Subject: [removed] Digest V2013 #32
From: [removed]@[removed]
Date: 3/13/2013 10:48 AM

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

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                                The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                                  Volume 2013 : Issue 32
                             A Part of the [removed]!
                                 [removed]
                                     ISSN: 1533-9289

                                     Today's Topics:

      Clock 165                             [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
      EDDIE MERMAN                          [ wcw57@[removed] ]
      Unit 99                               [ Charlie Summers <charlie@[removed] ]
      Marty Halperin?                       [ Larry Gassman <Lgsinger@[removed] ]
      Lightning Jim                         [ Charlie Summers <charlie@[removed] ]
      why Mary went off mike                [ Michael Berger <[removed]@yaho ]
      Re: Superheterodyne Radios            [ Don Shenbarger <donslistmail@sbcglo ]
      Headphones                            [ "Ian Grieve" <austotr@[removed] ]

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    Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 20:52:51 -0500
    From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
    To: Olde Tyme Radio Digest Digest <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Clock 165

    Has anyone ever heard of a program called "Clock 165." I was recently
    aired on public radio in Madison, Wisconsin.

    Ron Sayles

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    Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 20:52:56 -0500
    From: wcw57@[removed]
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  EDDIE MERMAN
    X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: from multipart/alternative
    X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: Alternative section used was text/plain

    This is a request for [removed] [removed] information regarding a
    performer named Eddie (Edward?) Merman.  He was a half-a**ed relative who
    performed in vaudeville (I am sure) and, perhaps, radio as a singer---maybe an
    Irish Tenor.  I am trying to track down any info regarding his history and can
    only pass along that he lived his last years in Suffolk County, Long Island,
    NY.  That is the best I can do and I hope that I am not out of line using this
    wonderful forum for an information request.

      *** This message was altered by the server, and may not appear ***
      ***                  as the sender intended.                   ***

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    Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 20:59:23 -0500
    From: Charlie Summers <charlie@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Unit 99

    Folks;

       Anyone have any information handy on the series Unit 99? Was listening to
    some episodes rebroadcast by the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service,
    and wondered if anyone here had more info on original network, producer, that
    sort of thing.

            Charlie

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    Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:45:38 -0500
    From: Larry Gassman <Lgsinger@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Marty Halperin?

    I am in contact with PPB on a regular baisis and haven't heard of his passing.
    I will make some inquiries.
    Larry

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    Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:47:35 -0500
    From: Charlie Summers <charlie@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Lightning Jim

    Folks;

       My daughter Katie and I, as our very first Old-Time Radio collaboration
    (predating SummersTime) researched Lightning Jim for an upcoming book (more
    about that much later). In a nutshell, Lightning Jim was originally
    performed, recorded, and broadcast locally on WGN in Chicago with its
    premiere on Tuesday, October 18, 1938. It is the story of the always right
    and just [removed] Marshall "Lightning" Jim Whipple and his comic-relief sidekick
    Deputy Whitey Larsen battling the outlaws and hostile Indian tribes of the
    old west. It was scheduled as a twice-weekly half-hour, every Tuesday and
    Thursday evening at 7:30 [removed] Central Time. Various newspaper advertisements
    of the period show the program was sponsored locally by the Beatrice Creamery
    Company, manufacturers of Meadow Gold Dairy Products (the show was referenced
    in the ads as the, "Meadow Gold Round-Up!").

       The WGN run of Lightning Jim continued until the beginning of November,
    1939 when the program left the airwaves. It appears transcriptions of the
    program were then broadcast on the Blue network, at least to the Pacific
    coast, beginning in 1942. The program was eventually purchased by the
    Fredrick W. Ziv Co., who advertised 104 episodes available for syndication, a
    reasonable number since the original broadcasts lasted a bit over a year. It
    is from Ziv transcription discs the forty-two episodes we have in general
    circulation are apparently from; each episode has a long musical bed at the
    beginning, middle, and end to accommodate local commercial inserts at the
    purchasing station. There are conventional numbers contemporarily used for
    the episodes, but they seem to have very little to do with the original WOR
    production order.

