The Boom of the Ol' Bass Drum: The Way It Was, 28 January

1940---Beat the Band---with Garry Moore hosting, Ted Weems (featuring a vocalist named Perry Como) leading the band, Marvel Maxwell also singing, longtime Easy Aces announcer Ford Bond in the same slot here, and General Mills sponsoring the show for its new corn cereal Kix---premieres on NBC, based in Chicago.

A precedent to the later, somewhat landscape-changing hit Stop the Music, Beat the Band listeners will receive ten dollars if their question is used on the air, and the answer is always the title of a song. If they can beat the band they land twenty dollars and a case of Kix, with the musicians who miss the answer having to “feed the kitty”---tossing half dollars onto the bass drum, with the musician scoring the most points answering the listeners’ questions getting to take the money home.

Folks, listen for the boom of the ol’ bass drum---that means the question beat the band.---Country Washburn, bassist with the Weems orchestra.

There is, of course, more, as explained by Moore on the 7 April 1940 broadcast, after explaining the twenty dollars and case of Kix.

But, now, that sum may be much more, because we have a hundred dollar bonus which is divided equally among those who beat the band. For example, if four persons beat the band, they receive twenty-five dollars, plus ten for the question. However, if only one person beats the band, that person receives the full one hundred dollars, ten for the question, and the case of Kix.

Beat the Band's first incarnation will expire in 1941, but the show will be reborn in 1943, out of New York, with "The Incomparable Hildegarde" (Walter Winchell hung that tag upon the famed cabaret/supper club singer) as hostess, Harry Sosnik joining Ted Weems in handling the music, Marilyn Thorne joining Marvel Maxwell in the singing, and a slight change in the rules, tied to the new sponsor, Raleigh cigarettes.

Listeners sent in musical questions and it was up to the band to identify songs from a few clues. Prizes of twenty-five dollars and a carton of the sponsor’s cigarettes . . . went to contestants whose questions did not beat the band. If the question did beat the band, the contestant received fifty dollars and two cartons of cigarettes, and the boys in the band had to throw a pack of cigarettes "on the old bass drum for the men in service overseas."

---Frank Buxton and Tim Owen, The Big Broadcast 1920-1950. (New York: Avon, 1971.)

A typical musical question might be something such as, "What song title tells you what Cinderella might have said if she awoke one morning and found that her foot had grown too large for the glass slipper?" (The correct answer, by the way, is, "Where, Oh Where Has My Little Dog Gone?")

A classic question, all things considered, will be this from a listener in Hopkins, Minnesota, also on the 7 April 1940 show: “If Joe DiMaggio hits sixty-one home runs this summer, what would Babe Ruth’s present mark represent?” The correct musical answer: “Broken Record,” then a novelty hit.

The second Beat the Band will expire in 1944, but not without sending Hildegarde's catch-phrase---"Give me a little traveling music, Harry"---into the American lexicon, somewhat: comedian Jackie Gleason will appropriate the phrase for his popular Saturday night television show, breaking off his opening monologue and calling to his bandleader, Sammy Spear, "A little travelin' music, Sam!"---before dancing crazily enough from center stage to the left rear wing, where he claps once, thrusts a hand from his not-incosiderable girth, and hollering, "And a-waaay we go!"

By which time Perry Como, of course, is en route places his former boss can reach only by the price of the ticket . . .

CHANNEL SURFING . . .

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF DENNIS DAY: THE RADIO SHOW (NBC, 1948)---Looking for a second income because his regular job isn't paying him quite enough, Dennis (Day) mulls a chance to write and perform in a radio show. Mildred: Barbara Eiler. Mrs. Anderson: Bea Benaderet. Mr. Anderson: Dick Trout. Willoughby: John Brown. Writer: Frank Galen.

ESCAPE: THREE GOOD WITNESSES (CBS, 1948)---Alone and unarmed, crossing Turkey on the Taurus Express train, a State Department oil investigator (Morgan Foley) eager to return home to California has more than he can handle eluding a nonchalant killer. Hetfield: Jack Webb. Mary: Jeanette Nolan. Kiborkian: Harry Bartel. Writer: John Dunkel, from a story by Harry Lamb.

I WAS A COMMUNIST FOR THE FBI: A STUDY IN OILS (SYNDICATED BY FREDERICK ZIV COMPANY, 1953)---The FBI can't back Matt Cvetic (Dana Andrews)'s latest Party assignment---softening a wealthy, anti-Communist oilman out of some of the yield from government-land oil leases---until he learns more about why the Party really needs the oil, as if he didn't have enough trouble having to meet the oilman with an odd oil painting as a kind of introduction. Additional cast: Unknown. Announcer: Truman Bradley. Writer: Possibly Robert Lee.

FATHER KNOWS BEST: TRASH CAN LIDS (NBC, 1954)---They've been crushed once too often by careless neighbourhood garbagemen for Jim's (Robert Young) taste, which is why being interrupted by Bud's (Ted Donaldson) sudden interest in telepathy isn't half as frustrating as the sanitation representative blaming the Andersons for the problem. Margaret: Jean Vander Pyl. Betty: Rhoda Williams. Kathy: Norma Jean Nilsson. Writer: Paul West.

PREMIERING TODAY . . .

1882---Richard Barrows (actor: Death Valley Days, Ellery Queen, Second Husband), Buffalo, New York.
1910---Arnold Moss (actor: Against the Storm, Big Sister)
1911---Donald Briggs (actor: The Adventures of Frank Merriwell), Chicago.
1912---Monty Masters (actor-producer: The Mad Masters; Candy Matson, Yukon 2-8209), New Haven, Connecticut.
1914---Nelson Olmstead (actor: Bachelor's Children), Minnesota.
1935---Nicholas Pryor (actor: CBS Radio Mystery Theater), Baltimore.