“The Sealed Book” was a horror program from the 1940s that was a bit of a mish-mash.  It was hosted by a “keeper of the book” that remind you of “The Hermit’s Cave” or “The Witch’s Tale”.  And most of the scripts were originally produced on Mutual’s series, “The Mysterious Traveler”.  The show isn’t particularly well regarded for its acting and direction, but it can be campy, gruesome fun.

“Escape by Death” is program 5 in the series and tells the story of an elderly woman who comes to believe that her relatives are trying to kill her.  The show is dated by Goldin to April 14, 1945, and it was originally broadcast on Mutual.  According to otrsite.com’s log of the series, the script was originally produced on “The Mysterious Traveler” on April 23, 1944.

The show was transferred from an original vinyl Charles Michelson transcription set, matrix numbers WOR-7-2315A and WOR-7-2315B.

It’s a concert from the “Hollywood Bowl”, distributed as Program 78 in the series when it was broadcast on the Armed Forces Radio Service.  According to Jim Hiliker of Monterey, California on the OTR mailing list, KFI locally broadcast the Hollywood Bowl concerts in the 30s and 40s, so the show probably originated at KFI.

A Mario Lanza website dates this particular show to July 24, 1948.  It’s “MGM Night”, so we hear various musicians and personalities under contract to the studio.  The orchestra is conducted by Miklos Rozsa and we hear Mario Lanza, very early in his Hollywood career, and Kathryn Grayson doing the vocal duties.  The program opens with the overture to the “Bartered Bride” and we hear works by Puccini and Victor Herbert.

The highlight of the show is “The Halloween Suite” composed by none other than actor Lionel Barrymore, who also provides narration for the piece.  This “Time” magazine article from 1944, notes that Barrymore had composed hundreds of works in the since the turn of the century, a side of the famous actor not as well known as his work on the screen.

The show was transferred from an original undated AFRS vinyl transcription set and appears to be uncommon or uncirculated among old time radio enthusiasts.

updated 11.3.2009: Corrected spelling of “Miklos Rozsa”.

Program 2 in the series is “Music Box from Hades”, concerning a man who finds a music box that can kill.

The show was transferred from vinyl NBC Orthacoustic Syndicated Program Series transcription, matrix ND5-MM-11445-5.

If you ever run into any transcriptions for this series, let me know - I really enjoy it and would like to add more to my collection beyond the single disc I have.

Program 19 is something of a mystery play, “Goodbye My Love” and stars Lurene Tuttle.  Her character tells the story of her husband, an up and coming novelist, who receives a strange telegram from another writer, inviting him to collaborate on a new book.  As usual, the opening announcements and commercials aren’t included, since these would be read by your local announcer.

The show was transferred from original ZIV vinyl transcription set, matrix numbers UR 174878 and UR 174879 AU1.  The disc suffered water damage, obscuring the label, so there’s no photo and I’ve run the file through click reduction software to improve the sound of this rather scratched disc set.

updated 10.29.2009 - corrected spelling of “Lurene Tuttle”

Betty and Dick returned from their honeymoon last week.  This week, in Program 43, they find Windy Bill camping out in their house.  Will the young couple be able to get rid of their unwanted house guest so they can have some time alone?

The program was transferred from an original World Broadcasting acetate transcription, matrix number SS 8723-2.

The show was transferred from original RCA Thesaurus 12″ transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5074-1A.

Program 43, as broadcast on the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service and dated September 19, 1958 in the disc matrix, is a drama called “The Man is Always Right” by Sophie Kerr.

The show was transferred from an original AFRTS vinyl microgroove transcription.

In this post, we hear the episode of September 25, 1945 heard on the Armed Forces Radio Service as program 23 in the series, “Hildegarde”.  Hildegarde starts off the show with her chipper version of “It’s a Hap-Hap-Happy Day”.  Guests are comedian Willie Howard, Paulette Goddard and Harry Conover and one of his models, Marsha.

The show was transferred from an original AFRS vinyl transcription, matrix numbers HD5-MM-12784-1 and HD5-MM12785-1, probably pressed by RCA.  Date is from the transcription matrix.  The original disc has groove damage and has been sent through some click reduction software to improve the sound.

