Subject: [removed] Digest V2005 #25
From: [removed]@[removed]
Date: 1/22/2005 9:02 PM
To: [removed]@[removed]

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


                            The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                              Volume 2005 : Issue 25
                         A Part of the [removed]!
                             [removed]
                                 ISSN: 1533-9289


                                 Today's Topics:

  The Karloff "Valse Triste"            [ "Michael Ogden" <michaelo67@hotmail ]
  Re: "Uncle Floyd" Vivino (Was "I'm M  [ jameshburns@[removed] (Jim Burns) ]
  Noses, Nickels, and Grandpas          [ Richard Fish <fish@lodestone-media. ]
  More Dossier on Dumetrius             [ "Austotr" <austotr@[removed]; ]
  Re: Early Television                  [ Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed] ]
  I'm My Own Grandpa                    [ John Politis <channel1@[removed]; ]
  TV's start                            [ <otrbuff@[removed]; ]
  One more on "I'm My Own Grandpa"      [ "Jim Hilliker" <jimhilliker@sbcglob ]
  1-23 births/deaths                    [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
  Sam Dann                              [ Paul Evans <evans_paul1963@[removed] ]
  I'm My Own Grandpa                    [ Udmacon@[removed] ]
  I'm My Own Grandpa                    [ "Michael Leannah" <mleannah@charter ]
  Nose full of nickels                  [ "Michael Leannah" <mleannah@charter ]
  Milton Cross                          [ "Arthur Funk" <Art-Funk@[removed]; ]
  Remley photo                          [ JackBenny@[removed] ]
  I'm my own Grandpa                    [ "WILLIS G Saunders" <saunders8@veri ]

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

Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2005 23:18:45 -0500
From: "Michael Ogden" <michaelo67@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  The Karloff "Valse Triste"

A question was asked about the Boris Karloff version of Arch Oboler's "Valse
Triste" on the original Chicago series of LIGHTS OUT on 3/30/38. I also
would love to find a copy of it, but the only source that I know of is the
Library of Congress Recorded Sound Center, and that of course is strictly
for listening on the premises (and then only by advance appointment and if
you're a bonafide researcher).

And yes, I agree with Mike, who posted the question, about the frustration
of encountering all the sites and sources who claim they have it when what
they really have is the 1942 version.

I especially would like to hear the Karloff because, in a sense, it's a
missing link. I've read Oboler's original script and I've heard the 1942
version, and there's a significant change between the script and the '42. A
final, particularly hideous "zinger" is missing from the '42. It would be
very interesting to know if it is present in the Karloff. I suspect so;
after all, the Chicago LIGHTS OUT had a particularly nasty reputation for
gruesomeness, whereas the 1942 revival was in prime time and with a sponsor
who might well be expected to object to something as horrible as the 1938
ending.

Another point: It's been a long time since I've listened to the 1942
version, but I seem to remember that--unlike what is indicated in the
original script--there is NO music which leads the two young women to the
hermit's cabin. If that's the case, then the title "Valse Triste" is totally
meaningless in the '42.

Mike Ogden

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 00:08:57 -0500
From: jameshburns@[removed] (Jim Burns)
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Re: "Uncle Floyd" Vivino (Was "I'm My Own
 Grandpa"

Derek--

We might have crossed paths!  I did a few episodes of THE UNCLE FLOYD
SHOW, "guest-starring" (!), in skits, in that period that ranged over
from UHF Channel 68 to syndication (and New York's NBC). My first time
out, I was acting in a play Off Broadway, satirizng FLASH GORDON, and
playing--

Ming the Merciless!

(To promote the play, I came on Floyd's show, AS Ming, in a wild makeup,
discoursed with Floyd and "electrocuted" cast member Looney Skip Rooney
with my mystical powers! (Skip Rooney, for years now, has also been a
popular DJ, in New Jersey.)

To further try to tie this into OTR, Floyd, for his Italian Music Show,
shopping for "old" records, would pop into the shop of one of my
favorite people in the nostalgia business, and longtime fixture at The
Friends of Old Time Radio:

Al Levine!

List member Doug Douglas also just emailed me, that

"Floyd hosts "Italian-American Serenade" on Sunday mornings over WRTN
[removed] in New Rochelle. He's been doing the show for about twenty years."

The old UNCLE FLOYD SHOW had a bunch of skits over the years that dealt
with OTR [removed]

For MANY reasons, I loved watching that show--

And still miss it!

