Ladies and Gentlemen, the President of the United States: The Way It Was, 6 December

1923---For the first time, a sitting American President, Calvin Coolidge, who just so happens to be radio friendly in the first place, delivers an official presidential address on the air. What's called his first annual message to Congress and the nation---a State of the Union address, which Coolidge seems to prefer delivering on the threshold of winter (he assumed office in August 1923, on the death of Warren G. Harding, and was elected in his own right in November 1924)---is carried live on radio.

CHANNEL SURFING . . .

1942: DEATH SHOOTS AN ARROW---Lamont (Bill Johnstone) and Margot (Marjorie Anderson) are troubled by an anonymous warning of danger against a disabled local elder, whose nephew has returned from South America feeling spooked by an unusual mind-gaming cult, on tonight's edition of The Shadow. (Mutual.)

Additional cast and writers: Unknown. Announcer: Ken Roberts.

1945: ATKINS, THE JEWEL THIEF---A clever jewel thief---who thinks it'll net him $25,000---steals and hides a pearl necklace from the wife of Blackie's (Richard Kollmar) doctor . . . and the necklace insurer's investigator is murdered outside Blackie's apartment, on tonight's edition of Boston Blackie. (ABC.)

Faraday: Maurice Tarplin. Mary: Jan Minor. Additional cast: Unknown. Writers: Kenny Lyons, Ralph Rosenberg.

1947: THE GREATEST MAN I KNOW---That's the school composition Junior's (Tommy Cook) writing, to be printed in the local paper, but what a revoltin' development that is, when Riley (William Bendix) learns the hard way for whom Junior wrote it, on tonight's edition of The Life of Riley. (NBC.)

Babs: Barbara Eiler. Peg: Paula Winslowe. Hobart Morris: Gale Gordon. Announcer: Ken Niles. Writers: Alan Lipscott, Ruben Schipp.

1951: BIG CANARIES---A high school student (Joyce McCluskey) jolts Friday (Jack Webb) and Romero (Burton Yarborough) twice, when she admits she doesn't regret her embittered, constantly argumentative mother was found stabbed deeply to death . . . and, when she admits to stabbing her cherished canaries to death when her mother ordered them out of the house, on tonight's edition of Dragnet. (NBC.)

Additional cast: Unknown. Announcer: Hal Gibney. Music: Walter Schumann. Writer: Jim Moser.

PREMIERING TODAY . . .

1887---Lynn Fontanne (as Lillie Louise Fontanne; actress: Theater Guild On the Air; Biography in Sound), Waterford, Essex, UK.
1888---Will Hay (comedian: Various British radio programs), Stockton-on-Tees, UK.
1900---Agnes Moorehead (actress: The Shadow; Mercury Theater On the Air; Suspense; Mayor of the Town; Way Down East; Terry and the Pirates), Clinton, Massachussetts.
1904---Elissa Landi (actress: Lux Radio Theater; I'm an American), Venice.
1909---Lyn Murray (conductor: Chesterfield Presents; Your Hit Parade; The Ford Theater), London.
1913---Karl Haas (musician: Adventues in Good Music), Speyer-on-the-Rhine, Germany.