JOSEPH DUNNINGER - RADIO'S MASTER MENTALIST
THE AMAZING DUNNINGER
Mind reading isn’t supernatural. It can be done by a child of three…with 30 years experience. - Joseph Dunninger.
Little Joseph Dunninger was obviously a special child. Born in New York City in the spring of 1892 he showed early proclivities to manual dexterity and deception, very early. His weathy parents encouraged the youngster’s obsession with magic and by the time he was a teenager he was popular in vaudeville as The Amazing Young Dunninger and at 17 performed for President Theodore Roosevelt, the first of many appearances before chief executives who enjoyed his slight of hand and impressed by his “mind reading.” (1) Among the famous personages who befriended him were Thomas Edison and Harry Houdini who made arrangements to contact the mentalist from the dead, “Just in case in can be done.” (2)
Dunninger also saw the promptional and financial value of marketing his skills with writing. He published his first books, Dunninger’s Tricks Deluxe and Dunninger’s Tricks Unique in 1918 when he was 26. Five years later he wrote Dunninger’s Master Methods of Hypnotism, having learned that practice and successfully incorporating into his act. By 1940 Dunninger had twelve books to his credit plus a number of magazine articles in publications ranging from Scientific American to Popular Mechanics to Life. (3)
Although he had been in the public eye for over 30 years, Dunninger’s debut on the Blue Network at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 12, 1943, caught what few listeners the network had at the time by surprise. A mind reading act on radio?
He relied on a few of his standard routines: identifying three objects placed in a box by audience members, reading cards written and placed in their pockets, revealing the telephone numbers, addresses or personal information of total strangers. To those unfamiliar with his act this was new stuff and quite remarkable. One of them was reporter Earl Sparling, who wrote in the November 24, 1943 issue of Variety:
"The Dunninger Show is about the strangest thing ever to get on the air. The Master Mentalist sits at a desk. At a long table is a committee of three judges - always well known and trustworthy citizens. (4) In the studio are some 300 persons, each wanting to know if this man up on the stage can actually read an innermost thought. The excitement which pervades the place can almost be felt.
"After the preliminaries of introductions and explanations, Dunninger says, 'Some woman is thinking of the letters T and O.' A woman in the audience raises her hand. 'The T is for Tojo your parrot. The O is for Oscar your goldfish.' 'That’s right,' says the woman in a weak voice who sinks back in her seat. A sigh runs through the audience.
"You would naturally suspect that Dunninger was in cahoots with the parrot lady - and with all the other participants. But Dunninger makes each person who stands up in the studio vow there is no collusion. Scores have done so and testified that he read their minds. No one has tried to collect the $10,000 he says he will forfeit to anyone who can prove he has confederates, employees or stooges."
Paint manufacturer Sherwin-Williams was also impressed and agreed to sponsor Dunninger’s half-hour of mental gymnastics beginning on January 5, 1944, for its Kem-Tone brand. That was the good news. The bad news was his timeslot, Wednesday at 9:00 p.m., opposite Eddie Cantor on NBC, Frank Sinatra on CBS and Mutual newscaster Gabriel Heatter, who together accounted for 38.2 average Hooperating points per week during the season. That left the crumbs of a 3.9 rating and 149th place for Dunninger.
An early show from this season, February 23, 1944, with guest Roy Acuff, is posted which displays the mentalist’s bag of tricks from Memphis. (5) (The program also features one of the worst commercial jingles ever broadcast.) Music was introduced in the show of June 14, 1944 with guest vocalist, Meredith Blake, which proved a good break from Dunninger’s rapid fire of mind reading tricks which lose their effectiveness in bulk amounts. The July 26, 1944, broadcast featured singing judge Dick Brown and the novel twist of guest Raymond Edward Johnson, Inner Sanctum’s host, presenting a mystery for the mentalist to solve. Dunninger’s show was becoming more of an entertaining variety half hour in which the mentalist was the highlight, not the repetitious solo act.
Nevertheless, the 1944-45 season was more of the same bad ratings as Cantor, Sinatra and Heatter ganged up for a weekly average total of 40.3 rating points against Dunninger’s 3.3. Instead of moving the mentalist to a more competitive time period, the paint company and network cancelled him on December 27, 1944.