Here’s the next to last excerpt of the CBS series “Pick and Pat” in my collection, drawn from a set of discs produced for the series producer, Frank Macmahon.

This is part two (of three parts) of an undated show from 1938.  Pick and Pat’s routine is about appearing in court because one of the pair is accused of stealing chickens.  The band plays “There’s a Far Away Look in Your Eyes” with a solo by Benny Krueger.  Edward Roecker sings “Did Your Mother Come from Ireland?”.

The excerpt of this otherwise lost show was transferred from original WABC aircheck laquer recorded by Advertiser’s Recording Service, New York.

This week, Luke and Mrs. Robinson rush to greet newlyweds betty and dick at the railroad station as their daughter and new son in law return from their honeymoon.  Of course, this fun little comedic episode quickly turns into a conversation about how farmers don’t like socialism.

The show was transferred from an original World Broadcasters, Inc acetate transcription, matrix number SS 8722-2.

Program GRS-5 is titled “The Dempsey-Tunny Fights” and features and interview with Jack Dempsey, reflecting on his years in boxing and Grantland Rice.

The program was transferred from original RCA Thesaurus 12″ transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5060-1A.

Perhaps you can pick up a few tips from Fibber McGee in program 85 of the “Fibber McGee and Molly” series from the Armed Forces Radio Service, originally broadcast December 26, 1944 on NBC.

The show features Jim and Marian Jordan, Arthur Q. Bryan, Billy Mills and His Orchestra, Harlow Wilcox, the King’s Men.  Our transfer is directly from a vinyl AFRS Navy Department transcription.  The program date is from the matrix and was verified by Goldin and a log of the series of otrsite.com.

A very special thanks to listener Michael Utz for donating this disc to my collection.

Program 2 of series B features Mercury Theater regular Everett Sloane in “Blow That Whistle”.  The drama is about a mailman who, against his better judgment, is drawn into “American First” group that harasses immigrants in the local community.

The show was transferred from an original vinyl Orthacoustic transcription pressed by NBC/RCA, matrix number ND7-MM-5851.

Program 42 of the series as broadcast on AFRS, features guest Kathy Barr promoting her new album “Follow Me”.  Barr was one of several female vocalists of the fifties that felt at ease with more sultry and uptempo material.  She was brought to the attention of RCA by Mario Lanza.  You guys out there might be saying “hubba hubba” when you take a look at the cover of the album.  The show includes informational AFRTS announcements about NATO for the troops.

Our program was transferred from an original AFRTS vinyl microgroove transcription.  It’s dated May 2, 1958 in the matrix, which could be the date the show was recorded, originally broadcast on Mutual, or the date this version was mastered by AFRTS engineers.

The curious thing about this disc is that it appears to be a program in the series you weren’t supposed to hear - the disc’s pressing plate on this side has been scratched out in a definite spiderweb pattern.  It’s hard to tell if this was done before the series was first distributed or later in the run.  But, based on the contents, one can see why.

Luke goes into a diatribe about “boondoggling” - the government creating useless jobs for the unemployed.  It’s one of the more heartless little  talks in the series, considering the high level of unemployment during the Depression and how many people that might have heard the show were either themselves working on a WPA or CCC job or had a relative that did.

I have a friend from the small town of Graham, NC, that recalls his parents and grandparents talking about one of his aunts who was an organist at the local movie theater.  At that time, small theaters couldn’t afford the upgrade to sound, so even into the late 1930s, the theater was still showing silent movies - you had to drive thirty miles or more to the big city of Greensboro to see a sound picture.  His aunt received WPA support to accompany films and the theater and give music lessons.

This episode of the series was transferred from an original World Broadcasting red acetate transcription, matrix number S 8686-2.  The file was compiled from two passes of the disc and was run through click reduction software - I had to reconstruct the program, since the disc skipped so much.

The show was transferred from original RCA Thesaurus 12″ transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5059-1.

Next week, we hear the inside scoop on the famous Dempsey-Tunney fights.

