BERGEN, McCARTHY & CHARLIE'S FIRST SEASON NEMESIS, W.C. FIELDS
"I'll Mow Ya Down!"
The 1937-38 Season
6th In A Series
Bergen Throws His Voice & Millions Catch It. Standard Brands’ Chase & Sanborn Coffee installed ventriloquist Edgar Bergen & his Charlie McCarthy into the 8:00 Sunday night slot on NBC to replace its short lived Do Want To Be An Actor? The prime time period once again proved to be prime radio real estate for Bergen just as it had been for Eddie Cantor and Major Bowes before him. Bergen tripled Do You Want To Be An Actor’s ratings and began a string of 16 consecutive seasons among the Annual Top Ten - never finishing below seventh place. (See First Season Phenoms on this site.)
The new Chase & Sanborn Hour was designed to be the cream of radio variety and featured an all-star cast to support Bergen and his wooden ward. Radio veteran Don Ameche, now a leading man in four 20th Century Fox movies a year, was the show’s host. Film star Dorothy Lamour provided its glamour and sang. Legendary comedian W.C. Fields became Charlie’s nemesis in an intramural feud of barbs early in the show’s run. The new show was also well stocked with top guest stars every week. But the real attraction remained Bergen and the irreverent, horny little adolescent dummy perched on his lap.
Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy pushed Hooper’s numbers to the Crossley-like heights of the early 30s. The highest Hooperatings ever recorded for a weekly series were scored during the debut season of The Chase & Sanborn Hour on NBC in 1937-38. On Sunday, January 16th the soft-spoken ventriloquist and his brash Charlie scored a 41.1. The following month on February 6th the Bergen & McCarthy rating rose to a 41.2. It “fell off” to a 40.9 on March 6th. And these numbers were generated after the notorious "Mae West incident" in December when the program was denounced in the press and pulpits across the country which called for a boycott of the show. (See Bergen, McCarthy And Adam & Eve.)
Radio Bags Grocery Money. Three giant consumer products manufacturers - General Foods, Standard Brands and Lever Brothers - each sponsored two of the season’s Top Ten programs. Standard had Bergen & McCarthy’s top rated Chase & Sanborn Hour plus Rudy Vallee’s variety hour in ninth place. General Foods’ Jello sponsored Jack Benny’s second place program and Grape Nuts had Burns & Allen who finished the season in eighth. Lever’s Lux Radio Theater rated third and Al Jolson hosted Lifebuoy Soap’s tenth place show. (1)
During the first six months of 1937, the three conglomerates reported spending a combined $3.5 Million in radio. Each spent more on radio than in national magazine advertising - an inconceivable thought less than a decade earlier. (2)
The Networks Meet At Sunset. With combined network revenues approaching a total of $340 Million in the five years since 1932, the chains had plenty of cash to finance new production facilities in Hollywood where most of the top rated prime time shows now originated. NBC and CBS both broke ground on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood just a few blocks from each other which made it handy in future years for actors and musicians rushing between shows in the rivals’ studios. CBS was first with its new $1.75 Million facility for KNX and network use at Sunset & Gower in April, 1937. Not to be outdone, NBC followed with its own $2.0 Million West Coast headquarters at Sunset & Vine six months later. (3)
Act One In Havana. Representatives from the United States, Canada, Mexico and Cuba met in Havana on November 1st to convene the North American Regional Broadcasting Conference. Their purpose was to assign radio frequency channels to each country in an effort to eliminate interference. The resulting Havana Act took four years to enact but affected the frequencies of over 800 stations in the United States. (See The March of Change.)
Going AFRA The Money. The networks were flush with money and the big name stars were making thousands per broadcast. Yet, not everyone involved was getting rich. The studio talent - the men and women who worked the shows as announcers and actors, often without name credit - received as little as $2.50 a program or as much as $25 a week, ($423 in today's money), which often included days of rehearsal. Led by comedian and social activist Eddie Cantor, radio performers banded together and formed the American Federation of Radio Artists six weeks before the 1937-38 season began. Wage negotiations began in 1938 resulting in a minimum talent fee per program of $25.
The Little Network That Could. Mutual, now with its own Hollywood connection at Don Lee‘s KHJ, continued to sign affiliates throughout the country. The network finished 1937 with 80 stations, more than doubling its size in a year. Mutual still didn’t have much entertainment programming to offer its affiliates but even its most popular programs suffered in ratings popularity because of a polling technicality coupled with the regional system by which the network was sold to many of its advertisers.
To meet Hooper reporting standards, a program had to attain a minimum total of 600 homes reported listening and sponsored by an individual advertiser in the 30 cities that Hooper surveyed during a rating period. When the same program was sold to different sponsors from city to city, it had little chance of making a dent in the ratings.
Mutual was at a further disadvantage in the 30 major markets surveyed because except for New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, Mutual affiliates were seldom the powerful and highly promoted stations that carried NBC, CBS or Blue programming. To make up the difference in coverage Mutual pursued more affiliates by reaching into smaller cities that its competitors dismissed. Because these less populated markets were ignored by the rating services, Mutual again received short shrift in the rating books.
In The Shadow of Prime Time. Mutual introduced Lamont Cranston as The Shadow with his ability to, “…cloud men‘s minds so they cannot see him”, at 5:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 26, 1937. It would remain a Sunday afternoon feature on Mutual for the next 15 years and became one of the most popular mystery melodramas to promise a weekly scare for anyone willing to suspend disbelief for half an hour. Twenty-two year old Orson Welles was first to play "the wealthy man about town" and his fellow actors from Welles’ off-Broadway Mercury Players contributed supporting roles, most notably Agnes Moorhead, 36, who portrayed, “...Cranston’s constant companion, the lovely Margo Lane”. (4)
Because of its afternoon timeslot and the ratings systems’ sporadic reporting of Mutual programming, The Shadow never received the same attention as prime time programs on the three established networks. It didn’t appear in the Hooperatings until four years after its debut on Mutual. Had The Shadow been grouped with prime time competition, it would have ranked in the season’s Top 50 programs three times. More surprisingly, it would have been among Sunday’s Top Ten only twice - 1942-43, (7th), and 1943-44, (9th). (See The Shadow Nos.)
The Season of BIG Bands. Over 40% of the season’s prime time programs were based in music of all varieties. Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey brought swing to network radio with their own series. They were joined by the show bands of Paul Whiteman, Ozzie Nelson, Ben Bernie and Kay Kyser. The “sweet” bands of Wayne King and Russ Morgan got the most exposure. Morgan’s “wah-wah” trombone and orchestra headlined The Camel Caravan on both CBS and NBC every week while King was heard three times a week until January, then twice a week with a prime time Lady Esther Serenades on both networks. (See The Waltz King.)