Jim Burns

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 00:09:29 -0500
From: Richard Fish <fish@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Noses, Nickels, and Grandpas

The "nose full of nickels" thread made me think of a scene from "The
Bank Dick." [removed] is a bank guard, and a little kid makes a crack
about his big nose. The kid's mother, trying to smooth it over, reproves
the kid and then says, "...you'd like to have a nose like that full of
nickels, wouldn't you?" This was in 1940. Was that the inspiration for
the song, or a reference to it, or just a co-incidence?

Also, I have a 78 of "I'm My Own Grandpa" by Al Dexter And His Troopers.
I thought that was the original hit, and the others mentioned were
covers. Anybody know where Al Dexter fits in?

And while we're on the subject, "I'm My Own Grandpa" was referred to,
more than once, in a short story by SF genius Robert A. Heinlein, called
"All You Zombies." Considering the plot, it may in fact have inspired
the story.

Richard Fish
--
"Post proofs that brotherhood is not so wild a dream as those who profit
by postponing it pretend." -- Norman Corwin, 1945

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 11:51:42 -0500
From: "Austotr" <austotr@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  More Dossier on Dumetrius

Folks I didn't pick up the incorrect spelling for Lindsay in Jims original
post when I cut and pasted.  So those who went looking on [removed]
wouldn't have found anything.  The Author for the Gregory Keen series is
Lindsay Hardy.

I noted with interest the comment one bookseller included, particularly as
Richard Denning is mentioned often here:

"Hardy, Lindsay
REQUIEM FOR A REDHEAD
A Gregory Keen espionage thriller filmed in 1956 with Richard Denning and
Carole Matthews (the film aka ASSIGNMENT REDHEAD and MILLION DOLLAR
MANHUNT.) The titular redhead shows plenty of back in the
flashback-montage-style jacket art by Albert Orbaan."

Ian Grieve
Moderator
Australian Old Time Radio Group

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 11:55:04 -0500
From: Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Re: Early Television

On 1/21/05 11:28 PM [removed]@[removed] wrote:

I really wonder if the technology of the times (1928???) would have been up
to the task of television broadcasting.

Television was getting a great deal of press in the late twenties, but
there were substantial technical limitations on what could be done with
the scanning-disc technology of the time. Probably the most knowledgeable
person in the world today on these methods is an Englishman by the name
of Don McLean, who for nearly a decade has been studying the rise and
fall of mechanical television -- with a focus on its deployment in
Britain thru the work of John Logie Baird. McLean's 2001 book "Restoring
Baird's Image" is the definitive text on mechanical TV, and his website,
[removed], contains a great deal of information on actual
recordings of 30-line broadcasts found in England and preserved thru
computer restoration. Viewing these recordings gives one an idea of what
the state of the art really was in the early thirties.

Baird's equivalent in the US was neither Sarnoff nor Paley, but rather
Charles Francis Jenkins, who originally used the same Nipkow-disc-based
technology as Baird before evolving from a spinning perforated disc to a
small mirrored drum. With these techniques, Jenkins actively promoted
television experimentation among the "Radio News"-reading set-building
hobbyists, and as a result of this publicity wave between 1928 and 1930,
dozens of mechanical TV stations were established around the US during
the early thirties, most of them in no way affiliated with either of the
major networks. Jenkins also formed a company to manufacture complete
mechanical-TV receivers, and these proved to be the first television sets
to be commercially sold in the United States. By 1933, there were over
sixty Jenkins system stations in operation from coast to coast, and it's
these stations that were being referred to in the article that originally
inspired this thread. These stations presented rudimentary programming,
and had little value other than as novelties -- but they were enough to
get people *talking* about television, and encouraged further
experimentation as well as breathless publicity articles that rather
exaggerated the capabilities of the technology at that time.

Mechanical television was strictly a dead end, however, and after Jenkins
died in 1934, the Jenkins-process stations disappeared -- with Jenkins
himself largely erased from the historic narrative, his work swallowed up
by the RCA publicity machine.

By 1932, experimentation with all-electronic television was well
underway, using technology developed by Farnsworth and Zworykin. An
interesting series of off-screen photographs taken by Zworykin during his
mid-thirties experimentation at RCA can be found at [removed]
-- these are the earliest known surviving relics of modern television,
and reveal that even the 240-line process of that era offered
surprisingly-clear images.

Elizabeth

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 11:57:27 -0500
From: John Politis <channel1@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  I'm My Own Grandpa
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On the Billboard Pop Charts, "I'm My Own Grandpa" peaked at #10 for Guy
Lombardo and at #21 for Jo Stratford.  On the Billboard C&W charts, it
peaked at #5 for Lonzo and Oscar.   Also recorded by Homer & Jetro.