Here’s another excerpt from “Pick and Pat”, a program featuring blackface performers Pick Padgett and Pat Malone, two Irishmen who teamed up in 1929 as Molasses and January and had their own network show from the early 1930s through 1945.  The shows in this series I’m posting on the blog are from rare aircheck discs that were created for the shows producer, Frank Macmahon.  The programs from this group were heard on CBS and sponsored by Dill’s Best and Model tobacco in 1937 and 1938.

This week, we hear part 1 (of three parts) of the program of December 12, 1938.  Unfortunately, the disc containing part 2 of the show is missing and the flipside of this disc, part 3, was damaged and I was unable to give it a transfer to digital.

The recording starts off with the end of the previous show on the network and the WABC id.  This particular episode, unlike the others I’ve posted on the blog, is billed as “Model’s Minstrels” and is formatted more like a traditional minstrel show.  he male chorus sings “There’s Gonna Be a Great Day”.  Pick and Pat read letters they’ve received, including one from “Shorty” wanting advice about his farm.

The date on the label is obscured, but the flip side of the disc contains part 3 of the show.  Unfortunately, the disc has extensive cracking of the lacquer and I couldn’t play it well enough to transfer, but I did hear the opening of the December 12, 1938 episode of “Lux Radio Theater” (”The Scarlet Pimpernel”) to date this “Pick and Pat” episode.

The program was transferred from original WABC aircheck laquer recorded by Advertiser’s Recording Service, New York.  This is a previously uncirculated episode of this rare series.

This is a pretty amazing little half-hour program.  Program 93 features hostess Paulette Goddard introducing W.C. Fields, Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd with Edgar Bergen, Virginia O’Brien, Borrah Minnevitch and the Harmonica Rascals and the King Sisters.  The announcer for the show is Don Wilson.

The program is dedicated to armed forces personnel from the State of Kentucky, so there’s something of a Kentucky Derby theme going on, at least in the program’s opening and first number by the orchestra, “Kentucky”.  The King Sisters sing the War themed tune, “Milkman, Keep Those Bottles Quiet” and the Harmonica Rascals do a wonderful arrangement of “Brazil”.  (I’m a fan of the Harmonicats, so this was a real treat.)

The highlight of the show is the sketch with W.C. Fields and Edgar Bergen.  They’re in rare form, with Fields and Bergen tossing in adlibs as Fields gets lost in the script.

The show was transferred from an original AFRS vinyl transcription.  According to the log of the series at otrsite.com, it was recorded May 24, 1944.

By the way - do you recognize the theme the orchestra plays after the intro of Paulette Goddard?  It would turn up years later as a main theme used on “The Big Show“.  Was this some kind of stock cue in the music score library at NBC?

In this post, program 88 in the series as broadcast on AFRS, originally heard on CBS on December 21, 1945.  The first question during opening is “Why does the subway have to raise the fare?” and the first question during the main body of the show is “What is the color of the Little Red Schoolhouse?”.  The show features host Tom Howard, George Shelton, Lulu McConnell, Harry McNaughton, and announcer Ken Roberts.  I think this particular episode might not be in common circulation among collectors.

Frank, a listener to the blog who has had a long  career in radio, remembered seeing “It Pays to Be Ignorant” and other shows live when he worked in the mailroom at Mutual.  Now that was an employee perk!

The show was transferred from original AFRS vinyl transcription.  Date is from the transcription matrix.

Program 13 is “The London Legend” with Jane Wyatt, possibly a previously lost/uncirculated program in the series.  The story concerns a love triangle involving a real diva, actress Victoria London, her secretary, and a small-town newspaper man.  You’ll notice there’s no opening announcement to identify the show - just music.  Your local announcer would provide the opening, along with a commercial from one of your fine local merchants.

You younger listeners prying your eyes away from the television to listen to some classic old time radio might recognize Jane Wyatt for her roles on “Father Knows Best” and as Spock’s human mother on “Star Trek”.

The show was transferred from original ZIV vinyl transcription set, matrix numbers UR 174870 AU1 and UR 174871 AU1.  This one doesn’t have a scan since there are no labels left on the discs - the set suffered water damage.  The discs were also pretty heavily scratched, so the file has been click-reduced before converting to mp3 format.

I have several more shows from the series that I’ll post on occasion.

