Wednesday, December 9, 2015

25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 9 - Department Store Woes with Johnny Dollar

Yesterday I featured the centennial honoree Frank Sinatra as a department store detective Rocky Fortune trying to solve the thefts in his store.  Today, I am heading back to a department store with one of the earliest episodes of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar.  I am not sure I heard it before I started working on this entry.  But that is the fun part of this project - listening to new recordings.  Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries.  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

Squirrels Outside the Michigan State Capitol (Lansing, Michigan) - December 7, 2015
Squirrel at the Michigan State Capitol Christmas Tree in Lansing (December 7, 2015)

Last year, I featured the great five part Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar series called the Nick Shurn Matter.  This is one of my favorite multi-part series.  It stars Bob Bailey (who is my favorite actor who played Johnny Dollar).  Also, with a 75 minutes to play with (15 minutes for five consecutive nights), there is a whole lot more the writers can do to make the story more complex.  That does not even take into account the ability to have more drawn out conversations between the characters.  Well, that was in 1955 and 1956.  When it started out in 1949, it was a basic 30 minute detective series.  After Dick Powell did the audition show for Johnny Dollar, but he opted to do the great series Richard Diamond (with many scripts written by a young Blake Edwards).  With Dick Powell turning down the role, CBS went with Charles Russell who played Dollar for the first year.

While Johnny Dollar is a basic detective program, the gimmick was that it revolved around his expense report.  Johnny Dollar provided the exposition around the expenses incurred during the case.  At first, I could not believe that they had a show featuring an insurance investigator with an expense report.  But it quickly became one of my favorite series.  

On December 24, 1949, the producers found an opportunity to work in a Christmas show during the first season.  And in many ways, the show tried by like Richard Diamond in not only having a good story, but also having a lot of fun with it.  That comes over loud and clear as Johnny Dollar tries to figure out who is the phantom burglar hitting New York Department Stores.

Johnny Dollar is called into the offices of the Association of Department Stores of Greater Manhattan when it is discovered that a burglar is dressing up as a store clerk, working with a customer, taking their cash and never returning.  Upon arriving in New York, Johnny Dollar discovers that this happened again, and is off to the store to find the witness, a little girl who wanted to buy a camera.  Thinking the camera had film, our mystery burglar tries to take it from the girl, only to be bit on his hand by the victim.  And when the store detective turns up dead, the simple theft becomes murder.  Johnny Dollar works his magic to solve the case.  And in the process, not only gets things wrapped up, but he also gets free shipping (trust me on this one - it makes sense).

So when your shopping this season, be extra nice to the sales staff.  Who knows if they have a worried store manager making their lives very difficult!  Actually, we should be nice to sales staff all year long.  What a wonderful world it would be.

How I Played Santa Claus - or Small Time Swindlers Of Big Time Department Stores (December 24, 1949)



Here are some links to programs relating to Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar:


      25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

      25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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      Tuesday, December 8, 2015

      25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 8 - The Plot To Murder Santa Claus (with Frank Sinatra as Rocky Fortune)

      One of the oldest conventions among radio programming is the reused script.  Gunsmoke did it.  Richard Diamond did it...and I will do it...  So with all sorts of stuff going on, I am going to reuse a blog entry that I used last year.  But there is a really good reason.  First, it is a great show.  Second, more people are reading the blog this year.  Third, it stars Frank Sinatra who we are celebrating the 100th anniversary of his birth this week (on December 12).

      So with this, I am highlighting for Day 8 Frank Sinatra as Rocky Fortune in The Plot to Murder Santa Claus.  (Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries).  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.


      Antique Postcard of the NBC Radio Studios in Hollywood, California 

      The first time I heard Rocky Fortune...I was not hooked.  The series was created in 1953 to showcase the great American singer, Frank Sinatra.  Sinatra was showcased in a large number of musical specials in the 1940s and 1950s - some of which I will share later this holiday season.  But there was this one series where he was featured for his speaking voice - not his singing.  Rocky Fortune was on NBC from October 6, 1953 through March 30, 1954.  The timing for the end of the series was not a fluke.  A few days before the last episode aired, Frank Sinatra won the 1954 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the 1953 From Here to Eternity.  With that, Sinatra's career portraying Rocky Fortune (Rocko Fortunato if you are not into the brevity thing) came to an end.