The veteran magician’s best rating came in the 13 summer weeks of 1945, when Dunninger was Lever Brothers’ Friday night replacement for Amos & Andy on NBC from June 8th to September 28th. Dunninger’s 8.8 rating wasn’t a world beater, by any means, but if he had that rating for the entire 1945-46 season, he would have out-rated favorites Ozzie & Harriet, Ginny Simms, Dick Haymes, Gangbusters, This Is Your FBI and It Pays To Be Ignorant.
Levers brought him back for an encore month on NBC in June, 1946, but that was the end of Dunninger’s series work in radio. He found new popularity in television, appearing with ventriloquist Paul Winchell in the 1948’s early Floor Show on NBC-TV and several short-lived revues. He was booked into many variety shows into the 1960’s, never failing to make viewers, like listeners, wonder, “How did he do that?”
A lifelong bachelor, Joseph Dunninger died at his New Jersey home of Parkinson’s Disease on March 9, 1975 at the age of 82, taking his mind reading secrets to the grave with him.
To those who believe, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe, no explanation will suffice. - Joseph Dunninger.
(1) During one performance for President Franklin Roosevelt, Dunninger correctly recited the serial numbers on a five dollar bill in the wallet of Treasury Secretary Morgenthau.
(2) It was from Dunninger’s friendship with Houdini, a dedicated pursuer of phony mediums, that the young magician took up the cause in his later years and encouraged other professional magicians to expose séance promoters who took advantage of grieving survivors seeking to communicate with dead relatives. His 1935 expose, Inside The Medium’s Cabinet, is considered a benchmark.
(3) Many of Dunninger’s 20 books and numerous articles were co-written or ghosted by his lifelong friend, Walter Gibson, creator of The Shadow. (See The Shadow Nos. on this site.)
(4) Dunninger once asked one of his judges, Columbia Professor Robert Merton, to visit the university’s library with two witnesses and select any book without telling him. He correctly identified the book Middletown 444 on the next broadcast.
(5) Dunninger continued his stage and nightclub career during the run of his broadcasts and the show followed him around the country.
Copyright © 2017, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
Mind reading isn’t supernatural. It can be done by a child of three…with 30 years experience. - Joseph Dunninger.
Little Joseph Dunninger was obviously a special child. Born in New York City in the spring of 1892 he showed early proclivities to manual dexterity and deception, very early. His weathy parents encouraged the youngster’s obsession with magic and by the time he was a teenager he was popular in vaudeville as The Amazing Young Dunninger and at 17 performed for President Theodore Roosevelt, the first of many appearances before chief executives who enjoyed his slight of hand and impressed by his “mind reading.” (1) Among the famous personages who befriended him were Thomas Edison and Harry Houdini who made arrangements to contact the mentalist from the dead, “Just in case in can be done.” (2)
Dunninger also saw the promptional and financial value of marketing his skills with writing. He published his first books, Dunninger’s Tricks Deluxe and Dunninger’s Tricks Unique in 1918 when he was 26. Five years later he wrote Dunninger’s Master Methods of Hypnotism, having learned that practice and successfully incorporating into his act. By 1940 Dunninger had twelve books to his credit plus a number of magazine articles in publications ranging from Scientific American to Popular Mechanics to Life. (3)
Although he had been in the public eye for over 30 years, Dunninger’s debut on the Blue Network at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 12, 1943, caught what few listeners the network had at the time by surprise. A mind reading act on radio?
He relied on a few of his standard routines: identifying three objects placed in a box by audience members, reading cards written and placed in their pockets, revealing the telephone numbers, addresses or personal information of total strangers. To those unfamiliar with his act this was new stuff and quite remarkable. One of them was reporter Earl Sparling, who wrote in the November 24, 1943 issue of Variety:
"The Dunninger Show is about the strangest thing ever to get on the air. The Master Mentalist sits at a desk. At a long table is a committee of three judges - always well known and trustworthy citizens. (4) In the studio are some 300 persons, each wanting to know if this man up on the stage can actually read an innermost thought. The excitement which pervades the place can almost be felt.
