------------------------------
The Old-Time Radio Digest!
Volume 2004 : Issue 350
A Part of the [removed]!
[removed]
ISSN: 1533-9289
Today's Topics:
Re: Alfred E. Newman [ Udmacon@[removed] ]
Re: The Market Crash [ Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed] ]
Perfect OTR for this Weekend [ "Sharon Wright" <write@[removed] ]
radio coverage of 1929 stock market [ "Mark Kinsler" <kinsler33@[removed] ]
LOST TWO MORE [ Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed]; ]
Amos and Andy Music Hall [ "tom bewley" <Fords3137@[removed] ]
10-31 births/deaths [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
11-1 births/deaths [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
This week in radio history [ Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed] ]
Radio references in early MAD [ Bhob <bhob2@[removed]; ]
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 10:53:13 -0400
From: Udmacon@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Re: Alfred E. Newman
I have a photograph of two of the Grand Ole Opry's first comedians--predating
Minnie Pearl--Sari & Sally.
In the 1930s they dressed as mountain women complete with sunbonnets (at
least for the publicity photos), and wore brooches (sp).
If you look at one of them it was a photo of Alfred E. Newman!
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 11:00:43 -0400
From: Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Re: The Market Crash
On 10/30/04 9:18 AM [removed]@[removed] wrote:
Since Friday is the 75th anniversary of
the 29 crash, does anybody know if there are any radio news or references
to the Stock Market Crash as it happened.
No recordings exist of any news commentary on the Crash. There were no
nightly network news programs in 1929, although local stations would run
"News Flashes" or "News Headlines," most often lifted from cooperating
local newspapers, and these would, no doubt, have mentioned the events on
Wall Street. But there would have been no in-depth coverage such as we'd
expect to see today.
The only significant network radio news commentators in 1929 (David
Lawrence and Frederick William Wile) were politically conservative and
business-oriented, and any commentary they would have given on the crash
would have stressed the Hoover Administration's arguments that nothing
was fundamentally wrong with the American system of doing business, and
that all would eventually work itself out. Likewise the only regular
program of financial news on any network in 1929, the Old Counselor
Program, was sponsored by the Halsey-Stuart brokerage house, and would
have also stressed the Wall Street party line.
Perhaps the most extended radio commentary on the crash came from "Amos
'n' Andy," who devoted several episodes in the fall of 1929 to the stock
market debacle -- in this storyline, Mr. Taylor saw his business holdings
wiped out by the steady erosion of the market during September of 1929,
and after the Crash, his health collapsed as well -- leading him into a
near-fatal decline over the winter.
Elizabeth
"The Original Amos 'n' Andy" -- Coming in Spring 2005 from McFarland & Co.
[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 12:10:01 -0400
From: "Sharon Wright" <write@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Perfect OTR for this Weekend
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Hi, I just listened to the perfect show for this weekend. Not only is it a
good show for Halloween it also has to do with time. The show is Radio Mystery
Theater 01-27-1974 Time And Again. Sit back and listen and think about whether
you really want a extra hour or two. Pleasant dreams!!
Sharon
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------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 12:10:21 -0400
From: "Mark Kinsler" <kinsler33@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: radio coverage of 1929 stock market correction
Little late but still on topic. Since Friday is the 75th anniversary of
the 29 crash, does anybody know if there are any radio news or references
to the Stock Market Crash as it happened.
I asked my spouse Natalie, a professor of finance and something of a
historian thereof, about this.
"Hmmm," said she. "I've never heard anything about that." I've never heard
about it, either: I know that it was written up in all of the newspapers of
the day, but I've never gotten a sense of what radio newscasts might have
been like in 1929 beyond sports and elections.
I will watch for replies with interest.
Mark Kinsler
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 15:02:38 -0400
From: Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: LOST TWO MORE
Lester Lanin and Vaughn Meader.
[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 15:48:56 -0400
From: "tom bewley" <Fords3137@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Amos and Andy Music Hall
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Folks
In the late 1950's I listened to The Amos & Andy Music Hall. I understand that
precious few of the shows are available to the OTR enthusiast. If this is
true, will someone please comment on why so few shows are now available.