      Rocky Fortune  was a "footloose and fancy-free young man" who was always searching for the next job - since he started most episodes without one.  In the series, he was a social director at a Catskills Resort, a truck driver, an oyster shucker, and just about anything else.  There is, however, a real charm in Sinatra's hard-luck Rocky as he fumbles through missed opportunities and problems with both the police and bad guys.  While many called this a "B grade series," I enjoyed it a great deal and sometimes wish there were more than 25 episodes.

      On December 22, 1953, The Plot to Murder Santa Claus was aired over the NBC Network. In this episode, Rocky is employed as an assistant store detective for the Krackenbaum Department Store in New York City.  They had just had a theft at the store of $8,000 in pearls and they were still missing.  Rocky finds himself in the middle of the entire situation when he discovers that in addition to be the assistant store detective, he also needs to play Santa when the main one had lunch.  That leads to him meeting a young girl and his older sister as they tried to tell Santa about the Elf doll she wanted.  Turns out, the little girl had expensive taste!

      This is a great episode for the holidays - enjoy!

      The Plot to Murder Santa Claus (December 22, 1953)



      Here are some links to programs relating to Rocky Fortune:

          25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

          25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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          Monday, December 7, 2015

          25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 7 - Dr. Sixgun's A Pony for Christmas

          Here is a series I have not written about before.  It was a relatively short run series called Dr. Sixgun.  And now - an Old Time Radio Quiz:

          Q: Dr. Sixgun was a radio series that...
          1. ...was a spun-off from Dr. Two-Packs-a-Day.
          2. ...featured a renegade Dr. who generates his own patients.
          3. ...a Coen Brothers kids show.
          4. ...a situation comedy featuring the misadventures of the Sixgun family.
          5. ...a NBC feature from 1954 to 1955 to capture the growing adult western-themed market created by Gunsmoke.

          I hope you guessed #5...and if you did, treat yourself to something nice!  And this is where I am going to take my next day in my review of Christmas episodes from old time radio.  (Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries).  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

          Dressage at Woodbine Schooling Show (September 20, 2015 - Chelsea, Michigan)
          My Niece on a somewhat white pony (hey - it's the best I can do) - September 2015
          Dr. Sixgun was a NBC program that was broadcast from September 1954 through October 1955. And it was definitely a program aimed at adults interested in westerns with characters that were not so black and white - good and bad - as the westerns aimed at younger audiences.  NBC did a great job with The Six-shooter starring Jimmy Stewart in 1953-1954, just before Dr. Sixgun  came out (I highlighted the Christmas Carol adaptation from that series last year).

          I have heard Dr. Sixgun a few times on Greg Bell's Radio Classics and they have good stories and production values as would anything produced by NBC at the time.  I am happy that this is the first time I am writing about it.  The show stared Karl Weber as Grey Matson.  Who is Grey Matson...wait - that is Dr. Grey Matson.  Still need help???  This is how the episodes started:
          "Across the rugged Indian Territory, rides a tall young man on a mission of mercy; his medical bag strapped on one hip and his six-shooter on the other. This is Dr. Sixgun. Grey Matson, M.D. was the gun-toting frontier doctor who roamed the length and breadth of the old Indian territory; friend and physician to white man and Indian alike, the symbol of justice and mercy in the lawless west of the 1870s." (opening transcribed from the Digital Deli site).
          On December 19, 1954, the show featured its only Christmas episode.  Called A Pony for Christmas, the episode told the story of the troubles for the Munoz family.  Poor little Tomasito Munoz was very sick and was struggling to regain his health.  The Munoz family were sheep herders and they were financially strapped with the holidays and winter fast approaching.  They had little more than $20 in all their savings.  With food and medicine that would be needed over the winter, there were little prospects for a happy Christmas.

          Tomasito asked his grandfather for a pony - a white pony.  The grandfather thought it would be the thing that would make him well and took all their savings into town to try to buy that horse for his sick grandson.  All is well when he finds someone who will sell him a pony for the money that he had.  Sadly, the grandfather unknowingly purchased a stolen pony and it was pulled from the family.  On Christmas Eve, they had no money and no pony.