"After the preliminaries of introductions and explanations, Dunninger says, 'Some woman is thinking of the letters T and O.' A woman in the audience raises her hand. 'The T is for Tojo your parrot. The O is for Oscar your goldfish.' 'That’s right,' says the woman in a weak voice who sinks back in her seat. A sigh runs through the audience.
"You would naturally suspect that Dunninger was in cahoots with the parrot lady - and with all the other participants. But Dunninger makes each person who stands up in the studio vow there is no collusion. Scores have done so and testified that he read their minds. No one has tried to collect the $10,000 he says he will forfeit to anyone who can prove he has confederates, employees or stooges."
Paint manufacturer Sherwin-Williams was also impressed and agreed to sponsor Dunninger’s half-hour of mental gymnastics beginning on January 5, 1944, for its Kem-Tone brand. That was the good news. The bad news was his timeslot, Wednesday at 9:00 p.m., opposite Eddie Cantor on NBC, Frank Sinatra on CBS and Mutual newscaster Gabriel Heatter, who together accounted for 38.2 average Hooperating points per week during the season. That left the crumbs of a 3.9 rating and 149th place for Dunninger.
An early show from this season, February 23, 1944, with guest Roy Acuff, is posted which displays the mentalist’s bag of tricks from Memphis. (5) (The program also features one of the worst commercial jingles ever broadcast.) Music was introduced in the show of June 14, 1944 with guest vocalist, Meredith Blake, which proved a good break from Dunninger’s rapid fire of mind reading tricks which lose their effectiveness in bulk amounts. The July 26, 1944, broadcast featured singing judge Dick Brown and the novel twist of guest Raymond Edward Johnson, Inner Sanctum’s host, presenting a mystery for the mentalist to solve. Dunninger’s show was becoming more of an entertaining variety half hour in which the mentalist was the highlight, not the repetitious solo act.
Nevertheless, the 1944-45 season was more of the same bad ratings as Cantor, Sinatra and Heatter ganged up for a weekly average total of 40.3 rating points against Dunninger’s 3.3. Instead of moving the mentalist to a more competitive time period, the paint company and network cancelled him on December 27, 1944.
The veteran magician’s best rating came in the 13 summer weeks of 1945, when Dunninger was Lever Brothers’ Friday night replacement for Amos & Andy on NBC from June 8th to September 28th. Dunninger’s 8.8 rating wasn’t a world beater, by any means, but if he had that rating for the entire 1945-46 season, he would have out-rated favorites Ozzie & Harriet, Ginny Simms, Dick Haymes, Gangbusters, This Is Your FBI and It Pays To Be Ignorant.
Levers brought him back for an encore month on NBC in June, 1946, but that was the end of Dunninger’s series work in radio. He found new popularity in television, appearing with ventriloquist Paul Winchell in the 1948’s early Floor Show on NBC-TV and several short-lived revues. He was booked into many variety shows into the 1960’s, never failing to make viewers, like listeners, wonder, “How did he do that?”
A lifelong bachelor, Joseph Dunninger died at his New Jersey home of Parkinson’s Disease on March 9, 1975 at the age of 82, taking his mind reading secrets to the grave with him.
To those who believe, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe, no explanation will suffice. - Joseph Dunninger.
(1) During one performance for President Franklin Roosevelt, Dunninger correctly recited the serial numbers on a five dollar bill in the wallet of Treasury Secretary Morgenthau.
(2) It was from Dunninger’s friendship with Houdini, a dedicated pursuer of phony mediums, that the young magician took up the cause in his later years and encouraged other professional magicians to expose séance promoters who took advantage of grieving survivors seeking to communicate with dead relatives. His 1935 expose, Inside The Medium’s Cabinet, is considered a benchmark.
(3) Many of Dunninger’s 20 books and numerous articles were co-written or ghosted by his lifelong friend, Walter Gibson, creator of The Shadow. (See The Shadow Nos. on this site.)
(4) Dunninger once asked one of his judges, Columbia Professor Robert Merton, to visit the university’s library with two witnesses and select any book without telling him. He correctly identified the book Middletown 444 on the next broadcast.
(5) Dunninger continued his stage and nightclub career during the run of his broadcasts and the show followed him around the country.
Copyright © 2017, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
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