But the big band that grabbed the most headlines was really big - 92 musicians. The NBC Symphony debuted in November and its maestro, 70 year old Arturo Toscanini, made his first appearance on Christmas Eve. The Symphony’s 90 minute concerts on Saturday nights at 10:00 were broadcast simultaneously on both the NBC and Blue networks for three months. The critically acclaimed orchestra remained on NBC for the rest of the season, then moved to co-owned Blue - RCA’s “cultural” network - for the next five years of its 17 season run before returning to NBC.
I Witness News. NBC hired Max Jordan, 39, as Network Radio’s first full time European correspondent in 1934, predating CBS’s hiring of the more famous Edward R. Murrow and William L. Shirer by three years. As a reporter for Hearst’s International News Service, the multi-lingual Jordan had free-lanced several stories for NBC since 1931. He went to work immediately to negotiate contracts that would assure NBC of facilities to short wave his reports to New York from most anywhere on the continent. Jordan’s efforts paid their first big dividend on March 12, 1938, when he was first to report directly from Vienna the news of Germany’s annexation of Austria. CBS had to settle for Shirer’s reports of the event the following day from London.
Lux Looms Larger. There was no stopping Lux Radio Theater in its march to becoming Monday’s all-time ratings champ for Lever Brothers and CBS. During the 1937-38 season alone, Lux presented dozens of movie greats in its radio adaptations of box office hits. The season’s weekly parade of stars included Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck, Gary Cooper, Joan Crawford, Henry Fonda, Olivia deHavilland, Cary Grant, Claudette Colbert, Errol Flynn and Bing Crosby. Throughout the remainder of Network Radio’s Golden Age no competing program in the 9:00 p.m. Monday timeslot would muster even half of Lux Radio Theater’s ratings. It proved to be an unmatched dominance. (See Lux…Presents Hollywood!)
Spitalny’s Charming Competitors. One of the few ratings “successes” against the Lux Hollywood extravaganza at 9:00 was veteran conductor Phil Spitalny’s all girl orchestra and its (30 minute) Hour of Charm. The 22 piece ensemble of female musicians and singers - whose highly accomplished members were identified only by their first names - featured Evelyn (Klein) and her “Magic Violin”. Klein, who married Spitalny in 1945, was both very talented and beautiful.
Despite their musicianship displayed in selections that ranged from standards to symphonic, the female orchestra was considered a novelty act which resulted movie appearances plus a ten year sponsorship by General Electric on NBC. Surprisingly, Hour of Charm’s 1937-38 season competing against the unbeatable Lux Radio Theater resulted in its only Top 50 season. (See The Hour of Charm.)
No Thanks, We’ll Walk. Fortunately for George Burns and Gracie Allen, the new CBS and NBC studios in Hollywood were just a few blocks apart on Sunset Boulevard. They’d make the trip six times. After five years on the CBS Wednesday schedule, Burns & Allen signed with General Foods for the 1937-38 season and moved to NBC on Monday against the feint competition of Horace Heidt’s Brigadiers orchestra. The couple’s network hopping lost 10% of their audience but they remained in the season’s Top Ten for one last time. They returned to CBS the next season.
Molly’s Delicate Condition. Jim Jordan and his writer/partner Don Quinn were dealt a problem in November even greater than being scheduled against Monday’s giant, Lux Radio Theater. To their credit, Fibber McGee & Molly had almost regained the momentum that was quashed when it was pitted against Lux for over a year. But early into the 1937-38 season, Marian Jordan took sick - very sick.
Jim and Marian had been running hard since spring when they filmed their first movie, This Way Please. The pressures of their weekly broadcasts, frequent personal appearance commitments and raising two youngsters got to Marian and forced her off the air and into a hospital. The decision was made that Jim would carry the show by himself until she returned. It would be a longer time than he or Quinn imagined.
Fibber McGee & Molly was moved to its new Tuesday timeslot in the spring and Marian managed a brief appearance on the show of June 28, 1938, but it would be almost a year until she returned permanently. Meanwhile, it was up to her husband and their trusted collaborator to keep the program going. (See Fibber McGee Minus Molly.)
Tinsletown To Big Town. Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor became the first major motion picture stars to commit to continuing roles in a dramatic series. Robinson, as “fighting” editor Steve Wilson of The Illustrated Press, and Trevor as his star reporter, Lorelei Kilbourne, immediately delivered the newcomer newspaper drama to the season’s Top 20. Trevor left the show after two seasons and Robinson stayed for five, yet Big Town scored an eventual total of 13 Top 50 seasons. (See Big Big Town.)
The Gang’s All Here. It was billed as Al Pearce’s Gang and it was exactly that. Imported by CBS from affiliate KFRC/San Francisco, Ford Motors slotted Pearce and his troupe of supporting players on Wednesday night midway in the previous season. Pearce was ringmaster of the group that included some of radio’s most talent comic voices: Arthur Q. Bryan, Morey Amsterdam, Mel Blanc, Harry Stewart as Scandinavian accented Yogi Yorgenson, and motor-mouthed Arlene Harris who performed one-way telephone conver-sations with her silent friend, Maisie. But the star was Pearce who did a regular turn as inept door-to-door salesman Elmer Blurt, whose under-the-breath wish after knocking on doors was, “Nobody’s home, Ah hope, Ah hope, Ah hope.” The line became national catch phrase.
By the 1937-38 season, Al Pearce’s Gang had taken root and scored a 35% increase in its second year ratings - its first and only trip to the Top 15. Then, unlike most radio stars, Pearce made four movies after his prime time glory years and six trips to the Top 50. However, the films were all “quickie” B films produced by Republic Pictures, destined for second billing in double feature houses.
It’s A Matter of Times... “I’ll mow ya down!” Charlie McCarthy’s weekly threat to W.C. Fields had became a national catch phrase by the fall of 1937. Texaco and CBS saw Edgar Bergen’s Sunday night ratings reaper coming and pulled Eddie Cantor out of its path. The comedian was moved from opposite Sunday’s Chase & Sanborn Hour - which, ironically, was once his own - and into the safe Wednesday timeslot vacated by Burns & Allen who had jumped to NBC for the season. Cantor returned the favor by producing Wednesday’s most popular program with the singing support of his young proteges, Dianna Durbin and Bobby Breen. (See The 1936-37 Season.)
...And A Matter of Dimes. The move to Wednesday kept Eddie Cantor in the season’s Top Five and helped him launch one of the nation’s most famous charity drives. The comedian and AFRA President was an active supporter of Franklin Roosevelt, a wheelchair bound victim of what had been diagnosed in 1921 as paralytic poliomyelitis, more commonly known as polio. Acting on the President’s request, Cantor - with the help of show business luminaries - spearheaded the first fund raising drive for The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. Cantor is credited with naming it The March of Dimes - its similarity to The March of Time intended. He introduced it in late January on a special broadcast carried by all four networks.. The effort became the most successful charity drive of the pre-war years.