In program 40, crazy schemer Windy Bill visits his brother-in-law, Luke, to bemoan the fact that he’s loosing the patent to his house car to Miss Timmons.  Gus “The Gorilla” Olson, Windy Bill’s bodyguard, shows up and gets to know Luke’s secretary - could we have a budding romance here?

Of course, we can’t have an episode of “American Family Robinson” without some speechifying; in this case, the topic is how big business isn’t bad just because it’s big.

The show was transferred from an original red acetate World Broadcasting system transcription, matrix number SS 8652.

Next week … the episode of “American Family Robinson” you weren’t supposed to hear…

In program GRS-3, “Big Red - Man o’ War”, sportscaster Jimmy Powers narrates Grantland Rice’s stories about great horses and great races from Rice’s long career as a sports reporter.   The show features an interview with jockey Earl “The Handy Guy” Sandy who was a friend of Grantland Rice, reminiscing about his own career in horse racing.

The show was transferred from original RCA Thesaurus 12″ transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5054-1C.

Next week, Jimmy Powers tells us Grantland Rice’s stories about boxer Jack Dempsey.

“When did Ayn Rand get a syndicated talk show?” he asked.

That pretty much sums up this odd mix of serial drama and comedy from the National Industrial Council (aka the National Association of Manufacturers) that includes at least one diatribe against FDR’s New Deal policies in each episode.  Perhaps the show influenced Ayn Rand’s writing style.

I found out a couple more interesting tidbits about the show from the Museum of Broadcast Communication’s “Encyclopedia of Radio”.  The idea for the show came from Harry A. Bullis, the vice president of General Mills and chairman of the NAM’s public relations committee.  Scripts for the show were originally submitted to both NBC and CBS, with the National Industrial Council hoping that one of the networks would carry it as a sustaining feature.  Not only did the networks turn them down, but NBC prohibited their owned and operated stations from carrying the show after seeing more of the scripts.  The Encyclopedia notes:

“Reviewing the series’ first three episodes, NBC script editor L.H.Titterton hardly knew what to make of the Robinsons, or the direction the story might take. An outline for the rest of the series and a script of the last episode received three days later confirmed Titterton’s suspicion. After meeting with Selvage and Douglas Silver, the scripts’ author, Titterton reported that the American Family Robinson proposed “to take on a definitely anti-Rooseveltian tendency.” “You would probably not find in the entire series any specific sentence that could be censored,” Titterton wrote to his network superiors, “but the definite intention and implication of each episode is to conduct certain propaganda against the New Deal and all its work.”

Probably the last thing the networks wanted was to antagonize the Roosevelt administration and, by extension, the Federal Communications Commission.

Program 39 in the series is more typical of the series, focusing on Luke, editor of the local paper, and his dealings with crazy relative Windy Bill.  It seems that Windy Bill is has a plot going to get some property that belongs to Miss Timmons, so she and Luke work out a scheme to thwart his plans.  Somehow, this quickly turns into a discussion of social welfare in European countries.

Don’t you have conversations like this every day?

My thanks to the Old Time Radio Researcher’s Group for their donation of these discs to my collection.

By the way - I recently obtained the First Generation Archive’s “Little Orphan Annie” set that includes shows dating from the mid-1930s. The “American Family Robinson”’s Luke sounds like the same actor that appeared on “Little Orphan Annie”.  Anyone else think so?

This disc promotes the movie “Francis”, the comedy with Donald O’Conner and the talking mule.  The interview was probably released in 1950 since “Francis” premiered in February and would have been in wide release throughout the spring and summer.  In the interview, Zasu talks about how she got her name, her reputation as one of the best party hostesses in Hollywood and, of course, her new movie.

If you’d like to follow along or create your own interview with Zasu, here’s the original cue sheet distributed with the disc.

Zasu Pitts interview cue sheet - PDF, 600 kb

Studios and tv networks still do this kind of thing today, with video interviews of stars distributed to tv stations where local reporters are cut into pre-recorded footage with “canned” questions.  I’m surprised that political figures haven’t started doing the same thing.

Our mp3 was transferred from an original 12″ Universal Pictures red vinyl transcription, matrix number .

Listener Christopher McPherson donated this fun little disc to my collection and provided a scan of the cue sheets.

