Subject: [removed] Digest V2003 #125
From: "OldRadio Mailing Lists" <[removed]@[removed];
Date: 3/24/2003 6:16 PM
To: <[removed]@[removed];

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


                            The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                              Volume 2003 : Issue 125
                         A Part of the [removed]!
                                 ISSN: 1533-9289


                                 Today's Topics:

  Arch Oboler's Chicken Heart           [ Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed]; ]
  Re: Chicken Heart                     [ Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed]; ]
  David Street, vocalist                [ "Martin Grams, Jr." <mmargrajr@hotm ]
  Re: Sam and Henry recordings          [ Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed] ]
  Jack and Ethel                        [ "Martin Grams, Jr." <mmargrajr@hotm ]
  Rye Billsbury?                        [ dltnkt@[removed] (Dennis/Nancy Town ]
  Wire player                           [ "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed]; ]
  March 24th Birthdays                  [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
  Japanese translation                  [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
  Australian Charlie Chan               [ "Jamie Kelly" <jamie77@[removed]. ]
  MARK DILLON                           [ "Lois Culver" <lois@[removed]; ]
  Truth or Consequences                 [ "A. Joseph Ross" <lawyer@attorneyro ]
  More on Parley Baer                   [ "Nemesis@[removed]" <nemesis@[removed] ]
  remastering otr - ultimate solution!  [ Mark Reesor <mrees@[removed]; ]
  Today in radio history                [ Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed] ]
  OTR-inspired place names              [ Derek Tague <derek@[removed]; ]
  moderating an OTR panel--advice need  [ Howard Blue <khovard@[removed]; ]
  March 25th Birthdays                  [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
  Andrew Keefe                          [ "Ken Lanza" <klanza@[removed]; ]
  Harry Bartell's Essay                 [ Dennis W Crow <DCrow3@[removed] ]

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:11:28 -0500
From: Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Arch Oboler's Chicken Heart

Ryan Osentowski asked whether the version of "Chicken
Heart" on Arch Oboler's Drop Dead lp was the same that
Oboler broadcast on Lights Out. I don't think any
broadcasts of the full version of "Chicken Heart" have
survived (you sometimes see it listed in
collections--but it always turns out to be the Drop
Dead version). My understanding is, most (if not all)
of the stories on "Drop Dead" are abridged versions of
Oboler's full-fledged radio plays. The only one I've
heard in both the original OTR version and the Drop
Dead version is the final track on Drop Dead, "The
Laughing Man", which is based on the "Future" or
"Humbug" segment of the Arch Oboler's Plays story "The
Ways Of Men: Past, Present And Future", from 04/15/39.

Does anybody know if the scripts from the lost
episodes of Lights Out and Arch Oboler's Plays have
survived? I gathered from a reference in Dunning's
encyclopedia that little is known about the Wyllis
Cooper plays for Lights Out, which implies that the
pre-Oboler scripts are lost as well. But Oboler was
much more of a packrat and I imagine most of his
scripts were saved. Any ideas what might have happened
to them?

Kermyt

PS. If you've never heard Bill Cosby's spoof of
"Chicken Heart", go look it up! It's on one of his
first records--Wonderfulness might be the name. A
classic homage to OTR, from a child's perspective.

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:11:40 -0500
From: Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Re: Chicken Heart

Regarding the Drop Dead version of "Chicken Heart,
Paul Urbahns noted, "The story may be the same but its
not the same recording." I should have noted this in
my earlier message--the original version of "The Ways
of Men: Past, Present and Future" starred Raymond
Edward Johnson (pre-Inner Sanctum) in the "future"
segment, while somebody else plays the role on Drop
Dead. This got me wondering who played some of these
roles in their original version. The track "I'm
Hungry" on Drop Dead features a Peter Lorre
soundalike--could Lorre have played the original role?
And the track "A Day at the Dentist's" on Drop Dead
features Hal Peary, who worked for Oboler when they
were both in Chicago in the late 30s. (A trivia
question: what "Lights Out" broadcast stars both
Harold Peary and Willard Waterman, before either of
them played the Great Gildersleeve?) So I'm wondering
whether Peary might have played the dentist in the
original version as well. Unfortunately, because
Oboler liked to change titles when rebroadcasting his
stories, it's often difficult to match the stories on
Drop Dead to their original OTR counterparts. (For my
money, the version of "The Dark" on Drop Dead is one
of the greatest pieces of audio atmosphere ever
created--that cackling woman just freaks me out!)