The Ol’ Maestro & The Ol’ Professor. Bandleaders Ben Bernie and Kay Kyser were both powerful radio personalities. They were 14 years apart in age when their Network Radio paths crossed on Wednesday night in 1938 and the age difference was obvious.
Bernie, “The Ol’ Maestro,” was 46. Despite starring in two movies with Walter Winchell in 1937, his radio career was on its downside after two disastrous seasons on Blue. His CBS series for U.S. Rubber was to have been his comeback show. His broadcasts were informal, relaxed and loose, with Bernie talking the lyrics of songs while his band, (aka The Lads), accompanied him in dated standards and novelties - like his own compositions, Sweet Georgia Brown and Who’s Your Little Whoosis?
Kyser, 32, took on a completely opposite persona as “The Ol’ Professor” - costumed in cap and gown as the frenetic, fast talking “dean” of the musical comedy quiz, The College of Musical Knowledge. American Tobacco had replaced its Wednesday edition of Your Hit Parade on NBC in December with singing movie star Dick Powell for 13 weeks while it honed Kyser’s College for the big time on Mutual. By April Kyser and his show band presented a tightly formatted NBC hour of audience participation, comedy and music.
Bernie and Kyser both finished the season with a 10.9 average rating, tied for 31st place. It would be Ben Bernie’s last Top 50 season and the first of nine for Kay Kyser, which included two years in the Top Ten.
A Better Barbour Poll Position. One of the first programs to move from NBC’s West Coast production headquarters at KPO/San Francisco to its new facilities in Hollywood was the popular Carleton E. Morse continuing drama, One Man's Family. The program was transferred to Hollywood in October, before NBC’s new studios had been finished. The Barbour Family obviously liked their new neighborhood in Southern California - their rating average increased by nearly 20%. It was the first of four seasons that One Man’s Family was NBC’s most popular dramatic show.
Good News For Bing, But Bad For Bowes. General Foods’ Maxwell House Coffee scuttled the aging Showboat in November despite the return of host Charlie Winninger as its host, Captain Henry, who went down with his ship. The food conglomerate updated its timeslot’s theme from minstrel to movies with MGM’s Good News of 1938 - a blatant promotional vehicle for MGM films but a ratings winner. It scored a fast 66% jump in audience over the Showboat troupe. (See Good News.)
Constant in the Good News cast among its rotating hosts and visiting stars was veteran MGM character actor and comedian Frank Morgan. (See Frank Morgan.) He was joined in November by former Ziegfeld star Fanny Brice, who trotted out her Baby Snooks character for a skit on each week’s show. (See Baby Snooks.) Good News’ ratings surge opposite Major Bowes’ Original Amateur Hour on CBS combined with Bing Crosby’s Kraft Music Hall audience increase of 35% - thanks in part to Good News’ strong lead-in - was enough to push Crosby into Thursday’s top spot over Bowes and into fourth place among the season’s highest rated programs. It was the first of Crosby’s three consecutive Thursday wins and the third of his seven Top Ten seasons.
The General’s Battle Plan. Good News was General Foods’ second new, hour-long variety show on Thursday night, just before Friday’s traditional grocery shopping. The company also picked up sponsorship of Kate Smith’s variety hour on CBS at 8:00, beginning a ten year association with the singer. Smith’s first season for Swansdown Cake Flour and Calumet Baking Powder was a struggle against Rudy Vallee on NBC, but it paved her way to four consecutive Top 20 finishes beginning the following year.
Not content with just two hours of Thursday prime time, General Foods moved Phillips H. Lord's We The People from Blue to CBS at 7:30 in 1937. It also installed a new host, Mutual newscaster Gabriel Heatter, who would remain with the show until 1942. We The People achieved the Top 50 ranks in only six of its 14 seasons on the air, but the half hour human interest mix remained on CBS at various times for twelve years and spent another two on NBC - all under the sponsorship of General Foods or Gulf Oil.
The Little Theater’s Big Audience. Friday’s top program was the Chicago based, low budgeted First Nighter which had been radio’s top rated dramatic series for three seasons before Lux Radio Theater came along. Longtime sponsor Campana defied programming logic when it shifted the “Little Theater Off Times Square” from NBC to CBS and a new Friday night timeslot in the middle of the 1936-37 season, then back again to NBC and its original Friday time in the heart of the 1937-38 season. Normally such mid-season dial twisting came at a high cost to ratings.
That wasn’t the case with First Nighter. In a real test of listener loyalty, the program didn’t budge a full point in its two uprootings. It actually gained ground in its second transplant and finished 1937-38 with its sixth season in the Annual Top 20. (See Friday's All Time Top Ten.)
Opposites Attract Listeners. Blue made an unusual bid for the early evening audience with two totally different Multiple Run quarter hour shows scheduled back to back three times a week. Easy Aces and Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons were Network Radio’s odd couple. Odder still, both programs were sponsored for many seasons by brands marketed by American Home Products/Whitehall Pharmacal.
Easy Aces was in the second of its seven year run on Blue at 7:00 for Anacin. The program could be considered Burns & Allen for the Mensa set. Former Kansas City newspaperman Goodman Ace wrote the show and, like George Burns, played straight man for his ditzy wife Jane. The Chicago based studio show was simply 15 minutes of conversation between the couple and a few friends - spiked by Jane’s frequent and sometimes memorable malapropisms and Goodman‘s clever puns. “Time wounds all heels,” was just one of her many classics. Although Easy Aces never received double digit ratings or cracked a season’s Top 50 until it became a half hour sitcom eleven years later, its small audience was appreciative and loyal. (See Easy Aces.)
Blue followed Ace’s urbane comedy at 7:15 with Mr. Keen, Frank & Anne Hummert’s major contribution to crime melodrama sponsored by Bisodol indigestion tablets. Veteran radio actor Bennett Kilpack, 54, was cast as “the kindly old investigator,” a role he would hold for the next 13 years. As much as critics praised Easy Aces, they panned Mr. Keen for its soap opera structure and simplicity of plots. Like Easy Aces, Mr. Keen wouldn't become a Top 50 show until it was reformatted into a half-hour program a decade later. Nevertheless, the two dissimilar Multiple Runs remained paired on Blue for five seasons.
Not Ready For Prime Time…Yet. Buried in the Multiple Run numbers, Arthur Godfrey was given his first solo prime time shot in February for 13 weeks on CBS at 7:15 Tuesdays and Thursdays. Still a local radio personality on WJSV in Washington, Godfrey’s 3.4 rating was a fraction of what his breakthrough show Talent Scouts would score ten years later. (See Arthur Godfrey.)
The Bronx Bombers & Brown Bomber. New York’s “subway” World Series between the defending champion Yankees against their cross-town rival Giants was given full coverage by all four networks plus New York independent stations WHN, WINS and WNEW. Both teams were loaded with future Hall of Fame players - Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, Bill Dickey, Lefty Gomez, Red Ruffing and Tony Lazzeri for manager Joe McCarthy’s Yankees and the Giants’ Mel Ott, Carl Hubbell, Travis Jackson and player/manager Bill Terry. The five game series won by the Yankees scored a 25.3 average rating - second only in October to Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy’s month leading 26.4.
