rand's esoteric otr

An update on Ma Perkins

After a discussion on the OTR mailing list about my post of "Ma Perkins", episode 423 from an original uncoated aluminum disc and speculation that it might be the first episode, researcher Mike Biel dug up some original articles.  The series was syndicated to some stations in April 1935.  So, he speculates that this and the other show from the disc are dubs of the syndicated show, rehearsals or a "demo" to sell the program.  The 1935 syndication discs were produced at RCA and probably pressed on Victrolac, so the disc in my collection was made for some reference purpose.

Ma Perkins - Pgm 424

A few months ago, I posted episode 423 of "Ma Perkins", a rare early entry in this long-running radio soap opera.  The program was transferred from an uncoated aluminum disc.

In this post, the flip side - program 424, where Ma continues to fret about Faye, who wants to go to the big city to seek her fortune.  She turns to her friends at the lumber yard for advice - will Ma let her go or encourage her daughter to stay?  Goldin dates the previous episode to August 1935, so this one comes from the same time period. The transfer is from an uncoated aluminum transcription by Mercury Recording Studios in Chicago.  You can check the previous "Ma Perkins" post for some conjecture on my part that the disc might have been created for extension spotting the series to Canadian radio stations. Unfortunately, the original sound levels in the recording are a little low, so it's difficult to understand the dialogue sometimes through the distinctive aluminum disc hiss.  However, I'm posting it since it appears to be a previously lost episode of the series.  I tried five different styli on the disc - ranging from a 2.0 mil to a 4.0 mil and, oddly, the 2.0 mil produced the least amount of surface noise and best tracking.  Usually, uncoated aluminum discs take a larger stylus.

Ma Perkins, Pgm 423

I'm sure all of you have heard of the long-running soap opera of the classic otr era, "Ma Perkins".  Running on NBC and later CBS between 1933 and 1960, the show followed the trials and tribulations of Ma as she ran a lumber yard in Rushville Center and tried to keep up with her kids, Evy, Fay, and John.  Virginia Payne played Ma Perkins for 27 years, starting in the role at age 23.

In this blog entry, we offer a very rare early episode of the series, dated by the radioGOLDINdex to August 1935.  Faye and John have an argument at dinner and Faye announces her intention to seek her fortune in the big city.  The show at this point in the run was sponsored by Oxydol and the long organ intro and outro were probably for the local announcer to insert the commercial. The show is of special interest to those looking at the changing role of women over the years - Faye is representative of an increasing number young women at the time were looking at having careers and a life outside of being a homemaker.  Ma Perkins herself was thrust into that role, managing her husband's business after his death. This is also the first metal base disc I've offered up on the blog.  These were used for a period in the early 1930s before instantaneous lacquers became common - the cutting head actually embossed the groove into a thin sheet of bare aluminum.  You can read something about the early days of recording radio broadcasts in two articles by otr experts Elizabeth Mcleod and Michael Biel here and here. The origins of this disc are obscure.  I think it may have been made for extension-spotting the show in Canada in conjunction with it's broadcast in the US.  According to this site, Proctor and Gamble was one of the biggest advertisers in Canada in the early 30s, buying up time on stations to broadcast "Ma Perkins" and other soaps, much to the annoyance of Canadian officials who wanted more home-grown content on the radio.  This led to restrictions on the use of transcriptions and gave the CBC power to selectively run series live from American radio networks.  So, this disc may have been used to broadcast "Ma Perkins" over one of those privately-owned Canadian stations. Our show was transferred directly from an original uncoated aluminum transcription made by Mercury Recording Studios, Chicago.