salomonsen, and by the mid-1990s, the "new
    kid" Martin Grams Jr.; nostalgia radio hosts such as Max Schmid, Carl Amari,
    Bobb Lynes and Barbara "Sunday" Watkins, Ed Walker, and the Gassman brothers;
    re-issuers like Mark 56, Radio Yesteryear, Adventures in Cassettes, and the
    powerhouse Radio Spirits; and the flourishing annual fan conventions in the
    New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Cincinnati areas. There was so much OTR
    for hobbyists and newcomers alike by the 1990s -- moreso than was available in
    the early 1970s -- that the new imprint of B/O just could not satisfy.
    Many of the other books I favour have already been mentioned in this thread.
    Here are some others dedicated to individual programmes I like:
    -- "Fibber McGee and Molly: On te Air 1935-1959" by Clair Schulz -- unlike
    "Heavenly Days," which was excellent fot biographies and photos, this volume
    has a complete annotated episode guide.
    --  Laura Leff's three individual "39 Forever" volumes about Jack Benny and
    his eponymous radio and TV shows -- like Martin Grams's books, her episode
    guides are comprehensive to the point of sharing more information than a
    casual fan would ever need to know,
    --  "Let's Pretend and the Golden Age of Radio" by Arthur Anderson -- for
    purposes of full disclosure, Martin and I are listed as secondary authors
    having compiled this book's episode log.
    -- Elizabeth McLeod's "Amos and Andy" book.
    -- Jim Cox's oeuvre all release through McFarland.
    -- "Vic 'n' Sade" and "Tthe Little House in the Middle of the Next Block" --
    both by the show's creator/head writer Paul Rhymer filled with Vic/Sade
    scripts.
    --The Jack Benny Show" by Milt Josephsberg (Benny's head writer) -- unlike the
    other JB memoir-styled books (Mary Livingstone, Irving Fein, and Joan Benny),
    this tome not only presents a linear history of the show but also  brief
    "technique" chapters exploring the dynamics of how Benny worked with and
    reacted on-mike and on-camera to his supporting cast, such as "Jack and Don
    [Wilson[," "Jack and Rochester," etc.
    -- "The Great Radio Personalities" by Anthony Slide -- primarily photographs;
    ditto "A Pictorial History of Radio" by Irving Settel.
    -- "Lux Presents Hollywood" by Connie Billips and Arthur Pierce --
    comprehensive history and annotated episode guide!
    -- Many of the recent books dedicated to Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds"
    "panic" broadcast.
    -- "The Air Waves of New York: Illustrated Histories of 156 Am Stations in the
    Metropolitan Area, 1921-1996" by Bill Jaker, Frank Sulek, and Peter Kanze --
    the stodgy styled McFarland title says it's all.
    Happy book-hunting from the ether,
    Derek Tague

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 10:44:38 -0400
    From: Jack & Cathy French <otrpiano@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Essential OTR books
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    As we should expect, Charlie nailed it - the two most essential ones are
    Dunning's encyclopedia and Hickerson's compendium. Virtually anything you
    want to know about the programs in the Golden Age of Radio will be contained
    in these two volumes. If you only own two OTR books, these must be your
    choices.

    Other Digesters are free to choose books that only cover their favorite
    performers or genre, but that probably wouldn't qualify for terming them
    essential.

    My runners-up to the top two would be:

    1) Tune In Yesterday (1976): Dunning's first OTR compendium, which was
    eclipsed by his 1998 encyclopedia.
    2)  The Big Broadcast by Buxton and Owen: Originally came out in the
    mid-60's and went through several editions, hardback and soft cover.  The
    benchmark of what we knew about OTR at the beginning of this hobby.
    3) Handbook of Old-Time Radio by Swartz and Reinehr:  A 1993 publication that
    could be a companion piece to our top two volumes since it contains data not
    found in either.

    But for pure pleasure, or an emphasis on one program or one genre, pick up any
    book by Jim Cox, Martin Grams, Jr. or Jim Harmon.  Maybe not actually
    essential, but certainly important to our enjoyment of OTR.

    Jack French
    Retired Editor: RADIO RECALL

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 10:46:12 -0400
    From: Don Shenbarger <donswiremail@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Re: Radio Books

    On 6/20/2019 11:18 AM, [removed]@[removed] wrote:

>     "The Encyclopedia of Old - Time Radio" by John Dunning

    It seems Dunning's book is on many lists. I consider it significant as well.

    But in another direction, a fun resource where you can lose hours of
    time is this archive of trade and periodical publications.

    [removed]

    Don Shenbarger

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    Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2019 13:06:49 -0400
    From: James Nixon <ranger6000@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  OTR BOOKS

    I'm surprised no one has yet mentioned Dick Osgood's "Wyxie Wonderland".
    It's the history of Detroit station WXYZ, perhaps the most famous of all the
    radio stations broadcasting in the golden age.

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    End of [removed] Digest V2019 Issue #31
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