Kermyt

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:12:05 -0500
From: "Martin Grams, Jr." <mmargrajr@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  David Street, vocalist

I received a letter earlier this week (only now going through my mail after
a week's partial absense) to find a letter, handwritten, four pages, double
sided by a man who seems to be obsessed (shall I say "possessed"?) by a
voalist named David Street.

David Street was a vocalist who was at one time a regular for the Sealtest
Village Store, and other radio programs.  Seems this fella is looking for
ANYTHING related to Street, pictures, articles, Playboy interview,
recordings, you name it - he wants it.

This fan is David McClow, 3162 Harvest Street, Gandville, Michigan.  Sorry,
as many times as he repeated his mailing address in his four-page letter, he
never gave a zip-code.

If anyone can help this fella out, it would be greatly appreciated.

Martin

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:12:59 -0500
From: Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Re: Sam and Henry recordings

On 3/23/03 4:52 PM OldRadio Mailing Lists wrote:

I guess the obvious question is, are there any extant air-checks (pretty
early for air-checks) or transcription recordings of Sam & Henry? (not
commercial studio recordings)

Nope, not a one. No genuine airchecks of Correll and Gosden's work are
known to exist in any form until 1932, and the earliest genuine program
recordings are several syndicated "Amos 'n' Andy" discs from 1928.

The widely-circulated "Sam and Henry" recordings known to OTR collectors
are, of course, all dubs of Victor records, and while they're not
airchecks of actual broadcasts, they do give a good idea of what the
performers sounded like in the earliest part of their career. I find it
interesting in listening to these Victor records that neither performer
has fully mastered the microphone yet -- although they have a basic
notion of what they *want* to do, it isn't quite as refined as it would
be after a couple years of practice.

Correll's work on these records is especially interesting -- there is
really none of the cocky, swaggering, from-the-belly quality that would
characterize Andy's voice in that of Henry. Instead, Correll delivers
Henry's lines out of the side of his mouth, in almost an under-the-breath
mumble.

Another interesting note from the Victor "Sam and Henry" records is that
the sketch entitled "Sam and Henry at the Fortune Teller's" is actually
adapted from a bit that Correll and Gosden wrote and performed in
whiteface in the Paul Ash stage review "Red Hot" in 1925, and they had
apparently worked up the basics of this routine as far back as their days
with Joe Bren. The fortune teller character heard on this record, played
by Gosden with a broad, bogus quasi-French accent, later turned up in
"Amos 'n' Andy," as the fortune teller/small-time blackmailer Prince Ali
Bendo.

Elizabeth

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:13:09 -0500
From: "Martin Grams, Jr." <mmargrajr@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Jack and Ethel

Does anyone know of or have heard of a radio program called JACK AND ETHEL?
The only info I have been able to dig up is that it was a short-run series
broadcast only on the West Coast during 1930 or 1931.
I'm curious to know anything about this oddity.
Martin
mmargrajr@[removed]

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:13:26 -0500
From: dltnkt@[removed] (Dennis/Nancy Townsend)
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Rye Billsbury?

Yes I know he is the first Mark Dillon of the Gunsmoke auditions but
does anyone know anything else about him? I cannot recall hearing him on
anything [removed]

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:13:45 -0500
From: "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Wire player

The phenomenal wire playback machine asked about by Stephen Jansen was
actually a reconfigured open reel tape recorder (an Ampex AG 440) not a
cassette recorder.  The machine can be seen at:
[removed]
and Art Shifrin's home page  [removed]    has links to
discussions of the machine and examples of playbacks including part of one
of the 3200 wires in the Arthur Godfrey collection at the Library of
American Broadcasting at U of Maryland.  The NPR broadcast  Stephen
probably heard is also on this site.

Michael Biel  mbiel@[removed]

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:13:52 -0500
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  March 24th Birthdays

If you were born on March 24th, you share your birthday with:

1914 - Richard Conte - Jersey City, New Jersey - Died: 4-15-75
1915 - Bill Bivens - Wadesboro, North Carolina
1923 - Murray  Hamilton - Washington [removed]
1928 - Vanessa Brown - Vienna, Austria
1930 - Steve McQueen - Slater, Missouri

Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Make your day, listen to an Olde Tyme Radio Program

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 19:14:15 -0500
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Japanese translation

Just dial TOKYO san hachi hachi ni go ni yon [removed]

38825241

Ron Sayles

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 21:30:09 -0500
From: "Jamie Kelly" <jamie77@[removed];
To: "[removed] ([removed])" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Australian Charlie Chan

In recent issues of the Digest their has been some discussion re
"Charlie Chan", here are some details on the Australian series - William
Rees played "Charlie Chan" and Rodney Jacobs was his Number One Son,
"Lee Chan". As far as I have been able to determine, the Grace Gibson
version was first broadcast in 1950, and there were 52 episodes.