“The Upholsterer”, program 4 in the series as heard on the Armed Forces Radio network, was originally broadcast November 17, 1949 on CBS as “Casey, Crime Photographer”.  In this episode, we get the standard “murder in a locked room” mystery that stumps the cops, but is a breeze for Casey and his eagle eyes and pushy personality to sort out.

The show was transferred from original AFRS vinyl transcription, matrix numbers D-63384 and D-63385.

Listener Joseph Webb loaned me the disc to dub for the blog and provided a bit of trivia on the show.  There were two broadcasts of “The Upholsterer” in the series.  Both shows are only circulating in their AFRS versions and you can tell them apart by the closing announcement.  The episode broadcast November 17, 1949 ends with “This is the United States Armed Forces Radio Service” right after the last line of dialog.  On the repeat broadcast of November 16, 1950, the ending AFRS announcement includes the words “starring Staats Cotsworth as Casey, came to you through the facilities of the United States Armed Forces Radio Service.”

Musician Alfred Wallenstein’s favorite story, “A Doll’s House” by Henrik Ibsen, is program 62 in the series.  The cast includes John Beal, Janet Waldo, and William Conrad.

The show was transferred from original red vinyl Ziv transcription set.  I think the show may be an uncirculated episode of the series among collectors.

The show was transferred from original RCA Thesaurus vinyl 12″ transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5049-1.  The program appears to be previously uncirculated.

Next week’s show looks at horse racing.  Guests start showing up to share their own stories about Rice and the personalities he covered in his reporting in program 7 of the series.

In this excerpt from the program of May 23, 1938, Pick and Pat present a routine about golfing and we hear a commercial for Model tobacco and a number by the orchestra with a solo by Benny Krueger.  This episode is particularly interesting since the team briefly mentions television during their routine.  This is part 2 of the program only; the show was originally recorded in three parts and parts 1 and 3, unfortunately, are lost.

This previously lost/uncirculated program was transferred from an original WABC aircheck laquer recorded by Advertiser’s Recording Service, New York.  The reverse of the disc is blank.

We have three more excerpts of “Pick and Pat” in the coming weeks.

Also, a little update on one of last week’s posts.

If you’ll recall, I posted a 78 called “Forbidden Broadcast” in the memorabilia section by vaudeville and nightclub performer Ray Bourbon.  I’ve been researching his life and work for over a decade and I’m pleased to report a significant new find - Ray wrote and self-published a novel in 1932.  You can read about the book and download a copy of it in a page I posted at the site yesterday.

Now, on with this week’s shows…

It’s the “Victor Radio-Tone Demonstration”, a 78 prepared by Victor for dealers to show off the sound of one of their radio-phonograph combinations.  It’s a fairly common record and easy to find on auction sites, but we offer it here in its more-rare Canadian pressing version which features a white “batwing” label, rather than the more common US version pressed with a black “scroll” label.

The first side of the disc features Milton Cross and his round tones extolling the virtues of Victor’s dedication to superior sound; the second side consists of the theme song to the weekly Victor radio broadcast, called, appropriately, “Victory” and performed by the Nat Shilkret and the Victor Symphony Orchestra.

One 78 collectors discussion board I frequent dates the disc to late 1930 and notes that it was likely used to demonstrate the RE-57 sets.  You can see a photo of this model at this site.

Our mp3 was transferred from an original Canadian pressing of the disc, matrix numbers D-1-A and D-1-B.

“Forbidden Broadcast” is a comedy record made by nightclub performer Ray Bourbon sometime in the 1930s.  Ray got his start in vaudeville, was a bit player in silent movies at Paramount and was friends with Rudolph Valentino and William Boyd, and made a name for himself with his outrageous improvised comedy.  He was also a sexually ambiguous “drag queen” that wasn’t afraid to do gay humor at a time when homosexuality was illegal and gay clubs were regularly raided by police.