       Former matinee idol Francis X. Bushman portrayed Whipple, with Chicago
    radio character actor Henry Hoople as Larsen. (Every time Kate hears an
    episode of this show, she wonders aloud why the [removed] Marshall's deputy was
    Swedish.)

       Naming the central character of this particular radio play was
    surprisingly simple. In a January 1939 article in the Chicago Tribune, radio
    writer Larry Wolters discusses the problems radio producers were having then
    with lawsuits brought by people with the same name as characters in radio
    plays. He notes the producer of Lightning Jim solved the problem neatly and
    admirably - by simply giving the character Jim Whipple his own name! It would
    be almost impossible for anyone else to claim this character was meant to
    defame them!

       One of the series' writers, Sol Saks, went on to write for radio's Duffy's
    Tavern, and in the 1960's created the beloved television series Bewitched
    starring Elizabeth Montgomery, according to a 2011 Chicago obituary.

    	           Charlie

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

    Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2013 11:46:18 -0500
    From: Michael Berger <[removed]@[removed];
    To: otr <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  why Mary went off mike

    Listening to another Mary Livingstone fluff on a Benny show last night,
    something occurred to me that may have been covered here before, but still, I
    wonder:

    Every fluff drew a big laugh so her mistakes were actually positives in light
    of audience reaction. But with every fluff came a comic rebuff from Jack. I
    wonder if, despite the outward laughs, Mary developed an inward phobia of
    sorts, and finally decided the only way to handle it was to have her lines
    recorded in advance and dubbed into the show.

    BTW, in reference to an earlier discussion here about whether OTR performers
    routinely dropped script pages on the floor after they were spoken, Mary,
    after a fluff, was asked by Jack in one show to repeat the line. "I can't,"
    she replied, "I threw the page away."

    Michael Berger

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

    Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2013 11:46:43 -0500
    From: Don Shenbarger <donslistmail@[removed];
    To: [removed]@[removed]
    Subject:  Re: Superheterodyne Radios

    On 3/12/2013 A Joseph Ross wrote:

> >     1923   A great improvement in radio receivers was advertised.

>     I wonder whether the "foolproof" design was superhetrodyne circuits, a
>     circuit design used to this day.

    There were many prototype, experimental, and handmade superheterodyne
    receivers built in the early 20's. RCA intended to provide commercial
    superheterodyne radios for the Christmas season in 1923, but failed to
    achieve this. They probably did advertise the radio sets in 1923 but the
    first models were delivered in February, 1924 and the official rollout
    in April, 1924.

    In April, 1923 the Neutrodyne receiver was introduced and adopted by
    several independent radio manufacturers. This design was a significant
    improvement to traditional tuned radio frequency (TRF) radios. The
    design was popular, cheaper to build than superheterodyne designs, and
    somewhat easier for owners to tune. Also, it was available for the
    important 1923 Christmas season and gave independents a jump start over
    RCA who had nothing to offer that year at all. Ten million Neutrodyne
    sets were sold by 1927.

    By the 1930s improvements in vacuum tube design, especially the
    introduction of the tetrode and pentode, provided circuit stabilization
    within the tubes that the Neutrodyne design provided with circuit
    components and made the superheterodyne design more practical and cost
    effective. The entire body of TRF radios disappeared from the stores
    afterword.

    Don Shenbarger

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

    Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2013 11:46:49 -0500
    From: "Ian Grieve" <austotr@[removed];
    To: <[removed]@[removed];
    Subject:  Headphones

    In issue #31 A. Joseph Ross mentioned radio prior to speakers and the use of
    Headphones.

    I was amazed to find a very early photo of a dance hall and what looked like
    hundreds of headphones hanging from the ceiling.  The caption told how they
    were used to listen to the radio during dancing intermissions.  I guess that
    was when it sunk in to me that radios didn't come with speakers in the
    beginning.

    Ian Grieve

    --------------------------------
    End of [removed] Digest V2013 Issue #32
    ********************************************

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