This past Monday, January 14th, marked the 107th birthday of actor William Bendix…who graced the silver screen during the 1940s/1950s in such movie classics as Wake Island (1942), Lifeboat (1944) ...
Review: The Phantom Thief (1946)(Post)Horatio “Boston Blackie” Black (Chester Morris…who later explains to a character in the film that he’s “of the Philadelphia Blackies”) returns to his humble bachelor environs to find a note from h ...
Happy Birthday, Kenny Baker!(Post)From 1935 to 1939, Kenneth Laurence Baker—born in Monrovia, California on this date in 1912—was welcomed into millions of homes as the popular tenor vocalist on radio’s The Jack Benny Program. Ke ...
Happy Birthday, Fran Carlon!(Post)Actress Fran Carlon—born in Indianapolis, Indiana on this date in 1913—was married to actor-announcer Casey Allen for many years. The couple even occasionally worked together on radio programs lik ...
“M-O-L-L-É…”(Post)It is interesting to note that one of radio’s most popular mystery anthologies—The Mollé Mystery Theatre, which debuted over NBC Radio seventy-two years ago on this date—did without its identifyin ...
“America’s favorite young couple…”(Post)On this date in 1935, bandleader Oswald George Nelson (we know him as “Ozzie Nelson”) tied the knot with Peggy Sue Snyder (we know her as “Harriet Hilliard”), the female vocalist that he hired for ...
Happy Birthday, Frank Graham!(Post)In 1950, actor-announcer Frank Graham was at the peak of his radio career. He was the star of Jeff Regan, Investigator—a detective series heard exclusively over CBS Radio on the West Coast. The ...
Happy Birthday, Judy Canova!(Post)There’s a reason why Judy Canova was frequently referred to as “The Ozark Nightingale” and “The Jenny Lind of the Ozarks.” Judy was blessed with an incredible singing voice, and at one point in h ...
Happy Birthday, Bob Bailey!(Post)Robert Bainter Bailey was born in Toledo, OH on this date in 1913. Though some would argue he never fulfilled his ambition to become a motion picture star, old-time radio fans will trump that card ...
Happy Birthday, Hans Conried!(Post)The man born Hans Georg Conried, Jr. on this date in 1917 in Baltimore, Maryland is described by author Leonard Maltin in his book The Great American Broadcast as “one of the most prolific perform ...
“There’s nothing like a quiet, pleasant dinner at home…”(Post)On this date in 1957, listeners who had not completely abandoned radio for television received a nice surprise when the Piper family—better known as The Couple Next Door—put down stakes in the nei ...
Happy Birthday, Staats Cotsworth!(Post)A newspaper man once referred to actor Staats Cotsworth—born in Oak Park, Illinois on this date in 1908—as “the Clark Gable of radio.” It was one of several nicknames Cotsworth would acquire duri ...
Happy Birthday, Sammy Kaye!(Post)It was at a Cleveland, Ohio venue known as The Cabin Club where Sammy Kaye—born Samuel Zamocay, Jr on this date in 1910—would acquire the slogan that would make him and his orchestra famous. The ...
A birthday valentine to Jack Benny(Post)Today is Valentine’s Day. You’ve been seeing TV commercials for weeks now, and I’ll bet dollars to donuts most of the stores had their Valentine’s Day displays up the day after New Year’s. Every ...
Happy Birthday, Victor Moore!(Post)In the 1945 Warner Bros. cartoon Ain’t That Ducky, Daffy Duck encounters a most unusual hunter: a sportsman who looks and sounds like veteran comic actor Victor Moore. As you can probably guess, t ...
Happy Birthday, Parker Fennelly!(Post)It would become one of radio’s most beloved weekly rituals in the late 1940s: comedian Fred Allen would venture into “Allen’s Alley” to ask its inhabitants a topical question about a recent event ...