Thanks
Tom
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------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 15:49:11 -0400
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: 10-31 births/deaths
October 31st births
10-31-1896 - Ethel Waters - Chester, PA - d. 9-1-1977
blues singer: "American Revue"; "Command Performance"; "Jubilee"
10-31-1909 - Thelma Boardman - d. 4-1978
actress: Minnie Mouse "Mickey Mouse Theatre of the Air"
10-31-1912 - Dale Evans - Uvalde, TX - d. 2-7-2001
actress, singer: (Queen of the Cowgirls) "Saturday Night Roundup"; "Roy
Rogers Show"
10-31-1922 - Barbara Bel Geddes - NYC
actress: "Lux Radio Theatre"; "Ford Theatre"; "[removed] Steel Hour"; "Cavalcade
of America"
10-31-1922 - Illinois Jacquet - Broussard, LA - d. 7-23-2004
jazz saxophonist: "One Night Stand"; "Command Performance"; "Jubilee"
10-31-1926 - Shirley Dinsdale - San Francisco, CA - d. 5-9-1999
ventriloquist: Judy Splinters "Judy in Wonderland, The Eddie Cantor Show"
10-31-1928 - Cleo Moore - Baton Rouge, LA - d. 10-25-1973
actress: "Bud's Bandwagon"
10-31-1931 - Dan Rather - Wharton, TX
newscaster: Houston Radio
October 31st deaths
02-02-1895 - George Halas - Chicago, IL - d. 10-31-1983
football coach: "Tops in Sports"
05-25-1908 - Linda Watkins - Boston, MA - d. 10-31-1976
actress: Dot "Amanda of Honeymoon Hill"; "Big Guy"; "Fat Man"
06-21-1921 - Joan Tetzel - NYC - d. 10-31-1977
actress: Sylvia Field "When a Girl Marries"; Jane Brown "The Goldbergs"
07-16-1882 - Charles Egelston - Covington, KY - d. 10-31-1958
actor: Shuffle Shober "Ma Perkins"; Humphrey Fuller "Just Plain Bill"
08-14-1889 - Robert Woolsey - Oakland, CA - d. 10-31-1938
actor: "Hollywood Hotel"
08-19-1915 - Ring Lardner, Jr. - Chicago, IL - d. 10-31-2000
screenwriter: "Lux Radio Theatre"
09-22-1902 - John Houseman - Bucharest, Romania - d. 10-31-1988
writer, producer: "Mercury Theatre on the Air"; "Campbell Playhouse"
11-18-1912 - Arthur Peterson - Mandan, ND - d. 10-31-1996
actor: Reverend John Rutledge "Guiding Light"; "World's Great Novels"
12-09-1906 - Ken Niles - Livingston, MT - d. 10-31-1988
announcer: "Hollywood Hotel"; "Rudy Vallee Show"; "A Date with Judy"
12-28-1915 - Dick Joy - Putnam, CT - d. 10-31-1991
announcer: "My Secret Ambition"; "The Saint"; "Advs of Sam Spade"
--
Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 18:06:46 -0400
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: 11-1 births/deaths
I will be out of town, so sending this a little early.
November 1st births
11-01-1880 - Grantland Rice - Murfreesboro, TN - d. 7-13-1954
sportscaster: "Sports Stories"
11-01-1908 - Felix Knight - Macon, GA - d. 6-18-1998
singer: "Schaefer Revue"; "American Album of Familiar Music"
11-01-1908 - Harry Ellis Dickson - Cambridge, MA - d. 3-29-2003
first violinist: "Boston Symphony Orchestra"; "Boston Symphony Rehearsal"
11-01-1919 - John Secondari - Rome, Italy - d. 2-8-1975
novelist: "As Europe Sees the Marshall Plan"; "Prologue"
11-01-1922 - George S. Irving - Springfield, MA
actor, singer: "Screen Guild Theatre"
11-01-1923 - Gordon R. Dickson - Edmonton, Alberta, Canada - d. 1-31-2001
science fiction writer: "X-Minus One"; "Exploring Tomorrow"
11-01-1929 - Betsy Palmer - East Chicago, IL
actress: "CBS Radio Mystery Theatre"
November 1st deaths
02-07-1908 - Bill Johnstone - Paisley, Scotland - d. 11-1-1996
actor: Lamont Cranston/Shadow "The Shadow"; Sam Young "Pepper Young's Family"
02-08-1894 - King Vidor - Galveston, TX - d. 11-1-1982
film director, screenwriter: "Screen Director's Playhouse"; "Hedda Hopper's
Hollywood"
05-11-1911 - Phil Silvers - Brooklyn, NY - d. 11-1-1985
comedian: "Phil Silver's Show"; "Screen Guild Theatre"; "Suspense"
05-17-1890 - Philip James - Jersey City, NJ - d. 11-1-1975
conductor, composer: "Bamberger Little Symphony"; "Wellsprings of Music"
05-24-1883 - Elsa Maxwell - Keokuk, IA - d. 11-1-1963
