Subject: [removed] Digest V2005 #342
From: [removed]@[removed]
Date: 11/6/2005 9:47 AM
To: [removed]@[removed]

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


                            The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                              Volume 2005 : Issue 342
                         A Part of the [removed]!
                             [removed]
                                 ISSN: 1533-9289


                                 Today's Topics:

  This week in radio history 30 Octobe  [ Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed] ]
  Goon Show in the [removed]                 [ "karl tiedemann" <karltiedemann@hot ]
  smoking on Dragnet                    [ Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed]; ]
  "The Past is History                  [ "RadioAZ@[removed]" <radioAZ@bas ]
  Cincinnati Convention                 [ "Bob Burchett" <haradio@[removed] ]
  Jack and smokes                       [ JackBenny@[removed] ]
  Lucky Strike in Black and White       [ Robert Cockrum <rmc44@[removed] ]
  Addenda/Rejoinder/Correction/Apology  [ "Derek Tague" <derek@[removed]; ]
  Thanx for the kind [removed]           [ "bobb lynes" <iairotr@[removed]; ]
  Golden Age of Radio - WTIC            [ "Austotr" <austotr@[removed]; ]
  Beer and tobacco advertising          [ "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed]; ]
  11-6 births/deaths                    [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 11:20:09 -0500
From: Joe Mackey <joemackey108@[removed];
To: otrd <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  This week in radio history 30 October to 5
 November

 From Those Were The Days --

10/30

Orson Welles, known to radio audiences as The Shadow, presented his
famous dramatization of [removed] Wells' The War of the Worlds on CBS's
Mercury Theater at 8 [removed]

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

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 home page: [removed]~[removed]

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 14:04:26 -0500
From: "karl tiedemann" <karltiedemann@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Goon Show in the [removed]

I appreciated Mr. Robert Angus standing up for "foreign" OTR and especially
mentioning the highly esteemed Goon Show.  This reminded me that-- oddly
enough-- the Goon Show WAS briefly a part of American OTR.  It seems that
NBC ran it for a while in 1955 or '56.  When I heard this, I  found it
almost unbelievable-- given what the Goon Show is like-- but saw it
confirmed by two separate sources.  It would fascinating to know what went
into the decision to buy the show, if it was edited to make room for
commercials, etc., and what on earth American listenersmade of it at the
time.  I can scarcely imagine the artistic/cultural whiplash that one would
experience in coming upon the Goon Show after having just been listening to
something by the [removed]!

K Tiedemann

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 14:04:45 -0500
From: Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  smoking on Dragnet

My wife and I recently watched a few episodes of the early Dragnet tv
show--the ones that were lifted straight from the radio scripts. We
watched "Big Hit and Run" and "Big Shoplift," both of which we'd heard
recently in their radio incarnations. In one of the episodes--I can't
remember which on--the show opens with a rather strange camera shot:
Friday and his partner are viewed from a camera that is placed right
behind an ashtray, so that the ashtray is prominently in the foreground
and the actors are in the background. In several other shots we were
conscious of how prominent the ashtrays were. I agree with comments
others have made about how smoking was more common back then, and has
always been used on film to denote both tension/excitement and
boredom/routine. (Also in books--didn't the Continental Op smoke
Fatimas, 25 years before Jack Webb endorsed them?) It struck me and
wife, however, that Webb was featuring cigarettes too prominently to be
just atmosphere--he was clearing verging into product placement
territory.

Kermyt

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 14:05:21 -0500
From: "RadioAZ@[removed]" <radioAZ@[removed];
To: "OTR Digest" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  "The Past is History

Christopher Werner, speaking of sensitizing youngsters to nuances of the
past, writes,

6 teenagers rode in a van I rented with a built in DVD player en route
to a camping trip. I wanted to play the 'Sky Captain and the World of
Tomorrow" movie to them, but not before they understood *why* it was
made.

Christopehr, what I'm curious about is this:  how did those kids react?
Were they interested?  Bored?  Tell us more.

Ted

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 14:05:35 -0500
From: "Bob Burchett" <haradio@[removed];
To: "[removed]" <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Cincinnati Convention
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Finally worked it out with the Ramada Hotel, and there will
be a 20th Cincinnati convention. April 21,22, 06
This very well be out last one.  20 years is a nice run, and
Robert and myself aren't getting younger.

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Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 20:13:25 -0500
From: JackBenny@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Jack and smokes

Stephen Kallis writes:

Well!   Arguably the one of the most popular comedy/variety  shows, the
Jack Benny program, was sponsored by Lucky Strikes.   Laura???