John Politis
Homepage: [removed]~politis
[removed]

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Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 11:58:16 -0500
From: <otrbuff@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  TV's start

Not to get into a disparity over the implication the technology wasn't
available before the 1940s, the fact remains that primitive TV transmitting
stations were on the air by 1930 and 1931.  RCA was demonstrating its
"advanced" equipment by 1936 and attracted legions of gawkers when it rolled
out its early sets at the 1939 World's Fair.  Those are documented facts
that would be difficult to refute.  How good the picture was and how well it
could be transmitted is open to conjecture, given the limitations of trial
and error experiments.  A few stations were on the air at the beginning of
the 1940s and I think many scholars agree that -- had there been no Second
World War -- TV would have eclipsed radio far sooner than it did.  I'm not
championing TV but restating what occurred.  Apparently the technology was
available before 1940 to bring it off.  But mass production of sets, the
licensing of large numbers of outlets and expansion of the coaxial cable was
curtailed due to the war effort.  Otherwise, the golden age of radio might
have ended by 1950 instead of a decade later.

Jim Cox

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 13:09:49 -0500
From: "Jim Hilliker" <jimhilliker@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  One more on "I'm My Own Grandpa"

Hi!

I didn't know about the two versions of the song "I'm My Own Grandpa" that
already have been mentioned here.  I first heard the 1948 hit version by
Grand Ole Opry stars Lonzo and Oscar, whose version was popular on the
Country music/Hillbilly Hit Parade that [removed] was played in 1970 as part
of a radio documentary on the history of Country Music, and later in Los
Angeles, Dr. Demento played it on his weekly show over KMET (FM) for quite a
few years, so I only knew of the Lonzo and Oscar [removed]

In an internet search on the song, I see that Guy Lombard's band (Don Rodney
on the vocal) and Jo Stafford also recorded their versions of it in 1948.
There was also a version done by Tony Pastor and the Clooney Sisters.  Quite
a few other singers recorded the song in the 1970s, '80s and '90s.

Jim Hilliker
Monterey, CA

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 13:10:04 -0500
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  1-23 births/deaths

January 23rd births

01-23-1893 - Franklin Pangborn - Newark, NJ - d. 7-20-1958
actor: "Screen Guild Theatre"
01-23-1898 - Randolph Scott - Orange County, VA (Raised: Charlotte, NC) - d.
3-2-1987
actor: "Academy Award Theatre"; "Campbell Playhouse"
01-23-1907 - Dan Duryea - White Plains, NY - d. 6-7-1968
actor: Lou Dana "Man from Homicide"
01-23-1910 - Django Reinhardt - Belgium - d. 5-16-1953
jazz artist: "Djanjo Reinhardt and the Quintet of the Hot Club France"
01-23-1913 - Max Smith - Des Moines, IA - d. 7-23-1999
singer: (Member Sportsmen Quartet) "Jack Benny Program"
01-23-1919 - Ernie Kovacs - Trenton, NJ - d. 1-12-1962
announcer: WTTM Trenton, NJ
01-23-1919 - Millard Lampell - d. 10-3-1997
co-founder of the Almanac Singers: "Treasury Star Parade"
01-23-1923 - Florence Halop - Jamaica Estates, NY - d. 7-15-1986
actress: Hotbreath Houlihan "Jimmy Durante Show"; Miss Duffy "Duffy's Tavern"
01-23-1926 - Lyn Osborn - Wichita Falls, TX - d. 8-30-1958
actor: Cadet Happy "Space Patrol"
01-23-1933 - Chita Rivera - Washington, [removed]
singer: "WOR Diamond Jubilee"

