Golden Age of Radio

Say Hello To- GEORGE PUTNAM—the announcer for Portia Faces Life , on CBS this afternoon. George was born in Deposit, N. Y., but soon went westward with his family, stopping in San Diego, Calif. George studied to be a history teacher, but jilted that profession in favor of a WPA drama group. Later he Toured the coast with a Shakespearian troupe headed by Tyrone Power’s mother. Then came six months of highly unsuccessful searching for gold before he got a job as announcer on a San Diego station. Three years ago he joined the CBS staff in New York. last June he married Ruth Carhart, the popular radio songstress.

Patricia Ryan -began her radio career at eight and a year later joined the Let’s Pretenders, where she still is heard, most often as a Fairy Godmother, a role she also played in real life during war years when she was a Nurse’s Aid and visitor to injured seamen in New York ’s hospitals. Pat has regular featured roles on Theater of Today. Grand CentralStation , Aunt Jenny and Big Sister , all Columbia programs .

Reading Eagle – May 1, 1940 ‘Kidnaping’ Starts Riot at Harvard Rochester, Benny’s Stooge, Center of Fracas Cambridge, Mass.. May 1 (AP)— The first riot of spring occurred in Harvard Square last night and seven Harvard students were arrested for disturbing the peace. The riot, which embodied all the usual features of Harvard Square spring disturbances, apparently developed from a combination of the warm evening air and the fact that a group of Massachusetts Institute of Technology students put one over on the Harvards by “abducting” Eddie “Rochester” Anderson , Negro comedian on the Jack Benny radio program . Rochester, scheduled to appear at a Harvary smoker, turned up instead at the Delta Kappa Epsilon House at M. I. T., after being persuaded by a group of Dekes to leave his plane at Providence, R. I., and motor to Cambridge. The comedian thought he was at Harvard until two hours later. The riot, which found some 200 students milling around in the s...

ON THE AIR TODAY: ZaSu Pitts , playing the role of Aunt Mamie in the CBS serial, Big Sister , at 11:30 A.M., E.S.T. (rebroadcast at 11:00 A.M., Pacific Time), sponsored by Rinso. That wistful little lady in Columbia’s Studio Four, eyeing the microphone so distrustfully, is ZaSu Pitts, who Eric Von Stroheim always insisted was the finest dramatic actress in America. She has been in the movies since 1917, and never has appeared on the screen, even in a small role, without bringing a delighted murmur from audiences. She is utterly without temperament or stuffiness, and has a heart as big as Radio City. She hasn’t given up movie work for radio , by any means. But she isn’t under contract to any one studio in Hollywood , and when the opportunity came along to spend a few months in New York and act in Big Sister it sort of appealed to her, she says. Asked if she has any movie plans for the future, ZaSu doesn’t commit herself. “I’m hoping,” she says. “I’ve been hoping for twent...

MORE THAN A CROONER SINATRA USES WORDS AS WELL AS MUSIC IN TOLERANCE BATTLE THERE are people who think FrankSinatra should climb down off his soapbox and stick to swooning the bobbysoxers. Intolerance, they will inform you, is a hot potato which has no business being kicked around as a publicity stunt by a radio crooner. But let all such skeptics be advised the Frankie Boy’s pitch for racial and religious understanding is the furthest thing from a publicity promotion. In fact, any good press agent would have counseled Frank that he’s putting his career in jeopardy to mention tolerance either pro or con. But Frank isn’t particularly concerned over the threat to his Hooper rating or box office appeal as a result of his campaign against discrimination. He plans to go right on beating the drums for tolerance and if his career crashes as a result, well, let it crash. The public got its first inkling that Frankie Boy’s emotions ran deeper than casting a romantic spe...

SAY HELLO TO . . . ALBERT WARNER – CBS ’s Washington reporter, whom you’ll hear this afternoon at 6:05, and whenever there’s important news from the nation’s capital. Warner was born in Brooklyn, and was editor of his school papers both in high school and at Amherst, from which he graduated in 1924 . He’s been a successful newspaperman ever since, and has covered all presidential campaigns since 1928 . He gave up newspaper work early in 1939 to join CBS. By unanimous election, he’s president of the Radio Correspondents Association in Washington; and he’s a close friend of many important personalities in both parties.

Say Hello To- Jack Fraser—NBC announcer who’s heard frequently on The Gospel Singer and other programs. Jack comes from Lawrence, Mass., and studied in the University of Maine and later at Brown, emerging from his classrooms with a Ph.D. degree in English. He was always enthusiastic about music, and his fine baritone voice led him to occasional radio work while he was still in college. After graduation he joined the staff of a New York station, and came to NBC in 1936. He particularly likes to announce sports and news events, and is interested in all sport, both as an observer and a participant. In college he went in for all of them, but when he never got beyond being an “also-ran,” he became a cheer-leader instead.