But the season’s ratings winner in sports involved just two men - Heavyweight Champion Joe Louis and the former champion who had knocked him out two years earlier, Max Schmeling. It was a grudge match of the first order - Schmeling representing Nazi Germany and Louis symbolizing American Democracy. Their June 22nd rematch was broadcast on both NBC and Blue - all two minutes and four seconds of it. Louis pummeled Schmeling in the first round. Crossley’s CAB survey the following day deter-mined that the bout had a knockout 63.6 rating. (See Ratings Rulers; Crossley, Hooper & Nielsen.)
(1) General Foods had the greatest ratings success in 1937-38 that any Network Radio sponsor would ever achieve. It controlled three of the season’s eleven highest rated programs and seven of the Top 50. (See Sponsor Sweepstakes.)
(2) All three were all outspent in Network Radio by a sponsor with no programs in the Top 50. Procter & Gamble spent most of its radio budget - some $4.0 Million in 1937 - on over a half-dozen weekday soap operas.
(3) Unlike CBS, NBC never owned a radio station in Los Angeles - depending instead on Earl C. Anthony's powerful KFI - 50,000 watts at 640 kc - as its affiliate in the film capital.
(4) Eddie Cantor was the logical choice as first President of AFRA - later known as the American Federation of Television And Radio Artists. He had previously served as President of the Screen Actors Guild from 1933 to 1935.
(5) Orson Welles left The Shadow and took his troupe to CBS for the 1938-39 season where his Mercury Theater ofThe Air would make headlines with its War of The Worlds broadcast. Agnes Moorhead also originated another famous character named Lane for Network Radio - “Ace girl reporter Lois Lane” for Mutual’s Adventures of Superman. Both radio roles - which often involved as much screaming as dialogue - kept the actress busy before her distinguished film career that resulted in four Oscar nominations.
Network Radio's Top 50 Programs - 1937-38
Clark-Hooper Radio Advertisement Reports, Sep-Dec, 1937
& C.E. Hooper Monthly Network Reports Jan-Jun, 1938
Total Programs Rated 6-11 PM: 96 Programs Rated 13 Weeks & Ranked: 94.
24,500,000 Radio Homes 74.0% Coverage of US One Rating Point = 245,000 Homes
1 N Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy 32.1 Standard/Chase & Sanborn Sun 8:00 60 NBC
2 1 Jack Benny Program 29.5 General Foods/Jello Sun 7:00 30 NBC
3 4 Lux Radio Theater 23.4 Lever Brothers/Lux Soap Mon 9:00 60 CBS
4 7 Bing Crosby’s Kraft Music Hall 22.7 Kraft Cheese Thu 10:00 60 NBC
5 2 Eddie Cantor Show 21.6 Texaco Petroleum Wed 8:30 30 CBS
6t 6 Fred Allen’s Town Hall Tonight 19.4 Bristol Myers Wed 9:00 60 NBC
6t 3 Major Bowes Original Amateur Hour 19.4 Chrysler Corp. Thu 9:00 60 CBS
8 5 Burns & Allen 19.2 General Foods Mon 8:00 30 NBC
9 8 Rudy Vallee Show 18.6 Standard Brands/Fleischmann Yeast Thu 8:00 60 NBC
10 10 Al Jolson Show 18.1 Lever Brothers/Lifebuoy Soap Tue 8:30 30 CBS
11 N Good News of 1938 16.6 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 9:00 60 NBC
12 9 Phil Baker’s Gulf Headliners 16.4 Gulf Oil Sun 7:30 30 CBS
13 16 One Man’s Family 15.3 Standard Brands/Tenderleaf Wed 8:00 30 NBC
14 14 First Nighter 15.1 Campana Sales/Italian Balm Fri 9:30 30 NBC (1)
15 31 Al Pearce Gang 14.8 Ford Motors Tue 9:00 30 CBS
16t 20 Gangbusters 14.7 Colgate Palmolive Peet Wed 10:00 30 CBS
16t 12 Hollywood Hotel 14.7 Campbell Soup Fri 9:00 60 CBS
18t N Big Town 13.7 Lever Brothers Tue 8:00 30 CBS
18t 15 Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal 13.7 Jergens Lotion Sun 9:30 15 Blue
20 21 Fibber McGee & Molly 13.4 Johnson Wax Tue 9:30 30 NBC (2)
21t 11 Amos & Andy 13.3 Campbell Soup M-F 7:00 15 NBC (3)
21t 25 Robert Ripley’s Believe It Or Not 13.3 General Foods Tue 10:00 30 NBC (4)
23 30 Jack Oakie’s College 13.1 RJ Reynolds/Camel Tue 9:30 30 CBS
24 N Mardi Gras/Lanny Ross 12.8 Packard Autos Tue 9:30 30 NBC
25 N Dick Powell Show 12.5 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Wed 10:00 60 NBC
26t N Jack Haley Show 12.4 General Foods Sat 8:30 30 NBC
26t 42 Professor Quiz/Craig Earl 12.4 Nash Kelvinator Refrigerators Sat 9:00 30 CBS
26t 24 Your Hit Parade 12.4 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sat 10:00 45 CBS
29 26 Lowell Thomas News 11.3 Sun Oil M-F 6:45 15 Blue
30 28 Vox Pop 11.1 Sterling Drug/Molle Shaving Cream Tue 9:00 30 NBC
31t 43 Ben Bernie Show 10.9 US Rubber Wed 8:30 30 CBS
31t N Kay Kyser College of Musical Knowledge 10.9 American Tobacco Wed 10:00 60 NBC
33t N Benny Goodman’s Swing School 10.7 RJ Reynolds/Camel Tue 9:30 30 CBS (5)
33t N Hollywood Playhouse 10.7 Andrew Jergens/Woodbury Soap Sun 9:00 30 Blue
35t 17 Boake Carter News 10.6 Philco Radios MWF 7:45 15 CBS
35t 17 Your Hit Parade 10.6 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Wed 10:00 60 NBC
37 22 Pick & Pat’s Model Minstrels 10.3 US Tobacco/Model Mon 8:30 30 CBS
38t 73 Manhattan Merry Go Round 9.8 Sterling Drug/Dr Lyons Tooth Powder Sun 9:00 30 NBC
38t 27 Maxwell House Showboat 10.3 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 9:00 60 NBC
38t 32 Uncle Ezra’s Radio Station 9.8 Miles Laboratories/Alka Seltzer MWF 7:15 15 NBC (6)
41 N Interesting Neighbors/Jerry Belcher 9.7 Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:30 30 NBC (7)
42 46 Voice of Firestone 9.5 Firestone Tires Mon 8:30 30 NBC
43 27 Wayne King Orchestra 9.4 Lady Esther Cosmetics Mon 10:00 30 CBS
44 45 Court of Human Relations 9.3 True Story Magazine Fri 9:30 30 NBC
45 N Paul Whiteman Show 9.1 Liggett & Myers/Chesterfield Fri 8:30 30 CBS
46t 57 National Barn Dance 9.0 Miles Laboratories/Alka Seltzer Sat 9:00 60 Blue
46t 38 Russ Morgan Orchestra 9.0 Philip Morris Cigarettes Tue 8:00 30 NBC
48t N Hour of Charm/Phil Spitalny 8.8 General Electric Mon 9:00 30 NBC (8)
48t 34 Lum & Abner 8.8 Horlick Malted Milk MWF 7:30 15 Blue (9)
50 34 Kate Smith Hour 8.7 General Foods/Calumet & Swansdown Thu 8:00 60 CBS
(1) First Nighter Sep-Dec Campana Balm Fri 9:30 30 CBS
(2) Fibber McGee & Molly Sep-Mar Johnson Wax Mon 9:00 30 NBC
(3) Amos & Andy Sep-Dec Pepsodent Toothpaste M-F 7:00 15 NBC
(4) Robert Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Oct-Apr General Foods Sat 8:00 30 NBC
(5) Benny Goodman’s Swing School Jan-Mar RJ Reynolds Tue 10:00 30 CBS
(6) Uncle Ezra’s Radio Station Sep-Dec Miles Laboratories MWF 7:00 15 Blue
(7) Interesting Neighbors Sep-Dec Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:45 15 NBC
(8) Hour of Charm Sep-Mar General Electric Mon 9:30 30 NBC
(9) Lum & Abner Sep-Nov Horlick Malted Milk M-F 7:30 15 Blue
This post is in part abridged from Network Radio Ratings, 1932-1953.
