Vintage Radio - Who Can Remember?
Vintage Radio - Who Can Remember?
If you were born in the 1950s or more recently, you probably grew up with TV, and vintage radio programs were probably on the way out. Having been born in January of 1937 I can remember many of the programs, and I had my favourites. The Shadow was one, Lux Radio Theater was another, Fibber McGee and Molly, Jack Benny, Hockey Night in Canada, and my favourite of all time, L for Lanky. "The Shadow knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men" and a scary laugh shivered my timbers. The 60 second crash of things falling out of Fibber McGee's closet when he opened the door is unforgettable. Jack Benny's long pauses, Dennis and Rochester with distinctive voices and accents, and "He shoots, he scores" yelled by Foster Hewitt every Saturday night back in the days when my team the Maple Leafs used to win the Stanley Cup. However, of all of those my real favourite, and I bet nobody else on NT will ever have listened to it, was L for Lanky. I believe it was only broadcast in Canada. Here's an explanation about it from AS YOU WERE WAR YEARS: MOTES & QUOTES V March 2000 Edition
L FOR LANKY: The radio drama exploits of a Lancaster bomber
The CBC radio programme, "L for Lanky," was a very imaginative program which many of us remember fondly from our childhoods. "L for Lanky" means the Lancaster bomber that was the central figure in the show. It was about a WWII flight crew and their adventures going out on raids with this bomber -- but the "narrator" of the program was the Lancaster bomber itself. The plane was given a voice and a personality, and it began each show setting up the premise, in a slightly echoed voice with airplane sound behind it, and it always started out by saying "I'm L for Lanky. I'm a Lancaster bomber....." And on it went from there, setting up that week's story and then the regular actors as airmen took over. The voice of Lanky was played by an actor named Herb Gott. A great example of how well radio tapped into the theatre of the mind - one simply bought the premise without question. Otherwise they were standard WW2 air adventures. Apparently most of the ETs were destroyed after the war and apparently there is little evidence of the show in the CBC archives. There are rumours of excerpts still in existence.
http://www.airmuseum.ca/web/ammq0003.html
One person (Ron Lehman) who still remembered listening to the programs described them as follows:
"Here's one for all the old timers who remember WWII Bomber Command over Europe. I listened to this radio show when the war was raging in Europe, and the Allies were bombing Hitler's "Fortress Europe" into oblivion. "Lanky" aircraft were better known as Lancs; Lancaster bombers that could carry a 22 ton "Big Boy" bomb to be used on strategic targets such as submarine pens in France, Pointe du Hoc gun emplacements before D-Day. They were used extensively over Berlin, the Ruhr Valley and any other target that needed blowing up ie: Peenumunde rocket sites. This radio show gave us the hope that we would succeed and go on to victory, which we did, with a lot of help from brave men and the great Lancaster Bomber."
It was broadcast during the war, and I and my brother, who is 4 years older than me, shared a bedroom and slept in a bunk bed where I had the top bunk. While we listened, we play-acted along with the crew. Since I was on the top bunk I was the top gunner while my brother was the pilot.
About 700 Lancaster Bombers with Rolls Royce Merlin engines were built in the A.V.Roe plant near Toronto, and one Lancaster is still flyable at the Air Museum near Hamilton, Ontario (my original home town).
This web site enables you to listen to many great old programs, even FDR's Fireside Speeches.
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Who can remember......?
I sure can. Great radio programs and one of my favorites was ''Inter Sanctum'' was one of my favorites. My younger brother Dolt, would hide in the closet when it came on the radio.
Sargent Preston of the Yukon and his dog King was another favorite.
Yeah, Inner Sanctum - you just reminded me about that one.
That was another big one for my dad.
I seem to recall that "Gunsmoke" began on radio.
This may be in the "other than" category: I recall a local popular music show with Arnie "Woo Woo" Ginsberg. The Night Train Show. That's mainly what I listened to as a boy. I can remember doing my homework with that on.
I never knew that. That must have been fun.
It was fun. The voices fit the characters. As I recall Kitty was something a bit more naughty than just a saloon girl. Or it was just my imagination.
The wonder of radio.
She was lady of the night.
Amanda Blake played her on TV. Wonder who did her character on the radio.
Lots of recording of these programs on YouTube.
I don't remember it on radio, but Gunsmoke was one of my favorite TV shows.
Their voices fit the but the appearance didn't according to the TV producers. That's why the replaced William Conrad with James Arness as Matt and Dennis Weaver as Chester
The TV series holds the record for most episodes of a TV show. I believe it's over 600. That went on for a long time.
Yup, Exactly, lol, do you remember when Conrad got to play TV detective Cannon? It used to crack me up to see him running down the street chasing someone!
There was one show that I know of the went the other way. It started on TV then went to radio. Anybody know which one?
No?
???
Have Gun Will Travel
That's interesting. I used to watch it on TV, didn't know about the radio versions.
I can only remember people talking about them, the radio shows.
The Shadows Knows was a big one for my dad.
Those Rolls Royce Merlin engines were works of art. When they were substituted for the Allisons, that is when the P-51 Mustangs became a dominant air superiority aircraft.
My cousins piloted B-26 Marauders, aka Widowmakers and would, at time, fly on the deck following rivers to their targets. Hopping or flying under bridges could be a life of death challenge.
I think I would enjoy the L for Lanky show.
Back in the early 70s a Sunday evening radio show aired by a local station, and originated from a station which I think was out of Chicago(?) and IIRC featured some of the original SNL members, was usually a pretty good adventure of the mind.
It was also called the "Baltimore Whore". It was built in Maryland and they said the wings were so small that the plane had no visible means of support.
Yeah, you are right about that. Forgot about that one.
The short wings probably gave it that hot rodder look too.
As a young child in the very early 1950s, I remember my parents listening to 15 minute episodes of soap operas on the radio - Search for Tomorrow and The Guiding Light - before they transferred to TV.
When I was a young adult, I enjoyed listening to a radio station that broadcast old radio shows from the 1930s and 1940s with my dad. It was great to share a re-broadcast of 1938's "War of the Worlds" with him. When he first heard it, he was a teenager. We also listened to Inner Sanctum and The Shadow together. Fun memories!
Orson Welles doing "War of the Worlds" caused new rules to be applied to radio broadcasting (and I assume they've been extended to TV as well) requiring announcements to be made throughout such a program indicating that it is not real but merely a fictional episode.
I was going to say, soap operas started on radio.
I think Lucille Ball did radio.
I remember seeing an old filmed production of a radio show. It showed how they did sound effects and all.