Yes, I do remember something about that.  Phil Harris made an  interesting
comment to me about when Jack announced to the cast that they were  switching
from General Foods to Lucky Strike in 1944.  Apparently, Phil's  perception
was
that shows sponsored by cigarette companies were the low-rent  and
on-the-way-out district (don't know exactly what that perception was  based
on, but there
it is).  So Phil was pretty shocked and disappointed  initially to hear
they'd been picked up by American Tobacco, thinking that this  signalled the
impending demise of the show.

Fortunately, he was wrong.

--Laura Leff
President, IJBFC
[removed]

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 20:14:40 -0500
From: Robert Cockrum <rmc44@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Lucky Strike in Black and White
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Re Lee Munsick's opus on cigarettes and his memory of a "Your Hit Parade"
telecast ...

But a shocker for the studio audience was that while everything else in the
studio was in attractive color, that giant photo of the colorful Lucky
Strikes cigarette pack was in glorious black and white! Because so was the
outgoing transmission. Clearly, poor little American Tobacco Company could
not afford the cost of a color reproduction.

A little something I learned as a kid (an older kid) while watching Art
Linkletter's Houseparty in its black-and-white days. One of the kids he was
interviewing asked why the package of Kellogg's Corn Flakes (one of the
sponsors, whose commercial was done live by Jack Slattery or Art) was printed
in black-and-white (actually shades of gray) ... I think with the rooster on
the package back then, the bird's comb would have been red, of course, maybe
a background of yellow, etc. The explanation Art gave all who were watching:
Color doesn't come off looking like the real thing on b&w TV ... that is,
reds look black, the yellow hardly registers at all, etc.

Thus it wasn't that poor little (filthy rich) American Tobacco Co. couldn't
afford a color reproduction of its product ... it just wouldn't have looked
good to all the folk at home. And when it was on camera as often as Lee
indicated it was, no wonder they had a modern ad agency Whistler render a new
"Arrangement in Gray and Black." The rest of those "attractive color" Lee
refers to might have looked OK as they were.

Bob C.

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Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 20:15:00 -0500
From: "Derek Tague" <derek@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Addenda/Rejoinder/Correction/Apology
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In a  previous post, I wrote:

The initials "FOTR" can easily be adapted to stand for "Friends of
Terrestrial Radio" if the need ever arises. Let's hope that day is not far in
coming.

I don't know what "gremlin" put the word "NOT" in that last sentence. Said
sentence should've read "Let's hope that day is far in coming." I'd like there
to ne scads more old-time radio [removed] for newer
conventioneers like Melanie Aultman and Amanda Osborne, re-acquaintees like
Lee and Charlotte Munsick, and "dueling Tontos" Hal Stone & Bobb Lynes.

Profoundest apologies from the ether,

Derek Tague

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 20:15:31 -0500
From: "bobb lynes" <iairotr@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Thanx for the kind [removed]

I want to quickly thank some folks for the kind words posted here lately.
Joy Jackson, you're a sweetheart ("if there ever was [removed]") and you
spelled my name correctly!
Jim Nixon, you beat me to the draw in getting the SPERDVAC info on these
pages.
Derek (The Sober)Tague, you silver-tongued [removed], too, correctly
spelled it LYNES.  Are ya listenin', "Jug"?  ;-)
Anthony "Tex" Tollin, I agree: Hal did a great "me" as Tonto and [removed]
Amanda (another sweetie) is referring to the fact that I asked for and got
HER autograph in my copy of the A&A book.  She,too, correctly spelled it
LYNES.
Forgive me, Charlie, but I've lived with folks continually getting it wrong,
that it's refreshing to have finally "arrived".
On the cigarettes "thread", the tobacco companies sponsored SO many of the
great OTR shows because they were large and could afford the heavy costs
that radio needed in those days.  Of course they were bad for us, but they
did perform that service for us.  I too, smoked for about 12 years (began in
1956 in the USAF when they were $[removed] per CARTON at the BX!) and finally
quit "cold turkey" at Xmas, 1968. (I still miss 'em after a good cup o'
coffee).  I've saved so much money since then!!   The best way to stop
smoking [removed]'t start.

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

Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 22:34:01 -0500
From: "Austotr" <austotr@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Golden Age of Radio - WTIC

G'Day folks, I am a fan of this series of shows that are announced here
roughly weekly.  I missed some episodes and Bob kindly supplied them to me.
We are getting close to the end and I thought I would take the opportunity
to thank Bob Scherago, Dick Bertel and Ed Corcoran for making these time
capsules available.

I have tended to listen to the episodes of people I have heard of first, but
am now working through those I would never have heard of without this
series.

