Jack Renews Contract, 1932

[Yhtapmys]

Here is the Associated Press radio column for Wednesday, July 13, 1932

Radio Day By Day
By C. E. BUTTERFIELD
NEW YORK, July 13 (AP)—Harold Stern plans to conduct his orchestra via television. Standing in the studios of W2XAB-CBS, New York, Stern will wave his baton, and his musicians, in a hotel a mile away, will watch him on the screen of several televisors and play as lie directs via radio light.
This feat is to feature the station's first anniversary program a week from Thursday night, also marking the first practical attempt to broadcast sound and sight together through the same transmitter on a wavelength of 107 meters.
Fifteen minutes ot the anniversary program also will be broadcast by the CBS chain. Reviews on television will be given by E. J. Cohan, technical director, and William A. Schudt, Jr., director of television.
After next week, Phil Lord's country doctor adds two nights to the weekly broadcast schedule on WJZ-NBC.
Start of the British imperial economic conference in Ottawa on July 21 is to be broadcast by WEAF-NBC—Babe Ruth and Helen Kane of Doop-Boop-a-Doop fame appear together on WAB-CCS Sunday night.
For 13 weeks more Jack Benny is to stick to his WJZ-NBC broadcasts. His contract has been renewed.

Now, here are the radio listings for that day, if you're curious what preceded and followed Jack. The first number, I'm guessing is metres; the second is kilocycles.

302—WBZ, BOSTON—990
3.30 p m—Cooking School, The Meaning of a Well-stocked Refrigerator.
4.00-5.00 p m—Exercises at grave of Daniel Webster at Marshfield.
5.15 p m—Toe Ticklers; Eleanor Talcott, contralto,
5.30 p m—Kellogg Singing Lady, nursery Jingles, songs and stories.
5.45 p m—Childhood playlet.
6.00 p m—Weather; sports review.
6.10 p m—Organ, Louis Weir.
6.15 p m—News flashes.
6.30 p m—Dutch Band, direction Edward Craig.
6.45 p m—Lowell Thomas, dally news summary.
7.00 p m—Amos 'n' Andy.
7.15 p m—Ward Wilson, Impersonations.
7.30 p m—Stebbins Boys, comedy sketch.
7.45 p m—Billy Jones and Ernie Hare songs, patter.
8.00 p m—American Legion pre-convention program.
8.15 p m—Shumlik presents Rollickers Quartet.
8.46 p m—De Marco Girls, harmony duo; orchestra under Win Sharples.
9.00 p m—Dance orchestra; male quartet.
9.30 p m—Canada Dry presents George Olsen's Orchestra; Ethel Shutta. soloist; Jack Benny, master of ceremonies.
10.00 p m—The Country Doctor.
10.15 p m—Absorbine Jr. presents Whispering Jack Smith: Humming Birds, vocal trio; Arnold Johnson's Orchestra.
10.30 p m—Victor Arden's Orchestra; Tom Brown, tenor.
10.45 p m—News flashes.
11.00 p m—Weather; sports review.
11.15 p m—Orchestra music.
11.45 p m—Louis Weir, organ.

What's interesting is in another column called "Try These On Your Radio Tonight," the paper simply mentions "Jack Benny." Mr. and Mrs. Olsen are omitted.

CBS was running a serial drama "The Corpse on the Bridge" opposite Jack (preceded at 9 p.m., say the listings, by 'Allen and Burns' on the Guy Lombardo programme) The other NBC (Blue, I guess) was running
"Dramatic Sketch - Danger" on WEAF.

And Win Sharples is well-known to any real fan of Fleischer/Paramount cartoons.

Yhtapmys

[Jhammes]

Thank you! Fun articles, as always.
Great show titles: especially "Cooking School, The Meaning of a Well- stocked Refrigerator".
The sponsers really thought themselves the important feature of the hour, guess those performers were mere hacks. Ha.
Organ music must have transmitted relatively well over static prone AM
radio? There sure was a lot of that!

[TimL2005]

Thank you! Fun articles, as always.
Great show titles: especially "Cooking School, The Meaning of a Well- stocked Refrigerator".
The sponsers really thought themselves the important feature of the hour, guess those performers were mere hacks. Ha.
!

That practice carried on to the early days of Television. Below is a page from "TeleVue" an early version of "TV Guide" printed in Cleveland from February 1949

Here are the Weekend TV listings for February 5-6, 1949 exactly as printed in TeleVue..These listings are unique in the detail for the time. Most Local Newspapers, If they carried TV listings at all, had one line for the show title and you couldnt always tell what it was by the title. Listings here have the sponsor, network and origin point (Chicago, New York, Hollywood, etc.)

Saturday, February 5, 1949

WEWS-TV Channel 5 (listed first in all listings-They had most of the ad space as well)

(Morning-Afternoon)

10:00 Test Pattern and Tone
2:00 Test Pattern and Tone

(Evening)
6:00 Test Pattern and Tone
6:30 Lucky Pup Review (CBS-NY) A full half-hour with Lucky Pup in a special adventure.
7:00 News (ABC-NY) Interviews with the Income Tax Experts
7:15 Wren's Nest (ABC-NY) Another Adventure in the life of the Wren Family
7:30 News (CBS-NY) World News with on-the-spot film coverage
7:45 Make Mine Music (CBS)
8:00 Film Shorts
8:30 Pabst Presents:Hockey:Cleveland Barons Vs. Buffalo Bisons from the (Cleveland) Arena. (American Hockey League-Barons were defending 1948 Calder Cup Champions)
10:30 To Be Announced