I haven't heard much of the US series apart from a US transcription disc
I have on the - RAMOND R. MORGAN PRODUCTION label, so I can't make much
of a comparison. I have about 6 episodes of the Gibson series and I
believe it is based on US scrips.

Very few episodes exist of the Australian series because  unfortunately
Grace Gibson productions in the 1960's made the discission to dump a lot
of their transcriptions mainly pre 1950 shows that they didn't feel were
going to be popular for broadcast any more and they also needed the
space. How I wish I had been around in those days, I certainly would of
found space for them! :) They did thankfully record many of the more
popular series such as the "shadow" and the Gregory Keen" series before
they were dumpt.

I'm happy to trade CD audio copies of "Charlie Chan" with anyone for any
Australian OTR that I don't have.

Jamie Kelly
Melbourne Australia

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 23:36:40 -0500
From: "Lois Culver" <lois@[removed];
To: "OTR Digest" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  MARK DILLON

You are correct in that the Mark Dillon of the early Gunsmoke recordings
were named Mark Dillon, then changed to Matt as Mark sounded too modern.

Howard Culver and Rye Billsbury did the two presentation Gunsmokes.  Howard
Culver was chosen for the role but had to turn it down because his role of
"Straight Arrow" on Mutual would not let him out of his contract to take the
Gunsmoke lead.

Lois Culver
KWLK Radio (Mutual) Longview, WA 1941-44
KFI Radio (NBC) Los Angeles CA 1945-47, 50-53
Widow of Howard Culver, actor

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

Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 23:37:23 -0500
From: "A. Joseph Ross" <lawyer@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Truth or Consequences

1940 - Truth or Consequences was first heard on radio. The Ralph
Edwards-produced program was hosted by Mr. Edwards. The show was
originally heard on only four CBS stations. Later, NBC picked up the show
where it eventually became the most popular of all radio quiz shows.

I've never really considered Truth or Consequences a quiz show, at least in the form that I 
saw in the 1950s.  Perhaps it changed, but when I saw it, the contestants were asked only 
one question, and it was some sort of a riddle that no one could possibly answer unless they 
had heard it before.  They were guaranteed to have to pay the consequences.  So much so 
that often the host, Jack Bailey and later Bob Barker, would tell the audience the trick that 
was going to be played on the next contestant, with no expectation at all that they would 
actually answer the question correctly.

One time, when the contestant actually did answer the question correctly, Bob Barker said 
he'd gotten a signal from the control room that they'd asked the wrong question and asked 
another.

Still later, they stopped even bothering to ask the question and just proceeded to the 
consequence.