Due to my particular interest in Australian OTR, I can point out that in
episode 2 - Charles Harrell, that Ed Corcoran was being unfair to Charles in
asking him to identify the cast in Famous Jury Trials which Charles was
associated with.  The episode played to Charles Harrell was  State VS
William Wright.  To Charles credit he was confused by the 'British voice' of
the narrator and didn't try to name names.  The episode Ed Corcoran played
was an Australian Episode.

It is very easy to assume that episodes in circulation are automatically
[removed], but Australia bought [removed] scripts, acted them, then sold the finished
shows back to the [removed]  A similar thing happened with Australian shows sold
to South Africa.  They ran out of episodes, liked the series and did their
own versions.  I myself have been caught out when trying to pick the
episodes.  I have a long way to go with picking voices and I have sent that
episode to some voice experts to confirm my belief that it is Australian,
but in the meantime I found the episode in question and compared it to our
Australian log of the series.

I believe that Famous Jury Trials and the other 4 sub series were also done
in [removed], and possibly South Africa.

Ian Grieve

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

Date: Sun, 6 Nov 2005 02:12:11 -0500
From: "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Beer and tobacco advertising

I'm sure Lee Munsick confused many of us when he wrote:
With tobacco and beer advertising legislated off the airwaves,
is it any wonder that stations and networks have to run often
1/3 or more of their program time filled not with the subject
program matter, but with commercials

First of all, beer advertising is not "legislated off the airwaves".  It is
there all the time--remember the taste bowl series, and the frog trio.
Hard liquor advertising is becoming more common on some cable channels, but
is rarely on broadcast TV and radio only because of liquor industry
self-regulation, and the rules of individual station owners.  There is no
federal law prohibiting alcohol advertising (but there might still be some
local regulations in dry areas.)  But what is most confusing is the latter
part of the statement which seems to contend that stations are often
commercialized 20 minutes per hour because they can't accept tobacco or
beer ads.  Huh???  Does this mean that tobacco and beer companies would pay
MORE for advertising which could allow stations to air fewer minutes of ads
per hour???

Michael Biel  mbiel@[removed]

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

Date: Sun, 6 Nov 2005 11:43:06 -0500
From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed];
To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  11-6 births/deaths

November 6th births

11-06-1886 - Gus Kahn - Koblenz, Germany - d. 10-8-1941
lyricist: "Good News of 1938"
11-06-1892 - Ole Olsen - Wabash, IN - d. 1-26-1963
comedian: (Olsen and Johnson); "Rudy Vallee Show"; "Breakfast Club"
11-06-1896 - Frank Readick - Seattle, WA - d. xx-xx-1965
actor: (Father of Bob) Knobby Walsh "Joe Palooka"; Shadow "The Shadow"
11-06-1899 - Francis Lederer - Prague, Czechoslovakia - d. 5-25-2000
actress: Guest Armchair detective: Ellery Queen
11-06-1901 - Juanita Hall - d. 2-28-1968
actress: "Story of Ruby Valentine"
11-06-1904 - Selena Royle - New York, NY - d. 4-23-1983
actress: Hilda Hope "Hilda Hope, [removed]"; Kathy Marsh "Portia Faces Life"
11-06-1905 - Isabel Carothers - Mt. Pleasant, IA - d. 1-8-1937
actress: Lu "Clara, Lu and Em"
11-06-1910 - Donald Dickson - Clairton, PA - d. 9-21-1972
singer: "Sealtest Party"; "Chase & Sanborn Hour"; "Blue Ribbon Town"
11-06-1916 - Ray Conniff - Attleboro, MA - d. 10-12-2002
arranger: Armed Forces Radio during World War II

November 6th deaths

03-11-1918 - Grace McTernan - d. 11-6-1995
soprano: "Your America"
04-14-1914 - John Hubbard - East Chicago, IL - d. 11-6-1988
actor: Willie Faye "Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show"
07-17-1904 - John B. Hughes - d. 11-6-1989
news commentator: "Hughes Reel"
07-21-1883 - Cecil Humphreys - Cheltenham, England - d. 11-6-1947
actor: "Theatre Guild on the Air"
08-01-1911 - Fora Campbell - d. 11-6-1978
actress: Jean Forbes Lambert "Brave Tomorrow"; Janice King "Strange Romance of
Evelyn Winters"
11-17-1907 - L. Sprague de Camp - New York, NY - d. 11-6-2000
science fiction writer: "X-Minus One"; "Future Tense"
11-19-1863 - Billy Sunday - Ames, IA - d. 11-6-1935
preacher: "Back Home Hour"
11-20-1920 - Gene Tierney - Brooklyn, NY - d. 11-6-1991
actress: "Lux Radio Theatre"; "Great Scenes from Great Plays"; "[removed] Steel
Hour"
--
Ron Sayles
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2005 Issue #342
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