Sunday, February 6, 1949
(Afternoon-Evening)
4:30 Test Pattern And Music
4:45 WEWS Film Featurette:"Life Has Its Ups and Downs"
5:00 Super Circus (ABC-Chicago)-Fun For the Whole Family Under The Big Top
6:00 Cartoon Teletales (ABC-NY) (With Chuck and Jack)
6:30 Ireene Wicker-The Singing Lady (ABC-NY) Songs and Stories
7:00 Old Gold Presents:The Original Amateur Hour (DuMont-NY)Ted Mack Gives young talent a chance for Fame and Fortune
8:00 Hollywood Screen Test (ABC-NY) Screen star Mary Anderson joins Neil Hamilton to test unknown actors.
8:30 Actors' Studio(ABC-NY) "Jim Pemberton and His Boy Trigger" by William Saroyan
9PM Emerson Presents:"Toast Of The Town" (CBS-NY)-Mc is Ed Sullivan with guest stars of top Broadway musical Hits "Lend an Ear" and "Where's Charley?"
10:00 WEWS Film Featurette "Strikes to Spare"

WNBK-Channel 4

(NBC Owned and Operated)

Saturday, February 5, 1949

(Evening)

6:45 Bulletin Board
6:50 Children's Film
7:00 Sportsdesk
7:30 The Armchair Travel(er)
8:00 "Scattergood Baines"
9:00 "NBC Television Newsreel"

Sunday, February 6, 1949

(Evening)

7:10 Bulletin Board
7:15 Feature Film
8:30 "Golden Wedding"
9:00 Philco Television Playhouse-"The Late Christopher Bean" with Lillian Gish and Bert Lytell-NC (Network Commercial)
10:00 NBC News Review-(Disney Hats)-NC
10:15 Program Previews
Notice Partcularly the "Toast Of The Town" Listing..

[Yhtapmys]

Thank you! Fun articles, as always.
Great show titles: especially "Cooking School, The Meaning of a Well- stocked Refrigerator".
The sponsers really thought themselves the important feature of the hour, guess those performers were mere hacks. Ha.
Organ music must have transmitted relatively well over static prone AM
radio? There sure was a lot of that!

JH, I wish I could find some early reviews on the show, but I haven't. No doubt part of the problem is the limited free access I have, which doesn't enable me to search an entire newspaper.

Organ music was probably the cheapest, easiest form of musical entertainment for a station to put on the air. As for the fridge, this was the era of the fridgerator-ice box war, as Mary Jane Higby reveals in "Tune In Tomorrow."

Now, here's something that totally baffles me. Below are the listings for a Boston station for Friday, April 14, 1933. You'll see Jack (and Mary!). But the show is not to be found on either of the two big NBC stations in New York (WEAF and WJZ). What's up with that? The flagship isn't running Jack? This is for a Boston station, a different Boston station than the one quoted in the post above:


508—WEEI, BOSTON—580
5.00 p m—Four Sharps, vocal.
5.15 p m—YWCA news, Mrs. B. Aldon Thresher; Do Students Think?
5.25 p m—Pianist.
5.30 p m—Jack and the Beanstalk, story.
5.45 p m—Bud, the radio Scoutmaster.
6.00 p m—Variety.
6.30 p m—News Dispatches.
6.40 p m—The Old Painter.
6.45 p m—Tillie the Typist.
7.00 p m—Walberg Brown Concert Ensemble.
7.15 p m—Jack, Ted, Bud and Roy,
7.15 p m—Farewell to Spinach, comedy.
7.30 p m—Drifting and Dreaming, piano team.
7.45 p in—The Goldbergs, domestic sketch.
8.00 p m—Concert Orchestra; Henry Shope and Frank Parker, tenors; John Seagle, baritone; Frank Banta and Lee Rettenberg, piano duo; Lee Montgomery, accompanist; Elliott Shaw, bass; Jessica Dragonette, soprano; Rosario Bourdon's orchestra.
8.00 p m—Musical Grocery Store: Tom Howard, comedian; Harry Salter's Orchestra.
9.30 p m—The Fox Fur Trappers with Ruddy Clark. John Herrick, Willie Morris, Rakov and orchestra.
10.00 p m—Chevrolet presents Jack Benny, master of ceremonies; Mary Livingstone, James Melton, tenor, Frank Black's Orchestra.
10.30 p m—Golf lesson, music.
11.00 p m—Weather forecasts, E. B Rideout.
11.05 p m—News dispatches.
11.15 p m—Adrian O'Brien, tenor; Alice O'Leary, contralto; Eddie Fitzgerald, pianist; Joe Donahue, tap dancer; Cliff Billington's Orchestra.
11.30 p m—Dance orchestra.

Yes, a tap dancer on radio.

What's remarkable in looking over some of the listings on other stations I haven't posted is how long some shows were on the air: Myrt and Marge, Chandu, Andre Kostelanetz, Buck Rogers, Just Plain Bill, the Singing Lady (Ireene Wicker for Kellogg's) and Ozzie Nelson's Orchestra among them.

My favourite listing is on WEAF
6.30 p m—Mae Questel, impersonator.
I believe 1933 was before she started voicing cartoons at Fleischer's.

Yhtapmys

[Maxwell]

Wikipedia gives the date as 1930, but they've been known to be (frequently) wrong. However, in this case I think they're right. I think she was the voice of Betty Boop from the beginning. Maybe 1933 is the year she started doing the voice of Olive Oyl.

[TimL2005]

Wikipedia gives the date as 1930, but they've been known to be (frequently) wrong. However, in this case I think they're right. I think she was the voice of Betty Boop from the beginning. Maybe 1933 is the year she started doing the voice of Olive Oyl.

The Fleishcher-produced Popeye cartoons began to be released to theaters in 1933, So it is possible Questel began to voice Olive Oyl even as she was working in radio. By the way, The first part of these cartoons have just been officially released on DVD..

http://www.amazon.com/Popeye-Sailor-193 ... B000P296AS