society mistress: Roma Wine spokesperson for Suspense; "Texaco Star Theatre"
06-22-1920 - Paul Frees - Chicago, IL - d. 11-1-1986
actor: Jethro Dumont/Green Lama "Green Lama"; Robert Aladdin "Mr. Aladdin"
07-14-1898 - Pat C. Flick - Philadelphia, PA - d. 11-1-1955
actor: Pablo Ittheptiches "Fred Allen Show"
08-10-1913 - Noah Beery, Jr. - NYC - d. 11-1-1994
actor: "Lux Radio Theatre"; "Screen Guild Theatre"
10-14-1906 - Benita Hume - London, England - d. 11-1-1967
actress: Victoria Cromwell Hall "Halls of Ivy"; "General Electric Theatre"
10-30-1885 - Ezra Pound - Hailey, ID - d. 11-1-1972
poet and traitor: "Italian Propaganda Broadcast"
11-04-1911 - Dixie Lee Crosby - Harriman, TN - d. 11-1-1952
actress: (Wife of Bing) "Shell Chateau"; "Bing Crosby Show"
12-23-1903 - Helen Troy - San Francisco, CA - d. 11-1-1942
actress: Telephone Operator "It Happened in Hollywood"
--
Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 23:18:54 -0400
From: Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed];
To: otrd <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: This week in radio history
From Those Were The Days --
10/31
1942 - One of the great wartime shows premiered. CBS debuted Thanks to
the Yanks, starring Bob Hawk. It became one of the most popular of the
wartime programs.
11/1
1937 - The first broadcast of Hilltop House was aired on CBS; while on
NBC, the comic strip character Terry and the Pirates debuted.
11/2
1920 -- KDKA presented the "first" radio program, the Cox-Harding
election returns.
1931 - Myrt and Marge was heard for the first time -- on CBS. The
program centered on two chorus girls who competed for the same parts and
the same men. The creator and writer (Cliff Thomas wrote some) of the
series, Myrtle Vail, also played the role of Myrt; and the original
Marge was performed by Vail's daughter, Donna Fick. Three other
performers played the part when Donna died giving birth. Myrt and Marge
continued for 11 years.
11/5
1934 - The first broadcast of The Gumps was heard on CBS. Wilmer Walter
played Andy Gump, Agnes Moorehead was Gump's wife, Min, and Jackie Kelk
was son, Chester. Karo syrup and Pebico toothpaste/tooth powder sponsored.
1950 - "The greatest stars of our time on one big program" was the
introduction by actress Tallulah Bankhead, who opened the 90-minute Big
Show on NBC. It was a big show all right. The peacock saw red as losses
exceeded a million dollars in the three years the program was on the air.
Joe
--
Visit my homepage: [removed]~[removed]
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 10:47:38 -0500
From: Bhob <bhob2@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Radio references in early MAD
[Gaines] also admitted that he got many of his stories for Mad from
radio broadcasts which, as many of the more perceptive in our group have
noted, featured the same wacky concept of the 'Host' with the sardonic
humor as first evidenced with Raymond and later to a more sophisticated
and darker degree with Paul McGrath as the great Inner Sanctum program
which ran during that same magical time. This means that at one time in
the great country of America, (Canada too) there was available,
concurrently, Inner Sanctum on the radio and EC Comics at the
drugstore.
This seems to blur EC horror with EC's MAD. The stories in EC horror
comics had hosts, but Harvey Kurtzman's MAD stories had no host. INNER
SANCTUM's long run (1941-1952) ended as EC's New Trend sf/horror titles
were in their third year. I had always assumed that the three EC horror
hosts were inspired by INNER SANCTUM until the day Bill Gaines told me
that both he and EC editor Al Feldstein had listened during the Thirties
to Alonzo Deen Cole's WITCH'S TALE (1931-1938). Thus, "Old Nancy, the
witch of Salem" (Adelaide Fitz-Allen, Miriam Wolfe, Martha Wentworth)
was the inspiration for EC's Old Witch, who welcomed readers into THE
HAUNT OF FEAR.
