Golden Age of Radio

<Demure, lady like and looking far aloof from crime, Alice Frost plays Pam North in the NBC mystery series, “ Mr . and Mrs. North ”> Faithful Frost Fans Are Alice’s Pride THE Alice Frost Fan club will be five years old in June. In that time Alice, reversing the recipe for a well behaved child, has been heard but not seen in a variety of roles ranging from saint to sinner to siren. Currently she is whimsical Pam North of NBC ’s “ Mr . and Mrs. North ,” (WTMJ, Wednesdays, 7p. m.). Thorough it all the 150 in the limited membership of her fan club have remained unwaveringly loyal. Listeners have a way of associating actresses with the parts they play, but the Frost fans can take changes in their stride. The women who visualized Alice herself as the very personification of the sweet, high minded girl she played so long in “ Big Sister ,” now accept her with equal enthusiasm as that gay amateur sleuth, Pam North. And when she’s heard, as she often is, as the e

The Pittsburgh Press – Oct 3, 1934 President’s Job Leaves No Times To Become Ardent Fan Of Radio First Lady Tells Of Listening ‘At Home’ By S. H. STEINHAUSER Every radio star would like to know that he or she is a favorite in the White House. Amos ‘n’ Andy were the admitted favorites of President Hoover, who let the cat out of the bag in a letter to the Washington Press Club. Mr. Hoover was to attend a gridiron dinner and the death of Chief Justice Taft intervened. The President sent a note to the diners “in the words of two famous gentlemen ‘un lax’.” Now comes the question of the New Deal radio favorites. <Mr. Steinhauser> There are none, Mrs. Roosevelt has told radio friends who surround her after each of her weekly broadcast. The Roosevelt are too busy to listen in and only on the White House sets when there is a particular program in which the President feels they have some special interest. If they can find leisure moments t

The Milwaukee Journal – May 19, 1940 Fibber and Molly Still Real Folks By Bill Porter JIM and Marian Jordan (better known to their fans as Fibber McGee and Molly ) are pretty disturbed about some untrue stories being printed about them. “Most of the stories lead you to believe that we were never successful until we became Fibber McGee and Molly ,” said Jim Jordan, “and you’d think that $10 a week was the most we made on radio before we hit the big dough. The truth is a much better story. If you’ll print it we’ll tell it to you.” I said, “Okay, I’ll print it, Mr. Jordan” And he said, “Mr. Jordan is my dad. I’m Jim.” The Jordans, prosperous now whatever  their financial condition before, live today in what you might call an estate, out Encino way. The place is surrounded by a rose-covered, brick wall. Within the walls are flower gardens, lawns, a swimming pool where Mrs. Jordan takes swimming lessons, a shop where Jim makes furniture, a small orange grove with a

Ready Eagle – May 3, 1954 ‘ Night Watch ,’ Radio Show, Real Thing in Police Work By NON THOMAS Hollywood , May 3 (AP) – The new “ Night Watch ” radio show tops “ Dragnet ” for realism in the cops-and-criminal department. It’s the genuine thing. Listeners to “ Night Watch ” on CBS Monday nights will hear the actual nabbing of a criminal. The recording was made during an arrest by Culver City, Calif., police. Columbia ’s answer to Jack Webb is an enterprising young man named Donn Reed. A radio veteran, he dreamed up “ Night Watch ” in an effort to find something new in radio. “I remember one day I came out of a radio conference feeling very depressed,” he told me. “I said to another fellow that I was tired of rehashing the same old things in radio. If only there was something new. “That day I went over to the place where I play handball. Another person who plays there is Ron Perkins who plays there is Ron Perkins, a sergeant with the Culver City police. H

The Milwaukee Journal – Apr 23, 1939 Darn Clever, These Sound Effects Men CLEVER, these sound effects men. They’re not merely content in inventing a gadget for a given sound; they make the same gadget do for many sounds. Knives and forks, for example, are used not only in eating sequences, but in exciting dueling scenes as well. A compressed air tank used for decompression hisses, can give the illusion of a tinkling bell buoy bobbling back and forth at sea. All you have to do is strike the side of the tank with a soft mallet. Squirting a seltzer water bottle sounds over the air just like turning on the water faucet. The seltzer bottle doubled in a comedy scene on a recent “ Town Hall Tonight ” broadcast when FredAllen used it to produce the sound of milk strumming into a pail.

The Pittsburgh Press – Nov 24, 1953 Goldbergs Anything But Idle Molly Busy Doing ‘House of Glass’ By JACK GAVER United Press Staff Writer NEW YORK –“ The Goldbergs ” may be off the air for the present, but that doesn’t mean that the creator of this much-loved program is idle. Gertrude Berg. Who is the author and the Molly Goldberg of the series, celebrated her 24 th anniversary on network radio last Friday, busy with a new series called “The House of Glass.” NBC introduced this radio show a few weeks ago after “The Goldbergs” dropped out of the television picture – temporarily everyone hopes—because there was just no so called prime time available for it. TV sponsors who spent the sort of money “The Goldbergs” get hesitate to buy anything that doesn’t have a good time segment.

The Milwaukee Journal – Jan 14, 1945 The Radio Parade – News and Gossip of Stars By George Lilley NEW YORK, N. Y.—Radio comedians (on the networks) average $2,000 to $5,000 a wekk, the fellows who write their stuff, $200 to $500. Youthful ( mid thirties) collegiate looking Don Prindle, who writes for Abbott and Costello, this year decided to do something about the financial disparity. Getting together with AnnouncerWendell Niles , who announces for Bob Hope , the two will become funnymen themselves with a soft drink sponsor beginning Jan. 24, 9 p. m., on the Blue network. Prindle has written wit into the mouths of the best, including Hope and Jack Benny . Niles, from Twin Valley, Minn., ex-band-leader and flier, was in 1934 one of the 80 government licensed ground school flying instructors in the United States. Out of military zones, he sometimes flies the planes taking the Bob Hope crew around the country. * * * Six foot one Art Linkletter was Southern Calif