Jeff Kallman's excellent The Easy Ace: A Journal of Classic Radio
is a wonderful place to spend hours on end, rediscovering the Golden Age of Radio
as it's meant to be discovered and celebrated. Article after article
is filled with a wonderful new vignette about Golden Age Radio History.
---The Digital Deli Online.

[I]n his matchless on-this-day approach to chronicling “yesteryear,”
he easily aces out a less organized mind like mine,
which promptly lapsed into a more idiosyncratic mode of relating the past.
---broadcastellan.

Sunday, June 01, 2008

Misinformation, Please: The Way It Was, 1 June

1943: CLIFTON FADIMAN VISITS THE TAVERN---The distinguished literary critic who hosts Information, Please is the invited lecturer to the Lord Byron Ladies' Literary Society this week.

The catch: He's giving the lecture to their weekly gathering at a certain New York dive whose manager (Ed Gardner) has a surefire way to make sure "he can't louse us up"---said manager plans to write the lecture for Mr. Fadiman, which seems a guaranteed way to secure his status as the extinguished literary critic who hosts Information, Please.

This from a man who befuddles his chief waiter (Eddie Green) by changing a courtesy sign the better to make the erudite Mr. Fadiman feel at home, and flummoxes his already-flummoxed buddy Finnegan (Charles Cantor) with a poem "in pure cubic centimeter," on tonight's edition of Duffy's Tavern. (CBS.)

Miss Duffy: Shirley Booth. Writers: Ed Gardner, Abe Burrows.

FURTHER CHANNEL SURFING . . .

1936: THE LEGIONNAIRE AND THE LADY---Remake of 1930's Morocco, a bruised French Legionnaire (Clark Gable, in the Gary Cooper film role) and a seductive but equally bruised singer (Marlene Dietrich, reprising her film role) fall into a no-strings-attached liaison that deepens just in time for him to have to leave on a dangerous assignment, on tonight's edition---its first produced and broadcast from its own Hollywood facility---of Lux Radio Theater. (CBS.)

Additional cast: Unidentified. Adapted from the play by Benno Vigny and the screenplay by Jules Furthman.

1939: GRANDPA SNYDER'S CHRISTMAS CARDS---Vic (Art Van Harvey) and Rush (Bill Idelson) return from the latter's sandlot baseball game, after Rush has made a number of slick fielding plays, and discover a development that usually arises long after baseball season is over . . . thanks to Sade (Bernadine Flynn) having fallen for Grandpa Snyder's latest little business venture, on today's edition of Vic & Sade. (NBC.)

Writer: Paul Rhymer.

1943: THE UGLIEST MAN IN THE WORLD---Tortured by the childhood taunts his grotesque visage attracted and his mother's attempt to isolate him because of it, a former tent show attraction (Raymond Edward Johnson) is driven at last to the brink of suicide, on tonight's edition of Lights Out. (NBC.)

Additional cast: Ann Shepard. Writer: Arch Oboler.

1958: THE WAYWARD RIVER MATTER---Old insurance and fishing buddy Lee Hargas (Chet Stratton) wants Johnny's (Bob Bailey) help to clean up the mess when heavy storms provoke heavy Ohio River flooding, including in Hargas's hometown, on tonight's edition of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar. (CBS.)

Additional cast: Frank Hertzel, Bob Bruce, Parley Baer. Writer/director: Jack Johnstone.

PREMIERING TODAY . . .

1870---Frank Cooley (actor: One Man's Family), Natchez, Mississippi.
1887---Clive Brook (actor: Sherlock Holmes), London.
1890---Frank Morgan (actor: The Fabulous Dr. Tweedy), New York City.
1898---Edward (Cookie) Fairchild (bandleader: Johnny Presents Ginny Simms; The Eddie Cantor Show), New York City; Molly Picon (actress: I Give You My Life; Molly Picon's Parade), New York City.
1901---John van Druten (writer: Radio Guild; The Chase and Sanborn Hour; Theater Guild On the Air), London.
1905---Robert Newton (actor: Lux Radio Theater), Shaftesbury, U.K.
1909---Ray Heatherton (singer/host: The Old Gold Hour; Musical Cruise with Spearmint Crew), Jersey City.
1911---Erik Rolf (actor: Joyce Jordan, M.D.; Prairie Folks), Chicago.
1915---John Randolph (actor: New World A-Coming; A Date with Judy), New York City.
1917---Donald Dame (singer: Music for an Hour), Titusville, Pennsylvania.
1921---Nelson Riddle (trombonist/arranger/composer/conductor: On a Sunday Afternoon; Sears Radio Theater), Oradell, New Jersey.
1922---Joan Caulfield (actress: Hallmark Playhouse; Great Scenes from Great Plays), East Orange, New Jersey.
1926---Andy Griffith (comedian/actor/host: Sears Radio Theater), Mount Airy, North Carolina; Marilyn Monroe (as Norma Jeane Mortensen; actress: Hollywood Star Playhouse; The Edgar Bergen-Charlie McCarthy Show), Los Angeles.
1930---Edward Woodward (actor: Price of Fear), Croydon, Surrey, U.K.
1934---Pat Boone (singer: Arthur Godfrey Time), Jacksonville, Florida.

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