          Dr. Matson did everything he could, but when the sheep herders and the cattlemen realized what had happened, they decided that they needed to do something for that poor family.  So just like in the musical Oklahoma, this is a case where the farmer and the cowmen can get along!  Definitely a sweet story of family, helping your fellow man, and the dangers of holiday scams (which sadly are not a recent invention).  I hope you enjoy this episode of Dr. Sixgun!

          A Pony for Christmas (December 19, 1954)




          Here are additional links to Dr. Sixgun items on the web.

              25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

              25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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              Sunday, December 6, 2015

              25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 6 - Santa Claus of Bums' Boulevard (Casey Crime Photographer)

              If you knew anything about me, you would know that I am an avid photographer, so when I find another one out there - we have something in common.  This is true of people in both fiction and non-fiction.   So one of the great radio characters I found was Casey, Crime Photographer.  I love the idea of following a cameraman through the rough streets of the city. The series was sponsored by Anchor Hocking glass company of Lancaster, Ohio.

              So this is where I am going to take my next day in my review of Christmas episodes from old time radio.  (Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries).  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

              Scenes at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (Phoenix, Arizona)
              Self-portrait at Scenes at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (Phoenix, Arizona) in 2012.

              Casey, Crime Photographer is the crime series as features...as you could imagine...a guy named Casey who is...anyone...a photographer for a newspaper.  He is joined out and about in the city finding stories with reporter Ann Williams.  The show almost always opens and closes at the Blue Note Tavern and their great bartender Ethelbert.  The voice talent was primarily Staats Cotsworth as Casey, Jan Miner as Ann Williams and John Gibson as Ethelbert the bartender.  Despite being part of the CBS Network, these are not brilliant shows.  I love them because they have a charm that comes with the opening and closing conversations at the Blue Note.  It is a great frame for these programs and I think gives it a bit more than what one might imagine.

              The Christmas episode I want to highlight is The Santa Claus of Bums' Boulevard from Christmas day, 1947.  As the episode opens, Casey, Ann and Ethelbert lament all having to work on Christmas Day.  The quiet Blue Note Tavern did not find that many people besides those three on Christmas.  Such is the life of a tavern keeper and newspaper staff!  Well, the staff without family or anyone else at home to give them an incentive to try to get the day off.  Casey and Ann are killing time at the Blue Note waiting to head to the worst part of town at mid-day.  Why?  Because the previous few years, a mysterious visitor handed out one dollar bills to all the people (or rummies as they were called) who are walking the streets among the down and out.  They were trying to catch this mysterious benefactor to see what his motives are.  But when this mysterious Santa Claus is jumped and the money that he had to give away is taken, Casey and Ann jump into action.  Among the others who come under scrutiny are a petty crime boss from that neighborhood, a down and out actress, and an old gent who lives there, but is so much more than he appears.  Casey and Ann Williams help shepherd the story to a happy ending!

              The Santa Claus of Bums' Boulevard (December 25, 1947)


              Here are additional links to Casey, Crime Photographer items on the web.

                  25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

                  25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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                  Saturday, December 5, 2015

                  25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 5 - Beeker's Barn (a Christmas tale from Gunsmoke)

                  For day five, I am going to head out to Dodge City and one of my favorite series, Gunsmoke.  As a long-standing show on CBS, Gunsmoke had a number of Christmas episodes, including one that I featured last year.  Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries.  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

                  Farms at Sunset in Saline, Michigan - Saturday January 10, 2015
                  Farm in the snow near my house in Saline, Michigan (January, 2015)

                  When most old time radio fans list their favorite five or ten programs, Gunsmoke is almost always on the list somewhere.  It is certainly on my list and a definite top five - if not higher.  The first western for adult audiences on radio, this CBS produced show featured the best cast, the best stories, and the best production values.  Gunsmoke had one of the best casts on radio, a group that stuck together during its entire run (1952 to 1961).  Each radio episode started the same way, with the narrator setting the scene:

                  Around Dodge City and in the territory out west, there's just one way to handle the killers and the spoilers... And that's with a U.S. Marshal, and the smell of...Gunsmoke! 
                  Gunsmoke!... the story of the violence that moved west with young America. And the story of a man who moved with it...
                  Then, Matt Dillon would chime in... 
                  I'm that man...Matt Dillon, United States Marshal. The first man they look for, and the last they wanta meet. It's a chancy job, and it makes a man watchful. And a little lonely...

