Irene Dunne is acknowledged by many classic movie fans to be the greatest actress who never won an Academy Award. It wasn’t for a lack of trying: she was nominated five times—for Cimarron (1931), ...
Happy Birthday, Tommy Cook!(Post)One night in 1941, child actor Tommy Cook was determined to see the Republic cliffhanger serial Jungle Girl. You see, he had a part in that motion picture as a native boy, Kimbu, so he stealthily ...
Happy Birthday, Jeanette Nolan!(Post)Actress Jeanette Nolan—born in Los Angeles on this date in 1911—met future husband John McIntire while working on a West Coast radio program in the 1930s. John was the announcer for a show on whi ...
Happy Birthday, Francis “Dink” Trout!(Post)In the Golden Age of Radio, actors were often called upon to play “meek” individuals—or whatever nickname you prefer: wimp, nebbish, milquetoast, etc. The gold standard for these portrayals might ...
Happy Birthday, Louise Erickson!(Post)Actress Louise Erickson—born in Oakland, California on this date in 1928—becomes a nonagenarian today…and we at Radio Spirits couldn’t be more excited about celebrating the occasion. In the 1940s ...
Happy Birthday, Bennett Kilpack!(Post)During his long-running stint as the titular sleuth on Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons, actor Bennett Kilpack—born William Bennett Kilpack on this date in 1883 in Long Melford, Suffolk in the Uni ...
Happy Birthday, Peg Lynch!(Post)The domestic comedy The Private Lives of Ethel and Albert had its official network radio premiere on May 29, 1944 over NBC Blue, but the idea for the program had been germinating in the mind of Pe ...
Happy Birthday, Minerva Pious!(Post)The legendary Fred Allen had words of high praise in his book Treadmill to Oblivion for long-time Fred Allen Show regular Minerva Pious, who was born on this date in either 1903 (according to most ...
Happy Birthday, Paula Winslowe!(Post)The untimely death of “platinum blonde” Jean Harlow at the age of 26 was devastating news to moviegoers…but since the motion picture business is a business, MGM (Harlow’s employer) soldiered on by ...
Happy Birthday, Verna Felton!(Post)It’s a bit of a stretch but try to imagine Verna Felton—the actress who appeared on Jack Benny’s radio/TV show as Dennis Day’s mother and later as “Hilda Crocker” on December Bride—as “Baby Felton ...
Happy Birthday, Henry Fonda!(Post)For actor Henry Fonda, the old “third time’s the charm” idiom certainly rang true in 1982. He was recognized by his peers at the Academy Awards ceremony that year and awarded the Best Actor in a L ...
Happy Birthday, J. Scott Smart!(Post)While two of the radio programs based on characters created by author Dashiell Hammett—The Adventures of the Thin Man and The Adventures of Sam Spade—were adapted from his novels, The Fat Man was ...
Happy Birthday, Robert Readick!(Post)Actor Frank Readick’s voice is a familiar one to those fans who remember old-time radio--he was one of the busiest thesps in the aural medium, starring on such programs as Smilin’ Jack and Meet Mr ...
Happy Birthday, Mandel Kramer!(Post)“I’m a product of radio,” actor Mandel Kramer confessed to an interviewer for a 1953 article in the March edition of Radio-TV Mirror. Mandel, who was born in Cleveland ninety-nine years ago on th ...
“On, King! On, you huskies!”(Post)The Detroit, Michigan station known as WXYZ—“the last word in radio”—was already responsible for introducing two dramatic programs over the airwaves that became firm favorites with radio listeners ...
“Better things for better living, through chemistry…”(Post)A dilemma faced E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, a Wilmington, Delaware firm founded in 1802 as a gunpowder mill. It was that whole gunpowder thing, of which DuPont manufactured plenty during ...