-- A. Joseph Ross, [removed] [removed] 15 Court Square, Suite 210 lawyer@[removed] Boston, MA 02108-2503 [removed] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 23:37:43 -0500 From: "Nemesis@[removed]" <nemesis@[removed]; To: <[removed]@[removed]; Subject: More on Parley Baer X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: from multipart/alternative X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: Alternative section used was text/plain This (shortened) obituary appears (of all places) in the current Star Trek Communicator magazine: "Veteran character actor Parley Bear, who played one of the three elder Nechani in Voyager's "Sacred Ground," died Nov. 22,,,The Salt Lake City native first worked as a circus ringmaster and with on to roles in more than 15,000 radio programs, 1,600 television shows and 60 [removed]" (Parley Bear appeared in a Star Trek: Voyager episode and I didn't catch it--me a Trekkie!) Linda T. *** This message was altered by the server, and may not appear *** *** as the sender intended. *** ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 23:44:25 -0500 From: Mark Reesor <mrees@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: remastering otr - ultimate solution! Further to Stephen Jansen's post about remastering otr. I guess the perfect solution would be a custom version of the ELP Laser Turntable which would play ETs. This device uses five laser beams to 'read' the record grooves. The only problem is that the cheapest model costs $9,500 -- and a $500 vacuum is strongly recommended! Of course, add a few hundred thou (at least) to modify it to read ETs! Oh well - it's interesting to read about anyway - the website is: [removed] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 11:09:47 -0500 From: Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed]; To: otr-net <[removed]@[removed]; Subject: Today in radio history From Those Were The Days -- 1932 - Belle Baker hosted a radio variety show from a moving train ... a first for radio broadcasting. The program originated from a Baltimore and Ohio train that chugged its way around the New York area. The broadcast was heard on WABC in New York City. 1935 - After a year as a local show from New York City, Major Bowes' Original Amateur Hour was heard on the entire NBC network. The show stayed on the air for 17 years. Later, Ted Mack took over for Bowes and made the move from radio to television. Joe ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 11:10:45 -0500 From: Derek Tague <derek@[removed]; To: <[removed]@[removed]; Subject: OTR-inspired place names Hi Gang: Resident historian & keeper of the OTR time-line Joe Mackey wrote:
1940 - Truth or Consequences was first heard on radio. The Ralph
Edwards-produced program was hosted by Mr. Edwards. The show was originally
heard on only four CBS stations. Later, NBC picked up the show where it
eventually became the most popular of all radio quiz shows.

   Mention of "T or C" reminded me how there was a town in New Mexico which
re-christened itself "Truth or Consequences,"  as an homage to this popular
quiz-show. This, in turn, got me thinking about the Arkansas town which
re-named itself "Pine Ridge" in honour of  "Lum 'n' Abner.'
   My  question now is: are there any other instances of USA place names
inspired  by OTR programmes? How about street names? There must be a "Wistful
Vista" or a "Margot Lane" out there somewhere.

Yours in the ether--

Derek Tague

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

Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 11:10:07 -0500
From: Howard Blue <khovard@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  moderating an OTR panel--advice needed

I will be moderating an OTR panel in April. I have made up a list of
questions for several actors who will be participating.  But I would
appreciate suggestions for additional questions. For example, these
actors (collectively) worked on Mystery Theatre,  Big Town, Crime Does
Not Pay, Dimension X, among other shows.  Therefore, I would appreciate
particular questions relevant to those shows. Also, I would love to hear
some general questions from people who have moderated panels in the past.

Thanks,

Howard Blue

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

Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 15:47:21 -0500
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  March 25th Birthdays

If you were born on March 25th, you share your birthday with:

03-25-1867 - Arturo Toscanini - Parma, Italy
03-25-1887 - Raymond Gram Swing - Cortland, New York
03-25-1892 - Andy Clyde - Blaingowrie, Scotland - Died: 5-18-1967
03-25-1901 - Ed Begley - Hartford, Connecticut - Died: 4-28-1970
03-25-1903 - Frankie Carle - Providence, Rhode Island
03-25-1905 - Binnie Barnes - London, England
03-25-1906 - Margaret Daum - Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania - Died: 2-23-1977
03-25-1919 - Jeanne Cagney - New York City
03-25-1920 - Howard Cosell - Winston-Salem, North Carolina - Died: 3-23-1995
03-25-1921 - Simone Signoret - Wiesbaden, Germany

Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Make your day, listen to an Olde Tyme Radio Program

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

Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 16:34:55 -0500
From: "Ken Lanza" <klanza@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Andrew Keefe

Anyone with information on Andrew Keefe?

He recorded on Edison cylinders, "Uncle Josh
In a department store" Edison 9221.

Looking for info on where he was from. Maybe
Albany, NY?? Was he ever on radio WGY perhaps???
 Thanks!
Ken Lanza

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

Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 19:15:59 -0500
From: Dennis W Crow <DCrow3@[removed];
To: OTR Digest <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Harry Bartell's Essay

I enjoyed Harry Bartell's enlightening little essay on  "interpretation."
Audiences comprise "individuals," who judge  what they see on stage
differently based on their own unique life  experiences and mindsets.  So
do actors as they interpret a part.

It reminds me of the famous writer  [I think it was Noel Coward] who wrote
that a particular  character should come on stage after having drunk a cup
of tea. I could be wrong,  but I think the play was "Blithe Sprit."  The
playwright  must have thought that particular stage direction  would affect
an actor's interpretation of a part, but  how  was it supposed to affect me
as an audience member?   Or  am I missing the point.

Dennis Crow

--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2003 Issue #125
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