                  CBS radio superstar William Conrad starred as Marshal Matt Dillon, He was joined by Howard McNear as Doc Charles Adams, Georgia Ellis as Kitty Russell, and Parley Baer as Dillon's assistant Chester Wesley Proudfoot.  They were often joined by the stars of CBS radio, most commonly it seems was John Dehner, who almost always played the bad guy.  Joseph Kearns also was a regular guest on the show, and was featured in the Christmas episode featured today.

                  First aired on December 23, 1956 (and reused on December 20, 1959), Beeker's Barn tells the story of a young lost couple trying to make their way in the cold snowy storm in the area around Dodge City on Christmas Eve.  In the driving snowstorm, they needed to seek shelter.  And when they realize that they are approaching a barn, the grim reality is that there is something familiar about this place strikes the pair.  For the young woman, named Harmony, it was all too familiar.  It was the farm of her estranged father.  And while she and her young husband Ross would have liked to be anywhere else, they knew that they needed to find a place to rest, especially with the baby on its way.

                  The owner of the barn, Jethro Beeker, stormed into Marshall Dillon's office the next day, demanding that he toss out the unwelcome guests.  While Marshall Dillon agreed to go out to the barn, he tried to convince Jethro that he should be kind to a stranger at the holidays.  When Matt realized that it was his daughter and her husband and that they were going to have the baby soon, he called off Jethro and called in Doc!  What they received that day was a wonderful Christmas gift that brought them together again.

                  There are two versions, both offered here with different stars (I love the Joseph Kearns script).  He is one of the best names in radio, especially on CBS.  The 1956 original stars Ralph Moody as Jethro Beeker.  Enjoy them both!

                  Beeker's Barn (Gunsmoke - December 20, 1959 with Joseph Kearns)



                  Beeker's Barn (Gunsmoke - December 23 1956 with Ralph Moody)





                  Here are some links to programs relating to Gunsmoke:

                    25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

                    25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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                    Friday, December 4, 2015

                    25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 4 - All is Bright (the story of Silent Night)

                    Made it to day four!  And I am going back to the CBS Radio Workshop - one of the best programs from the late 1950s.  Once again, I am showcasing more Christmas themed shows from Old Time Radio's golden age.  Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries.  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

                    173/365/903 (December 1, 2010) - Wanda under the Christmas Tree
                    Wanda the cat under the Christmas tree (2010)

                    Well, here we are on December 4th and instead of having someone play Santa, I thought I would go in a different direction.  Last year, I showcased the Hallmark Playhouse's version of the way the Christmas masterpiece Silent Night was written.   This year, I am tapping the telling of the story from a slightly different point of view.  In All is Bright, The CBS Radio Workshop tells the story on how the song Silent Night became the loved and well known Christmas song that it is known today.

                    The CBS Radio Workshop continued the tradition at the network to produce some of the most innovative programs on radio.  The program was intended to provide a link back to the Columbia Workshop days and Norman Corwin and provide amazing drama "dedicated to man's imagination, the theater of the mind" In 1956, CBS returned to the airways with a program that would cement their network as the home for innovation.   Starting in January 1956, the CBS Radio Workshop would be on the air for 86 episodes through September 1957.  The CBS Radio Workshop was designed not to be commercially lucrative, but to find a place where the network could put on cutting edge works that might not match with a sponsor's goals.  The 30 minute program started out with a two-part adaptation of Huxley's Brave New World and featured many original and adapted programs.  These features great radio talent and special effects that were the best in the business.

                    The episode we are featuring today is titled All is Bright.  It starts aboard an ocean liner on Christmas Eve.  A big band on the ship entertaining the guests on the liner start playing Silent Night in a big way.  Upon hearing this, an older guest on the ship beckoned them to stop.  Turns out this guest was a famous conductor who was well versed in the way that Silent Night should be played.  It is a peasant song - one without pretension.  It was even called the song from Heaven.  What they proceeded to do was not to talk about how the song was written, but how it was spread from a small Austrian village to be one of the best known Christmas songs ever.