Ray’s career would extend from the 1920s until his death in 1971 in prison.  He was convicted of the murder of the owner of the Pet-A-Zoo, a business in Big Springs, Texas.  When Ray left his dogs with the owner, Roy Blount, and couldn’t pay the bill, Blount sold the animals for medical research.  But, during Ray’s storied life, he appeared on stage with such stars as Mae West and helped composers Chet Forrest and Robert Wright and actor Robert Taylor get started in the business.  Even Robert Mitchum, when he was breaking into the business, wrote songs for Ray’s nightclub act to pick up a few dollars in the 1940s.  Ray travelled all over the US and Europe, performing well into his 70s.

Despite Ray’s reputation as a “smutty” comedian, his material is rather tame and coy today and he did appear on radio a few times.  In May 1933, his San Francisco revue “Boys Will Be Girls”, was carried live on the radio - and, in a twist that made headlines at the time, the show was raided by the police and the raid was carried live on the station.  I’ve also found documentation on program schedules that Ray appeared on radio three times in December 1938 on Los Angeles radio station KTMR in a 15 minute show.  Ray was regularly working in Los Angeles nightclubs during this period and may have bought the time to promote his stage act.

Researching Ray’s life and work and collecting his recordings and other memorabilia has been another one of my hobbies over the past decade.  I was lucky enough to obtain the original typed manuscript of Ray’s incomplete memoirs that he was working on when he was in prison in Texas.  If you’d like to learn more about Ray’s very strange life, check out my website on this unique performer.  Also, sixties underground cartoonist Skip Williamson had a fascinating blog post a few months ago on working as a publicist for one of Ray’s productions.

“Forbidden Broadcast” is one of over 150 recordings Ray made from the 1930s to the 1960s.  He was a true “do it yourself” artist, contracting to have 78s and lps produced and selling them at his shows and via mail order.  Some were sold “under the counter” at record shops and the discs are well known to “party record” collectors today.

So, in this post, give a listen to “Forbidden Broadcast” by Ray Bourbon, originally released on Western Record Company Bourbana, matrix number WR-716-A.

My sincere thanks to collector Sara Hassan for providing a tape copy of this 78 used as the basis for this mp3 file.

Program 51 in the series, as broadcast on the Armed Forces Radio Service, appears to be previously lost or uncirculated.  The first quiz subject on the show is Henry Wallace, vice president during Roosevelt’s 1940 term.  The guest panelist is baseball player and coach, Hank Gowdy.  Others in the program include host Bill Slater, Fred Van Deventer, Florence Rinard, Bobby McGuire, Herb Polesie, announcer Bob Martin, and the “Mystery Voice” Don Fredericks.

The show was originally broadcast on Mutual and there’s no date on the disc matrix.  Goldin lists AFRS program 23 in the series dated to November, 1946, so this show was probably broadcast in early or mid 1947.  The Newspaper Radio Logs site has a listing from the New York Times for May 10, 1947 listing “Twenty Questions” with Gowdy as the guest, so that could be the original date for the show.

Our program was transferred from an original AFRS vinyl transcription.  Click reduction software has been used on the master .wav file to improve the sound.

I hope you like “The Grantland Rice Story” because it’s going to be a long haul - I have all 52 episodes of the series.  It might remind you a bit of “The Passing Parade”, with its simple setup of a narrator guiding us through interesting personal and professional stories of the famous and not-so-famous.

The program was syndicated by Thesaurus, a division of RCA that initially produced music library discs for stations then later expanded into syndicated programming.  “The Grantland Rice Story” was one of eight series released for syndication the first week of May, 1955 by Thesaurus during their 20th anniversary (you can see a “Billboard” magazine article about the release here).  My particular set came from a station in the southwest that started broadcasting the program weekly on September 17, 1955, noting the date of each broadcast inside the album box cover.

Hosted by Jimmy Powers, the show focuses on the life of the “Dean of the Sportswriters”, Grantland Rice, and was based on Rice’s autobiography, “The Tumult and the Shouting”.  Powers reads from the autobiography and, on some shows, major sports and newspaper figures drop by to comment on the story or offer memories of Rice, who knew just about every major sports figure during his long career that extended from the 1920s until his death a few months before this series was recorded.  Powers was a well-known sports writer in his own right, serving as the sports editor of the “Daily News”.  He was also the announcer for NBC’s Friday night fights all through the 1950s.