The various OTR Digest posts about MAD prompted me to research all radio
references in the early MAD, something I'd given little thought to
previously. The original concept of MAD Comics was simply to do humorous
stories of various comic book genres, from romance and horror to mystery
and adventure. But radio immediately came to mind when MAD #1
(October-November 1952) appeared with its prominent "Tales Calculated to
Drive You" cover blurb satirizing the opening of SUSPENSE, plus the
haunted-house story, "Hoohah!," illustrated by Jack Davis and filled
with sound and echo effects. "Blobs," beautifully cartooned by Wally
Wood, was a satire of [removed] Forster's "The Machine Stops" (1909),
dramatized by 2000X years later on NPR and currently available as an
audiobook. (Was there an earlier adaptation?)
For the second issue of MAD, Jack Davis drew a sports story, "Hex!,"
displaying MAD's first caricature of a media personality – sportscaster
Mel Allen (1913-1996). Comic books were required to run a certain amount
of typeset material to qualify for second class mailing permits, and
that issue's text-only one-pager, "Cosmo McMoon," told of radio
interference from a "berserk transmitter" that jumbled together the
radio networks: "Jock Beanny appears to be playing first violin on the
Boston Symphony broadcast!"
MAD 3 had two radio parodies, "The Lone Stranger!" (Davis) and "Dragged
Net!" (Bill Elder). Since no caricature of Jack Webb was evident, some
readers concluded that Kurtzman and Elder did not have TV sets at the
time. MAD 4 featured the Shadowskeedeeboomboom in Elder's "Shadow!"
According to Kurtzman, his inspiration for that character name came from
the tongue-twisting scat phrases sung by the great Yiddish entertainer
Aaron Lebedeff (aka Lebedev, 1873-1960), often credited as the major
influence on Danny Kaye. Kurtzman could have seen Lebedeff in the late
Forties when he performed in lower Manhattan as part of a show that
included an unauthorized stage version of THE JOLSON STORY (1946).
In MAD 5 (June/July 1953), two radio detectives were blended into one
for "Kane Keen! Private Eye," drawn by Davis. While the MARTIN KANE,
PRIVATE KANE series ran on both radio and television (1949-1954), it
also had a short run as a comic book published by Fox in 1950; William
Gargan was featured prominently on the front cover and inside. MAD 5
also featured Elder's "Outer Sanctum!" which mostly lampooned "The Heap"
comic book series but ended with an entire page depicting the closing of
the sanctum's squeaking door. (The cover date of the first issue of MAD
coincided with the last broadcast of INNER SANCTUM on 5 October 1952.)
The sixth issue led off with "Teddy and the Pirates!," (Wood), and the
Lone Stranger returned in MAD 8, along with gags about radio sets in
Kurtzman's "Hey Look!" pages, one showing Winchell's voice booming from
a small radio as he says, "Good evening, Mr. And Mrs. America!" MAD's
first TV satire was a different "Dragged Net!" in MAD 11, a story that
did feature Jack Webb caricatures. MAD 17 satirized the Army-McCarthy
hearings (which aired on both radio and TV).
MAD 20 featured Wally Wood's memorable "Sound Effects!," a seven-page
story told with no captions and no dialog balloons -- only sound
effects. Possibly Kurtzman got the idea from Norman Corwin's "Anatomy of
Sound" (7 September 1941) with Gale Sondergaard. In an interview with
Roger Gregg (29 March 2003), Corwin commented, "Well, you know, sound
can be spooky. I once wrote a program called ‘The Anatomy of Sound’
which is a kind of a presumptuous title. You cannot anatomize sound in a
half hour, but I tried. For sound can tell stories. I had a whole scene
in which the action could be followed very graphically by sound alone."
MAD switched format from comic book to magazine with issue 24 (July
1955). After Elder's "Radiodetectiveland" (#25) came a superb and
surreal Wood depiction of DJ Al "Jazzbo" Collins' Purple Grotto ("What's
All This Jazz about Jazz?") in MAD 31. Other 1957-58 issues carried
contributions by Steve Allen, Bob and Ray, Stan Freberg, Tom Koch
(scripter for Bob and Ray), Ernie Kovacs, Henry Morgan and Jean Shepherd
("Night People vs. Creeping Meatballism"). The first three MAD
paperbacks had introductions by Roger Price, Stan Freberg and Bob and
Ray.
Bhob Stewart
[Editor of AGAINST THE GRAIN: MAD ARTIST WALLACE WOOD @
[removed] ]
--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2004 Issue #350
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