What Crazy Things Did They Try On Early Radio? #1
Posted: Wednesday, April 19, 2006
by Nostalgia John
WHAT CRAZY THINGS DID THEY TRY ON EARLY RADIO ?
Selections Of Firsts The Most Clever The Wackiest The Eye Brow Raisingest Maybe Most Surprisingly Successful In Our Hall Of Fame Of Trial And Error Air-ers Selected by Nostalgia John And Edited, Extracted, Condensed, Gleaned, Adapted, Pillaged And borrowed from The Definitive John Dunning’s On The Air Encyclopedia of Old Time Radio This is Article One Hobby Lobby Bride and Groom Breakfast With Burrowes Between The Bookends Radio was a new medium.
An old vaudevillian, if he played nightly for forty years might have the same size audience a radio guy had his first show. With radio it was all BRAND NEW territory.
Could the entrepreneurs really know what would work…?
…the answer is NO. So….they used…trial and error. And They tried almost everything Here are my top selections that I originally used for LIVE entertainment "lecturing". I entertain seniors at whatever facilities they reside or have recreation. Dozens of shows are covered in this series from 35 year runs to deliberately one-month shows. From The Happiness Boys to the Grouch Club to Darts For Dough, from 1921 to 1960.
The title page mentions my main source. John Dunning’s ability to combine research and anecdotal writing is marvelous. I hope if you have any interest in the history of radio, you get yourself a copy of this excellent tome.
Dave’s Ellman’s Hobby was….Hobbies.
So, besides a live auction radio show he also did… Hobby Lobby from 1937-49 Don’t confuse Hobby Lobby with the craft supply superstore of today.
Dave featured people with, well, hobbies that were not too usual, like the guy who made sculptures from burnt toast. Another collected decorative walking sticks.
One time a beekeeper came and a swarm got loose in the studio. A guy who claimed to teach dogs to talk had one on that barked I Love Mamma. Bwooww wowwvv--wowwmmm-wmmwo.
One guy had formed an organization that whenever a disparaging remark about Brooklyn made the rounds, he would do some research and then get the publicity necessary to correct it.
At its peak, Dave got 3000 letters a week of people wanting to be on the show. Dave Ellman, the king of offbeat human interest.
THEY TRIED EVERYTHING ON RADIO including an REAL weddings Bride and Groom was on the air from 1948-52. It was actually a simple idea that ran those five years. The producers selected couples who wrote in based on the human interest of how they met or other interesting angles. One episode they had a blind couple that had met at a school for seeing-eye dogs.
The couple was introduced before the show and interviewed at the end. Their story was told while they went across the street to a chapel and got married. If selected they won the travel arrangements to the honeymoon destination of their choice, the wedding rings and some appliances.
In 1947, 48 and 49, a sophisticated comedy man named Abe Burrowes was the star of a show called Breakfast With Burrowes. He had been the head writer for the immensely successful Duffy's Tavern. He would later write Guys And Dolls and How to Succeed In Business Without Really Trying.
As clever as his wit was, the critics and the other comedians liked him better than the public. He was a favorite of Groucho Marx, Danny Kaye and Bob Benchley. The show was after hour performances with show biz folk that got this show rolling. Song satires, razor sharp wisecracks. So, what they were really trying was what we call today "inside jokes"
But it earns its presence in the wckiest because it was titled Breakfast With Burrowes. If you looked at your radio listings in the newspaper you found it at 9:30 at night. Abe explained that he was a late riser.
THEY TRIED EVERYTHING ON RADIO including breakfast at 9:30 PM A lot of early radio shows that lasted got started in suddenly improvised ways. Who knows how many shows got started because an act didn’t show at a studio and the local announcers or SOMEONE had to stay on the air?
There is one such last minute happening that resulted in a quarter century show with two spin-off programs.
It was in Kansas City in 1929 when an act didn’t show up. Alden Russell, who had been hanging around the station, was shoved to a microphone and handed a poetry book.
Just before the mike went live, he warned the announcer: "Don’t you use my name for this sissy stuff."
He just started reading the poetry and at the end of the time segment, he totally ad libbed a closing. "Ladies and Gentlemen you have been visiting Between the Bookends with Ted Malone." He made up the name of the show and an alias for himself in one sentence.
The show bounced around a while but got a network gig in 1934, was one of the big hits of ’35 and lasted all the way until 1955.
Reading"sissy stuff" poetry on the air made Malone (Russell) a favorite of the ladies.
Did I say favorite?
How about 20,000 letters a months from females, including such things as getting telegrams every day by women seeking to date him?
His romantic flair in reading is credited with putting a lot of marriages back together. I can’t even read you some of the testimonies of women being cured of coldness by listening to love poems read by this "idol".
He used Arthur Godfrey’s principle of talking as if to just one person. Godfrey did it to sell tea and cigarettes, Malone bragged that he could produce the same sort of response as "blowing in your ear" while cheek to cheek dancing. A lot of it was read with the lights actually dimmed and organ music schmaltzing softly in the background.
TIME magazine said: "Malone is Shelley, Prince Charming, Don Juan and Galahad all in one." Of course, we are talking RADIO, it couldn’t happen in TV because Mr. Russell was short, chubby and nearly bald.
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