Program GRS-1 is titled “Beginning at the Beginning”, where Jimmy tells us about the series and reads from sections of Granny Rice’s autobiography on his early life and the start of his newspaper career.

The show was transferred from an original RCA Thesaurus 12″ vinyl transcription, matrix number F7-MR-5048-1.  The matrix numbers used on the discs, beginning with “F” and “G” indicate the program was recorded and mastered in 1955 and 1956.

“The American Family Robinson”, first syndicated in Fall 1934, was a program produced by the National Industrial Council, a group set up by the National Association of Manufacturers.  Disturbed by the policies of the Roosevelt administration, the show was designed to use the medium of radio and the popular format of continuing serials to “sell” the public on more conservative economic polices.  It was part of a larger effort, including texts for speeches, leaflets, films for schools and other materials, by the NAM to organize owners of manufacturing business to influence public opinion in their local communities about New Deal economics.

Hmm … sounds like some of the information campaigns going on about health care and the economy today, doesn’t it?

On the surface, the concept sounds rather dry, but the show has some fun characterizations and good writing as we follow the Robinsons dealing with hard times during the Depression.  The program was quite popular, running on about 300 stations, with the air time paid for by local sponsors.  It was controversial in its time - the National Association of Broadcasters issued a memo to stations encouraging them to inform audience that the program was sponsored and didn’t necessarily represent the views of station management or owners.  No doubt, the NAB was concerned about the FCC clamping down on the series and requiring equal time for opposing viewpoints.

The show was also referenced in Congressional testimony in a subcommittee on labor rights and free speech, with one source noting that the first 19 programs in the series did not include any attribution to who was sponsoring the program and, with program 20, the show credited to the National Industrial Council, a name that would have been unfamiliar to the public at the time - the implication being that the NAM was misleading the public about their propaganda efforts.  You can view some of the testimony at Google Books.  (And, by the way, would someone mind explaining why Google Books is restricting viewing of publications from the Government Printing Office and the Copyright Office, which are public domain?)

Despite the broad distribution of the program, few episodes are known to exist.  It’s been written about by many scholars, but the shows themselves seem to have been neglected and lost over the years - they were pressed on an experimental plastic primarily made of acetate, which probably hasn’t helped them survive.

The discs I have were won at auction by the Old Time Radio Researcher’s Group, which donated them to my collection and I obtained an additional disc from another collector.  The discs in my collection cover a significant portion of the storyline with some shows missing, but there’s still enough to follow what’s happening with the characters and to give you a flavor of the story and propaganda elements.  I have over 25 episodes of this original series and another 15 from a second “American Family Robinson” series produced in 1940, following the same characters and dealing with the theme of how industry is preparing for War.  I’ll be presenting all of them, in order, each week on the blog over next few months.

We begin our look at the series with Program 38.  The father of the family owns a newspaper and has some wacky relatives that are always involved in crazy “get rich quick” schemes.  This episode focuses on the newlywed couple in the family,  Betty and Dick, on their honeymoon at Devil’s Gulch, a dude ranch.  While Betty goes out riding and enjoying herself with the ranch foreman, husband Billy teaches a thing or two about capitalism and American industry to the ranch hands.

The show was transferred from an original red acetate World Broadcasting System transcription, matrix number SS 8619-33.

Again, my deepest thanks to OTRR for donating the “American Family Robinson” discs to my collection.

Kicking off this week’s posts, from June 28, 1937, we hear part of the rare comedy-variety minstrel show, “Pick and Pat”, originally broadcast on CBS.  This disc is part of a set of airchecks I recently obtained that were produced for the producer of the show, Frank Macmahon.

The disc opens with part of Stewart-Warner refrigerator commercial at the end of the Horace Heidt program, local announcement on how to get tickets for the Heidt program, and the WABC id.  The “Pick and Pat” program is dedicated to the Boy Scouts of America, potential future smokers of the sponsor’s Model and Dill’s Best tobacco.  The duo’s opening routine is about swimming and going home to see “Mammy” on vacation.  Edward Roecker sings “I Love You Truly” and Benny Krueger and the band perform “Where or When?”.  Pick and Pat’s second routine is about Frank MacMahon’s libel suit against them, a running gag in the show at the time.

