Lassie was an unusual series in that the canine star did its own acting, with owner-trainer Rudd Weatherwax giving cues and providing on-air narration. The original Lassie (a male named Pal) took abou...
Just down the street from Gildersleeve, in the next block, lived the widow Leila Ransom. In the second full year she became a pivotal character who on June 27, 1943, got Gildersleeve to the altar and...
Joyce Jordan progressed slowly from Girl Interne to M.D., the change becoming complete around 1942. But the theme of a woman’s difficulty in a man’s world remained. In the earliest days it was a progr...
Jack Webb had been active in radio for several years before Dragnet propelled him to national prominence. He had arrived at KGO, the ABC outlet in San Francisco, an unknown novice in 1945. Soon he was...
It Pays to Be Ignorant was radio’s lamebrained answer to such intellectual quizzes as Information, Please and The Quiz Kids. It was a feast of the absurd in which questions were asked but seldom answe...
In the fall of 1950, Waterman became the new Gildersleeve. Peary, meanwhile, jumped to CBS with a new sitcom, Honest Harold. In a dual review (Gildy vs. Gildy, Sept. 29, 1950), Radio Life summed up th...
In the fall of 1945, Valentine stepped down as police chief and became the regular Gang Busters narrator. In 1946 he left the show at the request of Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who wanted him to reorganiz...
In fact, the humor was extraordinary. The narrator, Thomas Hyland, was played absolutely deadpan by Lou Merrill. Over the sound of rainfall came his droll voice. That’s the way it sounded when it rain...
He hunts the biggest of all game! Public enemies that even the G-men cannot reach! This 1939 signature was reportedly revamped after top G-man J. Edgar Hoover complained. For many years thereafter it...
Each episode was billed as another great story based on Frederick L. Collins’s copyrighted book, The FBI in Peace and War—Drama! Thrills! Action! Peace and War was not blessed with Bureau approval: Je...
Crosby’s name was mentioned, and Peyton got on the telephone. He tracked Crosby to the set of The Bells of St. Mary’s, where Crosby was working on the role, ironically, of a priest. On the spur of the...
Cantor began a practice, long associated with Vallee, of introducing new talent via radio. Gracie Allen made her first radio appearance with Cantor: Burns and Allen would occasionally be mentioned, on...
You the listener into the shoes of some embattled hero. You are alone and unarmed in the green hell of the Caribbean jungle, you are being trailed by a pack of fiercely hungry dogs and a mad hunter ar...
Wilson, whose strange past is darkly troubled (Radio Life), and Ray Brandon, a bitter ex-con on parole. By the early 1950s, the Bauer family had become the serial’s center: Bill and Bertha (Bert), the...
When President Roosevelt suggested to Archibald MacLeish that radio be prodded to help celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Bill of Rights, Corwin was given the job. It was an enormous undertaking,...
Today’s Children, The Woman in White, and The Guiding Light crossed over and interchanged in respective storylines.) June 2, 1947–June 29, 1956, CBS. 15m weekdays at 1:45. Procter & Gamble’s Duz Deter...
Titled by year, Good News of 1939, 1940 became Maxwell House Coffee Time to begin the 1940–41 season, though the Good News title was still used for a few broadcasts. Maxwell House Coffee. CAST: Hosts:...
This was not an isolated incident. Crosby in private was easygoing but distant. He was easy to write for, seldom fussing or making major changes in the script. But if he got his back up, there was lit...
Then, in 1942, a disastrous strike against the record companies disrupted the industry and upset the delicate balance of business. Though it hit directly at record producers, the real target was radio...
Then Wolff thought of Ronald Colman. He had long been Colman’s friend and agent, and he knew that Colman was a natural. But Colman had shown little interest in weekly series radio: only in recent year...