Copyright © 2012 & 2019, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
The 1937-38 Season
6th In A Series
Bergen Throws His Voice & Millions Catch It. Standard Brands’ Chase & Sanborn Coffee installed ventriloquist Edgar Bergen & his Charlie McCarthy into the 8:00 Sunday night slot on NBC to replace its short lived Do Want To Be An Actor? The prime time period once again proved to be prime radio real estate for Bergen just as it had been for Eddie Cantor and Major Bowes before him. Bergen tripled Do You Want To Be An Actor’s ratings and began a string of 16 consecutive seasons among the Annual Top Ten - never finishing below seventh place. (See First Season Phenoms on this site.)
The new Chase & Sanborn Hour was designed to be the cream of radio variety and featured an all-star cast to support Bergen and his wooden ward. Radio veteran Don Ameche, now a leading man in four 20th Century Fox movies a year, was the show’s host. Film star Dorothy Lamour provided its glamour and sang. Legendary comedian W.C. Fields became Charlie’s nemesis in an intramural feud of barbs early in the show’s run. The new show was also well stocked with top guest stars every week. But the real attraction remained Bergen and the irreverent, horny little adolescent dummy perched on his lap.
Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy pushed Hooper’s numbers to the Crossley-like heights of the early 30s. The highest Hooperatings ever recorded for a weekly series were scored during the debut season of The Chase & Sanborn Hour on NBC in 1937-38. On Sunday, January 16th the soft-spoken ventriloquist and his brash Charlie scored a 41.1. The following month on February 6th the Bergen & McCarthy rating rose to a 41.2. It “fell off” to a 40.9 on March 6th. And these numbers were generated after the notorious "Mae West incident" in December when the program was denounced in the press and pulpits across the country which called for a boycott of the show. (See Bergen, McCarthy And Adam & Eve.)
Radio Bags Grocery Money. Three giant consumer products manufacturers - General Foods, Standard Brands and Lever Brothers - each sponsored two of the season’s Top Ten programs. Standard had Bergen & McCarthy’s top rated Chase & Sanborn Hour plus Rudy Vallee’s variety hour in ninth place. General Foods’ Jello sponsored Jack Benny’s second place program and Grape Nuts had Burns & Allen who finished the season in eighth. Lever’s Lux Radio Theater rated third and Al Jolson hosted Lifebuoy Soap’s tenth place show. (1)
During the first six months of 1937, the three conglomerates reported spending a combined $3.5 Million in radio. Each spent more on radio than in national magazine advertising - an inconceivable thought less than a decade earlier. (2)
The Networks Meet At Sunset. With combined network revenues approaching a total of $340 Million in the five years since 1932, the chains had plenty of cash to finance new production facilities in Hollywood where most of the top rated prime time shows now originated. NBC and CBS both broke ground on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood just a few blocks from each other which made it handy in future years for actors and musicians rushing between shows in the rivals’ studios. CBS was first with its new $1.75 Million facility for KNX and network use at Sunset & Gower in April, 1937. Not to be outdone, NBC followed with its own $2.0 Million West Coast headquarters at Sunset & Vine six months later. (3)
Act One In Havana. Representatives from the United States, Canada, Mexico and Cuba met in Havana on November 1st to convene the North American Regional Broadcasting Conference. Their purpose was to assign radio frequency channels to each country in an effort to eliminate interference. The resulting Havana Act took four years to enact but affected the frequencies of over 800 stations in the United States. (See The March of Change.)
Going AFRA The Money. The networks were flush with money and the big name stars were making thousands per broadcast. Yet, not everyone involved was getting rich. The studio talent - the men and women who worked the shows as announcers and actors, often without name credit - received as little as $2.50 a program or as much as $25 a week, ($423 in today's money), which often included days of rehearsal. Led by comedian and social activist Eddie Cantor, radio performers banded together and formed the American Federation of Radio Artists six weeks before the 1937-38 season began. Wage negotiations began in 1938 resulting in a minimum talent fee per program of $25.
The Little Network That Could. Mutual, now with its own Hollywood connection at Don Lee‘s KHJ, continued to sign affiliates throughout the country. The network finished 1937 with 80 stations, more than doubling its size in a year. Mutual still didn’t have much entertainment programming to offer its affiliates but even its most popular programs suffered in ratings popularity because of a polling technicality coupled with the regional system by which the network was sold to many of its advertisers.
To meet Hooper reporting standards, a program had to attain a minimum total of 600 homes reported listening and sponsored by an individual advertiser in the 30 cities that Hooper surveyed during a rating period. When the same program was sold to different sponsors from city to city, it had little chance of making a dent in the ratings.
Mutual was at a further disadvantage in the 30 major markets surveyed because except for New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, Mutual affiliates were seldom the powerful and highly promoted stations that carried NBC, CBS or Blue programming. To make up the difference in coverage Mutual pursued more affiliates by reaching into smaller cities that its competitors dismissed. Because these less populated markets were ignored by the rating services, Mutual again received short shrift in the rating books.