This is only the first part of the program and the remainder of the show doesn’t survive.  These discs were originally recorded on three sides and the other side of this disc is labeled and dated for part 3 of the show, but is blank -  this side of the disc runs almost 18 minutes, so the rest of the show may have been recorded on the missing second disc.

This previously lost/uncirculated program was transferred from original WABC aircheck laquer recorded by National Recording Company, New York.  The file has been run through click reduction software to improve the sound.

Harry Sosnik and the Savings Bond Orchestra start things off with a peppy arrangement “Dizzy Fingers”.  Then we hear the main feature, radio favorite and “Night Beat” star Frank Lovejoy in a short drama about a soldier in Korea called “Nothing Happens Here”.

The show was transferred from an original Allied Record vinyl transcription.

Thanks again to Michael Utz for his donation of the disc to my collection.

This week, we hear program 4 in the series as broadcast on the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service, and originally heard May 8, 1953 on NBC, Burgess Meredith and Anthony Quinn in a well done adaptation of John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men”.

The show was transferred from an original vinyl AFRTS transcription set.

Hildegarde’s first song on the show is “Who?”.  Patsy Kelly tries to get a date with Xavier Cugat and Clifton Webb gives her some advice, putting in a few plugs for his new movie, “Laura”.  Hildegarde and Cugat sing “Take It Easy”, with lyrics making fun of Patsy’s man-chasing.  In the cast are Hildegarde, Patsy Kelly, guests Xavier Cugat and Clifton Webb, and Harry Sosnik and His Orchestra.

The show was transferred from original AFRS vinyl transcription, matrix numbers HD5-MM-7476-1 and HD5-MM-7477-1, probably pressed by RCA.  Date is also on the transcription matrix.

The announcements were transferred from an original vinyl RCA Thesaurus transcription, matrix number E1-MM-1741.

Special thanks to listener Michael Utz for his donation of the disc to the blog!

You may have heard of RCA’s Thesaurus discs.  First released in the 1930s and continuing well into the fifties and sixties, stations could subscribe to a music library that included songs, generic singing commercials and other material recorded especially for broadcast.  Collectors of jazz and country music have mined music library transcriptions for years for recordings by well-known artists that were never released in any other form.  Stations would use music from the discs for several purposes - theme songs or background music on local shows, filler when programs turned up short, or even to assemble a custom program of music.

In this mp3, we hear “The Hour of Charm - Audition Program #5″, a fifteen minute demonstration program aimed at local potential sponsors for a program based on a Thesaurus-based music series that demonstrates how the show could be assembled from the recordings.  The demo features, as hostess, “Evelyn and Her Magic Violin” and we hear the music of Phil Spitalny’s All-Girl “Hour of Charm” Orchestra.

The next post is the flip side of the disc - a set of announcements by Evelyn promoting the show.

The program was transferred from an original vinyl RCA Thesaurus transcription, matrix number E1-MM-1730.

Many thanks to listener Michael Utz for donating the disc to my collection.

update, 9/20/2009

A listener asked for some more information on the show in the comments, so here’s some additional background on the disc and “The Hour of Charm”.

RCA’s matrix numbers at the time used a code, with the first two figures indicating the date. So, I’d make a guess that the “E1″ would date this disc to 1951. There’s a “Night Beat” 45 rpm promo set I posted on the blog a few months ago with the matrix code “E0″ from 1950.

Dunning’s “Encyclopedia of Old Time Radio” has a fascinating entry on Spitalny’s All-Girl Orchestra. “The Hour of Charm” ran on CBS and NBC from 1934 to 1948. “Evelyn” later described life in the group as being in a kind of very strict sorority - Spitalny enforced a code of behavior and the girls even had to get approval to go on dates from a committee. The girls had to weigh less than 122 pounds when they auditioned and their costumes and hairstyles were very carefully planned.

But, all of the women in the group were immensely talented musicians; many had to play multiple instruments and sing - one played 24 instruments and took up tuba when Spitalny couldn’t find a suitable tuba player in a nationwide search.

Evelyn must have been pretty happy in the group. Dunning notes that she married Spitalny in June 1946 and they lived together in Miami until Spitalny’s death in 1970.