                    Sid Garfield of CBS Radio wrote an article in the January 9, 1957 edition of Variety (p102) called "Please State Previous Experience."  This article was about giving young writers in radio a break.  He wrote"
                    Paul Roberts, executive producer of CBS Radio's Workshop, for example, is consistently sympathetic towards inexperienced writers, no matter how dubious or nonexistent their credits.  This hospitality has paid off.  Just recently, an obscure scriptist named Henry Fritsch sent in several bare outlines of notions he felt, if developed, would enhance the Workshop series.  
                    One of these ideas was All is Bright, I think you will agree with Garfield that taking the chance on this script idea was a great idea.  I hope you enjoy this beautiful story behind this beautiful song.


                      25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

                      25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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                      Thursday, December 3, 2015

                      25 More Days of Old Time Radio Christmas: Day 3 - Christmas Story from The Mysterious Traveler

                      Made it to day three!  Once again, I am showcasing more Christmas themed shows from Old Time Radio's golden age.  Here is a link to all the 2014 OTR Christmas entries.  If you have Sirius/XM, you can listen to Greg Bell's Old time radio channel (#148).  He does a great job of showcasing great holiday themed episodes, especially as we get closer to Christmas and the end of December.

                      Holland-Fawcett Family Christmas Party (2010)
                      Santa paying a visit in 2010
                      Well, here we are on December 3rd and for the third consecutive day, I found a story of someone playing Santa Claus.  But actually, if you listen to all three, you will notice that they are very, very different.

                      This entry is from The Mysterious Traveler, a great old time radio series focused on the supernatural.  This series was broadcast on the Mutual Radio Network and recorded in the studios of WOR in New York City.  The show was the brainchild of Mutual Network's Robert Arthur and David Kogan.  They also produced other series including Dark Destiny, The Strange Dr. Weird and The Sealed Book.  The Strange Dr. Weird was a 15 minute show sponsored by Adam Hats, and often was a trimmed version of a story on one of their 30 minute series.  The Sealed Book is one of my favorites - despite being pretty campy!  I will definitely write about that later.  The series was directed and co-produced by Sherman 'Jock' MacGregor.  Each episode of the Mysterious Traveler starts off with the following introduction:

                      This is the Mysterious Traveler inviting you to join me on another journey into the realm of the strange and the terrifying. I hope you will enjoy the trip! And that it will thrill you a little, and chill you a little. So settle back and get a good grip on your nerves - if you can!

                      The Mysterious Traveler was played by Maurice Tarplin, a very well known radio actor.  Tarplin also played the often frustrated Inspector Faraday on Boston Blackie, one of my favorite Old Time Radio series.  His wonderful voice sets the mood so perfectly on the show, though he is only on air in the beginning and end of each episode.  In each of these episodes, strange and mysterious happenings take place.  There would be an explanation offered, if there was one!  The show was so popular that it even inspired a series of comic books that started in 1948 (that are also on the Internet Archive) and a magazine starting in 1951.

                      This Christmas story starts with a down on his luck man, named Steve Ferrell, who ended up playing Santa Claus is a huge way!  He was in Seattle with few prospects and even less money.  By chance looking through the classified section of the paper (think Craigs List) when he found a personal ad from Paul Harris.  Paul was looking for someone to share a drive to New York City - no expenses needed!  Steve jumped at the chance to get a free trip to New York City and off they went.  On the long car drive, they talked and talked and talked.  Steve learned a great deal about Paul Harris and why he was heading to New York.  Turns out that Paul Harris was recently contacted by a grandfather he never met.  The grandfather, who was estranged from Paul's parents, was getting older and wanted to connect with his only living heir.  But then an accident in the Allegheny Mountains cost Paul his life, but spared Steve.  So in a moment of seizing the brass ring, Steve, who was not hurt badly in the wreck, decided to move forward in Paul's place.  No one ever met Paul in New York City, and there was an inheritance on the other end.

                      As he struggled to keep up the act, Steve (as Paul) fell in love and realized that he found something better than the inheritance that he might get.  Without giving the story away, he decided that playing Santa Claus would be the best way to win the girl and save the day.

                      Christmas Story (December 25, 1951)





                         25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2015) & Other Links

                        25 Days of Old Time Radio Christmas (from 2014)
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