In The Shadow of Prime Time. Mutual introduced Lamont Cranston as The Shadow with his ability to, “…cloud men‘s minds so they cannot see him”, at 5:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 26, 1937. It would remain a Sunday afternoon feature on Mutual for the next 15 years and became one of the most popular mystery melodramas to promise a weekly scare for anyone willing to suspend disbelief for half an hour. Twenty-two year old Orson Welles was first to play "the wealthy man about town" and his fellow actors from Welles’ off-Broadway Mercury Players contributed supporting roles, most notably Agnes Moorhead, 36, who portrayed, “...Cranston’s constant companion, the lovely Margo Lane”. (4)
Because of its afternoon timeslot and the ratings systems’ sporadic reporting of Mutual programming, The Shadow never received the same attention as prime time programs on the three established networks. It didn’t appear in the Hooperatings until four years after its debut on Mutual. Had The Shadow been grouped with prime time competition, it would have ranked in the season’s Top 50 programs three times. More surprisingly, it would have been among Sunday’s Top Ten only twice - 1942-43, (7th), and 1943-44, (9th). (See The Shadow Nos.)
The Season of BIG Bands. Over 40% of the season’s prime time programs were based in music of all varieties. Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey brought swing to network radio with their own series. They were joined by the show bands of Paul Whiteman, Ozzie Nelson, Ben Bernie and Kay Kyser. The “sweet” bands of Wayne King and Russ Morgan got the most exposure. Morgan’s “wah-wah” trombone and orchestra headlined The Camel Caravan on both CBS and NBC every week while King was heard three times a week until January, then twice a week with a prime time Lady Esther Serenades on both networks. (See The Waltz King.)
But the big band that grabbed the most headlines was really big - 92 musicians. The NBC Symphony debuted in November and its maestro, 70 year old Arturo Toscanini, made his first appearance on Christmas Eve. The Symphony’s 90 minute concerts on Saturday nights at 10:00 were broadcast simultaneously on both the NBC and Blue networks for three months. The critically acclaimed orchestra remained on NBC for the rest of the season, then moved to co-owned Blue - RCA’s “cultural” network - for the next five years of its 17 season run before returning to NBC.
I Witness News. NBC hired Max Jordan, 39, as Network Radio’s first full time European correspondent in 1934, predating CBS’s hiring of the more famous Edward R. Murrow and William L. Shirer by three years. As a reporter for Hearst’s International News Service, the multi-lingual Jordan had free-lanced several stories for NBC since 1931. He went to work immediately to negotiate contracts that would assure NBC of facilities to short wave his reports to New York from most anywhere on the continent. Jordan’s efforts paid their first big dividend on March 12, 1938, when he was first to report directly from Vienna the news of Germany’s annexation of Austria. CBS had to settle for Shirer’s reports of the event the following day from London.
Lux Looms Larger. There was no stopping Lux Radio Theater in its march to becoming Monday’s all-time ratings champ for Lever Brothers and CBS. During the 1937-38 season alone, Lux presented dozens of movie greats in its radio adaptations of box office hits. The season’s weekly parade of stars included Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck, Gary Cooper, Joan Crawford, Henry Fonda, Olivia deHavilland, Cary Grant, Claudette Colbert, Errol Flynn and Bing Crosby. Throughout the remainder of Network Radio’s Golden Age no competing program in the 9:00 p.m. Monday timeslot would muster even half of Lux Radio Theater’s ratings. It proved to be an unmatched dominance. (See Lux…Presents Hollywood!)
Spitalny’s Charming Competitors. One of the few ratings “successes” against the Lux Hollywood extravaganza at 9:00 was veteran conductor Phil Spitalny’s all girl orchestra and its (30 minute) Hour of Charm. The 22 piece ensemble of female musicians and singers - whose highly accomplished members were identified only by their first names - featured Evelyn (Klein) and her “Magic Violin”. Klein, who married Spitalny in 1945, was both very talented and beautiful.
Despite their musicianship displayed in selections that ranged from standards to symphonic, the female orchestra was considered a novelty act which resulted movie appearances plus a ten year sponsorship by General Electric on NBC. Surprisingly, Hour of Charm’s 1937-38 season competing against the unbeatable Lux Radio Theater resulted in its only Top 50 season. (See The Hour of Charm.)
No Thanks, We’ll Walk. Fortunately for George Burns and Gracie Allen, the new CBS and NBC studios in Hollywood were just a few blocks apart on Sunset Boulevard. They’d make the trip six times. After five years on the CBS Wednesday schedule, Burns & Allen signed with General Foods for the 1937-38 season and moved to NBC on Monday against the feint competition of Horace Heidt’s Brigadiers orchestra. The couple’s network hopping lost 10% of their audience but they remained in the season’s Top Ten for one last time. They returned to CBS the next season.
Molly’s Delicate Condition. Jim Jordan and his writer/partner Don Quinn were dealt a problem in November even greater than being scheduled against Monday’s giant, Lux Radio Theater. To their credit, Fibber McGee & Molly had almost regained the momentum that was quashed when it was pitted against Lux for over a year. But early into the 1937-38 season, Marian Jordan took sick - very sick.
Jim and Marian had been running hard since spring when they filmed their first movie, This Way Please. The pressures of their weekly broadcasts, frequent personal appearance commitments and raising two youngsters got to Marian and forced her off the air and into a hospital. The decision was made that Jim would carry the show by himself until she returned. It would be a longer time than he or Quinn imagined.
Fibber McGee & Molly was moved to its new Tuesday timeslot in the spring and Marian managed a brief appearance on the show of June 28, 1938, but it would be almost a year until she returned permanently. Meanwhile, it was up to her husband and their trusted collaborator to keep the program going. (See Fibber McGee Minus Molly.)
Tinsletown To Big Town. Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor became the first major motion picture stars to commit to continuing roles in a dramatic series. Robinson, as “fighting” editor Steve Wilson of The Illustrated Press, and Trevor as his star reporter, Lorelei Kilbourne, immediately delivered the newcomer newspaper drama to the season’s Top 20. Trevor left the show after two seasons and Robinson stayed for five, yet Big Town scored an eventual total of 13 Top 50 seasons. (See Big Big Town.)
The Gang’s All Here. It was billed as Al Pearce’s Gang and it was exactly that. Imported by CBS from affiliate KFRC/San Francisco, Ford Motors slotted Pearce and his troupe of supporting players on Wednesday night midway in the previous season. Pearce was ringmaster of the group that included some of radio’s most talent comic voices: Arthur Q. Bryan, Morey Amsterdam, Mel Blanc, Harry Stewart as Scandinavian accented Yogi Yorgenson, and motor-mouthed Arlene Harris who performed one-way telephone conver-sations with her silent friend, Maisie. But the star was Pearce who did a regular turn as inept door-to-door salesman Elmer Blurt, whose under-the-breath wish after knocking on doors was, “Nobody’s home, Ah hope, Ah hope, Ah hope.” The line became national catch phrase.