January 23rd deaths

01-19-1887 - Alexander Woollcott - Phalanx, NJ - d. 1-23-1943
commentator: "Early Bookworm"; "Town Crier"
03-26-1907 - Phil Rapp - d. 1-23-1996
creator, writer, director: "The Bickersons"; "Baby Snooks"; "Old Gold Time"
03-28-1924 - Freddie Bartholomew - London, England - d. 1-23-1992
guest: "Anchors Aweigh"
04-08-1919 - Virginia O'Brien - Los Angles, CA - d. 1-23-2001
actress: "Blue Ribbon Town"
04-09-1898 - Paul Robeson - Princeton, NJ - d. 1-23-1976
singer: "Pursuit of Happiness"
07-07-1899 - George Cukor - NYC - d. 1-23-1983
film director: "Marilyn Monroe: Fame is Fickle"; "Hollywood Calling"
09-16-1893 - Sir Alexander Korda - Pusztaturpaszto, Hungary - d. 1-23-1956
director: "Lux Radio Theatre"
11-04-1896 - Ian Wolfe - Canton, IL - d. 1-23-1992
actor: "Suspense"; "Cavalcade of America"; "Escape"
11-10-1916 - Billy May - Pittsburgh, PA - d. 1-23-2004
orchestra leader: "Music Depreciation"; "Stan Freberg Show"
11-12-1903 - Jack Oakie - Sedalia, MO - d. 1-23-1978
comedian: "Jack Oakie's College"
12-18-1915 - Bill Zuckert - NYC - d. 1-23-1997
actor: Detective. Lieutenant. Parker "Crime and Peter Chambers"
12-25-1886 - Kid Ory - LaPlace. LA - d. 1-23-1973
dixieland jazz trombonist: "This is Jazz";"Radio Almanac"; "Here's to Veterans"
12-28-1929 - Brian Redhead - Newcastle-upon-Tyne - d. 1-23-1994
presenter: "Today"; "A World in Edgeways"; "From Plato to Nato"
--
Ron Sayles
Radio: Theatre of the mind
Television: Theatre of the mindless

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 13:12:49 -0500
From: Paul Evans <evans_paul1963@[removed];
To: Old-Time Radio <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Sam Dann
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Sam Dann wrote several excellent stories for The CBS Radio Mystery Theatre.
I haven't found any print works of his, such as novels or short stories, etc.
Does anyone know other series or publications he wrote?  Was that even his
real name?  One friend suggests that he might have been John D. MacDonald,
but my friend was purely guessing, since MacDonald's middle name was Dann.
MacDonald died in 1986, so if this had been true, we'd have found out by now.

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 13:14:34 -0500
From: Udmacon@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  I'm My Own Grandpa

"I'm My Own Grandpa," written in 1948, was a great favorite of the Grand Ole
Opry, recorded any performed by Opry stars Lonzo & Oscar and Grandpa Jones.

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 15:16:57 -0500
From: "Michael Leannah" <mleannah@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  I'm My Own Grandpa

Who was the first to record "I'm My Own Grandpa"? I've been singing it with
my kids for years. The first I heard it was from an Grand Ol' Opry record,
probably from the 1940s. That record was made by country and western
musical-comedy duo Lonzo and Oscar. I found the sheet music for the song in
an antique store in northern Wisconsin many years ago. It's lost in my attic
right now so I can't say for sure, but I believe the song is attributed to
Lonzo and Oscar.

Michael Leannah
Sheboygan, Wisconsin

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 18:09:47 -0500
From: "Michael Leannah" <mleannah@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Nose full of nickels

What's the origin of the phrase "nose full of nickels"? I remember hearing
it in [removed] Fields's movie "The Bank Dick". Some kid comments to his mother
about the size of Fields's nose and she says, "But wouldn't you like to have
a nose like that full of nickels?" I've always been amused by that line. I
didn't know Stan Frieberg took a spin with it.

Michael Leannah
Sheboygan, Wisconsin

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 18:10:03 -0500
From: "Arthur Funk" <Art-Funk@[removed];
To: "OTR Digest" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Milton Cross

This week I heard a promo on my NPR station saying that the Met Opera
broadcast this week would be a re-broadcast of a program originally aired in
1959.  I've been waiting all week for a chance to hear those wonderful tones
of Milton Cross' voice.  Drat!!!!!  The program was announced by the current
announcer.  Oh, well.

Regards to all,
Art Funk

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 18:10:18 -0500
From: JackBenny@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Remley photo

but was there a REAL Franky Remley on the Jack Benny show?

Yes.

If so, does anyone have a picture of him?

Yes, but I need to scan them some time.  The person from whom I got  them
thought that Remley was Lawrence Welk, and I can see a  passing resemblance.

--Laura Leff
President,  IJBFC
[removed]

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

Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 21:07:08 -0500
From: "WILLIS G Saunders" <saunders8@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  I'm my own Grandpa

Hi All,

For the past several issues, I've been reading about the song "I'm My Own
Grandpa," but I don't think anyyone has mentioned the version with which my
kin and I are most familiar.  I recalled it while I was sitting against a
tree and scratching the moss off my back.  It was a "hillbilly" version done
by Grandpa Jones.  If I'm not suffering from advanced senility, it was
popular around early 1948.

There are various apocryphal stories about this song, among which is that
sokngwriter who wrote it committed suicide because, according to the legend,
the story was true.  Personally, I have my doubts about that.

Does anybody else remember that record from that far back?

Buck Saunders

--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2005 Issue #25
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