By the 1937-38 season, Al Pearce’s Gang had taken root and scored a 35% increase in its second year ratings - its first and only trip to the Top 15. Then, unlike most radio stars, Pearce made four movies after his prime time glory years and six trips to the Top 50. However, the films were all “quickie” B films produced by Republic Pictures, destined for second billing in double feature houses.
It’s A Matter of Times... “I’ll mow ya down!” Charlie McCarthy’s weekly threat to W.C. Fields had became a national catch phrase by the fall of 1937. Texaco and CBS saw Edgar Bergen’s Sunday night ratings reaper coming and pulled Eddie Cantor out of its path. The comedian was moved from opposite Sunday’s Chase & Sanborn Hour - which, ironically, was once his own - and into the safe Wednesday timeslot vacated by Burns & Allen who had jumped to NBC for the season. Cantor returned the favor by producing Wednesday’s most popular program with the singing support of his young proteges, Dianna Durbin and Bobby Breen. (See The 1936-37 Season.)
...And A Matter of Dimes. The move to Wednesday kept Eddie Cantor in the season’s Top Five and helped him launch one of the nation’s most famous charity drives. The comedian and AFRA President was an active supporter of Franklin Roosevelt, a wheelchair bound victim of what had been diagnosed in 1921 as paralytic poliomyelitis, more commonly known as polio. Acting on the President’s request, Cantor - with the help of show business luminaries - spearheaded the first fund raising drive for The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. Cantor is credited with naming it The March of Dimes - its similarity to The March of Time intended. He introduced it in late January on a special broadcast carried by all four networks.. The effort became the most successful charity drive of the pre-war years.
The Ol’ Maestro & The Ol’ Professor. Bandleaders Ben Bernie and Kay Kyser were both powerful radio personalities. They were 14 years apart in age when their Network Radio paths crossed on Wednesday night in 1938 and the age difference was obvious.
Bernie, “The Ol’ Maestro,” was 46. Despite starring in two movies with Walter Winchell in 1937, his radio career was on its downside after two disastrous seasons on Blue. His CBS series for U.S. Rubber was to have been his comeback show. His broadcasts were informal, relaxed and loose, with Bernie talking the lyrics of songs while his band, (aka The Lads), accompanied him in dated standards and novelties - like his own compositions, Sweet Georgia Brown and Who’s Your Little Whoosis?
Kyser, 32, took on a completely opposite persona as “The Ol’ Professor” - costumed in cap and gown as the frenetic, fast talking “dean” of the musical comedy quiz, The College of Musical Knowledge. American Tobacco had replaced its Wednesday edition of Your Hit Parade on NBC in December with singing movie star Dick Powell for 13 weeks while it honed Kyser’s College for the big time on Mutual. By April Kyser and his show band presented a tightly formatted NBC hour of audience participation, comedy and music.
Bernie and Kyser both finished the season with a 10.9 average rating, tied for 31st place. It would be Ben Bernie’s last Top 50 season and the first of nine for Kay Kyser, which included two years in the Top Ten.
A Better Barbour Poll Position. One of the first programs to move from NBC’s West Coast production headquarters at KPO/San Francisco to its new facilities in Hollywood was the popular Carleton E. Morse continuing drama, One Man's Family. The program was transferred to Hollywood in October, before NBC’s new studios had been finished. The Barbour Family obviously liked their new neighborhood in Southern California - their rating average increased by nearly 20%. It was the first of four seasons that One Man’s Family was NBC’s most popular dramatic show.
Good News For Bing, But Bad For Bowes. General Foods’ Maxwell House Coffee scuttled the aging Showboat in November despite the return of host Charlie Winninger as its host, Captain Henry, who went down with his ship. The food conglomerate updated its timeslot’s theme from minstrel to movies with MGM’s Good News of 1938 - a blatant promotional vehicle for MGM films but a ratings winner. It scored a fast 66% jump in audience over the Showboat troupe. (See Good News.)
Constant in the Good News cast among its rotating hosts and visiting stars was veteran MGM character actor and comedian Frank Morgan. (See Frank Morgan.) He was joined in November by former Ziegfeld star Fanny Brice, who trotted out her Baby Snooks character for a skit on each week’s show. (See Baby Snooks.) Good News’ ratings surge opposite Major Bowes’ Original Amateur Hour on CBS combined with Bing Crosby’s Kraft Music Hall audience increase of 35% - thanks in part to Good News’ strong lead-in - was enough to push Crosby into Thursday’s top spot over Bowes and into fourth place among the season’s highest rated programs. It was the first of Crosby’s three consecutive Thursday wins and the third of his seven Top Ten seasons.
The General’s Battle Plan. Good News was General Foods’ second new, hour-long variety show on Thursday night, just before Friday’s traditional grocery shopping. The company also picked up sponsorship of Kate Smith’s variety hour on CBS at 8:00, beginning a ten year association with the singer. Smith’s first season for Swansdown Cake Flour and Calumet Baking Powder was a struggle against Rudy Vallee on NBC, but it paved her way to four consecutive Top 20 finishes beginning the following year.
Not content with just two hours of Thursday prime time, General Foods moved Phillips H. Lord's We The People from Blue to CBS at 7:30 in 1937. It also installed a new host, Mutual newscaster Gabriel Heatter, who would remain with the show until 1942. We The People achieved the Top 50 ranks in only six of its 14 seasons on the air, but the half hour human interest mix remained on CBS at various times for twelve years and spent another two on NBC - all under the sponsorship of General Foods or Gulf Oil.
The Little Theater’s Big Audience. Friday’s top program was the Chicago based, low budgeted First Nighter which had been radio’s top rated dramatic series for three seasons before Lux Radio Theater came along. Longtime sponsor Campana defied programming logic when it shifted the “Little Theater Off Times Square” from NBC to CBS and a new Friday night timeslot in the middle of the 1936-37 season, then back again to NBC and its original Friday time in the heart of the 1937-38 season. Normally such mid-season dial twisting came at a high cost to ratings.
That wasn’t the case with First Nighter. In a real test of listener loyalty, the program didn’t budge a full point in its two uprootings. It actually gained ground in its second transplant and finished 1937-38 with its sixth season in the Annual Top 20. (See Friday's All Time Top Ten.)
Opposites Attract Listeners. Blue made an unusual bid for the early evening audience with two totally different Multiple Run quarter hour shows scheduled back to back three times a week. Easy Aces and Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons were Network Radio’s odd couple. Odder still, both programs were sponsored for many seasons by brands marketed by American Home Products/Whitehall Pharmacal.
Easy Aces was in the second of its seven year run on Blue at 7:00 for Anacin. The program could be considered Burns & Allen for the Mensa set. Former Kansas City newspaperman Goodman Ace wrote the show and, like George Burns, played straight man for his ditzy wife Jane. The Chicago based studio show was simply 15 minutes of conversation between the couple and a few friends - spiked by Jane’s frequent and sometimes memorable malapropisms and Goodman‘s clever puns. “Time wounds all heels,” was just one of her many classics. Although Easy Aces never received double digit ratings or cracked a season’s Top 50 until it became a half hour sitcom eleven years later, its small audience was appreciative and loyal. (See Easy Aces.)
Blue followed Ace’s urbane comedy at 7:15 with Mr. Keen, Frank & Anne Hummert’s major contribution to crime melodrama sponsored by Bisodol indigestion tablets. Veteran radio actor Bennett Kilpack, 54, was cast as “the kindly old investigator,” a role he would hold for the next 13 years. As much as critics praised Easy Aces, they panned Mr. Keen for its soap opera structure and simplicity of plots. Like Easy Aces, Mr. Keen wouldn't become a Top 50 show until it was reformatted into a half-hour program a decade later. Nevertheless, the two dissimilar Multiple Runs remained paired on Blue for five seasons.
Not Ready For Prime Time…Yet. Buried in the Multiple Run numbers, Arthur Godfrey was given his first solo prime time shot in February for 13 weeks on CBS at 7:15 Tuesdays and Thursdays. Still a local radio personality on WJSV in Washington, Godfrey’s 3.4 rating was a fraction of what his breakthrough show Talent Scouts would score ten years later. (See Arthur Godfrey.)
The Bronx Bombers & Brown Bomber. New York’s “subway” World Series between the defending champion Yankees against their cross-town rival Giants was given full coverage by all four networks plus New York independent stations WHN, WINS and WNEW. Both teams were loaded with future Hall of Fame players - Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, Bill Dickey, Lefty Gomez, Red Ruffing and Tony Lazzeri for manager Joe McCarthy’s Yankees and the Giants’ Mel Ott, Carl Hubbell, Travis Jackson and player/manager Bill Terry. The five game series won by the Yankees scored a 25.3 average rating - second only in October to Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy’s month leading 26.4.
But the season’s ratings winner in sports involved just two men - Heavyweight Champion Joe Louis and the former champion who had knocked him out two years earlier, Max Schmeling. It was a grudge match of the first order - Schmeling representing Nazi Germany and Louis symbolizing American Democracy. Their June 22nd rematch was broadcast on both NBC and Blue - all two minutes and four seconds of it. Louis pummeled Schmeling in the first round. Crossley’s CAB survey the following day deter-mined that the bout had a knockout 63.6 rating. (See Ratings Rulers; Crossley, Hooper & Nielsen.)
(1) General Foods had the greatest ratings success in 1937-38 that any Network Radio sponsor would ever achieve. It controlled three of the season’s eleven highest rated programs and seven of the Top 50. (See Sponsor Sweepstakes.)
(2) All three were all outspent in Network Radio by a sponsor with no programs in the Top 50. Procter & Gamble spent most of its radio budget - some $4.0 Million in 1937 - on over a half-dozen weekday soap operas.
(3) Unlike CBS, NBC never owned a radio station in Los Angeles - depending instead on Earl C. Anthony's powerful KFI - 50,000 watts at 640 kc - as its affiliate in the film capital.
(4) Eddie Cantor was the logical choice as first President of AFRA - later known as the American Federation of Television And Radio Artists. He had previously served as President of the Screen Actors Guild from 1933 to 1935.
(5) Orson Welles left The Shadow and took his troupe to CBS for the 1938-39 season where his Mercury Theater ofThe Air would make headlines with its War of The Worlds broadcast. Agnes Moorhead also originated another famous character named Lane for Network Radio - “Ace girl reporter Lois Lane” for Mutual’s Adventures of Superman. Both radio roles - which often involved as much screaming as dialogue - kept the actress busy before her distinguished film career that resulted in four Oscar nominations.
Network Radio's Top 50 Programs - 1937-38
Clark-Hooper Radio Advertisement Reports, Sep-Dec, 1937
& C.E. Hooper Monthly Network Reports Jan-Jun, 1938
Total Programs Rated 6-11 PM: 96 Programs Rated 13 Weeks & Ranked: 94.
24,500,000 Radio Homes 74.0% Coverage of US One Rating Point = 245,000 Homes
1 N Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy 32.1 Standard/Chase & Sanborn Sun 8:00 60 NBC
2 1 Jack Benny Program 29.5 General Foods/Jello Sun 7:00 30 NBC
3 4 Lux Radio Theater 23.4 Lever Brothers/Lux Soap Mon 9:00 60 CBS
4 7 Bing Crosby’s Kraft Music Hall 22.7 Kraft Cheese Thu 10:00 60 NBC
5 2 Eddie Cantor Show 21.6 Texaco Petroleum Wed 8:30 30 CBS
6t 6 Fred Allen’s Town Hall Tonight 19.4 Bristol Myers Wed 9:00 60 NBC
6t 3 Major Bowes Original Amateur Hour 19.4 Chrysler Corp. Thu 9:00 60 CBS
8 5 Burns & Allen 19.2 General Foods Mon 8:00 30 NBC
9 8 Rudy Vallee Show 18.6 Standard Brands/Fleischmann Yeast Thu 8:00 60 NBC
10 10 Al Jolson Show 18.1 Lever Brothers/Lifebuoy Soap Tue 8:30 30 CBS
11 N Good News of 1938 16.6 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 9:00 60 NBC
12 9 Phil Baker’s Gulf Headliners 16.4 Gulf Oil Sun 7:30 30 CBS
13 16 One Man’s Family 15.3 Standard Brands/Tenderleaf Wed 8:00 30 NBC
14 14 First Nighter 15.1 Campana Sales/Italian Balm Fri 9:30 30 NBC (1)
15 31 Al Pearce Gang 14.8 Ford Motors Tue 9:00 30 CBS
16t 20 Gangbusters 14.7 Colgate Palmolive Peet Wed 10:00 30 CBS
16t 12 Hollywood Hotel 14.7 Campbell Soup Fri 9:00 60 CBS
18t N Big Town 13.7 Lever Brothers Tue 8:00 30 CBS
18t 15 Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal 13.7 Jergens Lotion Sun 9:30 15 Blue
20 21 Fibber McGee & Molly 13.4 Johnson Wax Tue 9:30 30 NBC (2)
21t 11 Amos & Andy 13.3 Campbell Soup M-F 7:00 15 NBC (3)
21t 25 Robert Ripley’s Believe It Or Not 13.3 General Foods Tue 10:00 30 NBC (4)
23 30 Jack Oakie’s College 13.1 RJ Reynolds/Camel Tue 9:30 30 CBS
24 N Mardi Gras/Lanny Ross 12.8 Packard Autos Tue 9:30 30 NBC
25 N Dick Powell Show 12.5 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Wed 10:00 60 NBC
26t N Jack Haley Show 12.4 General Foods Sat 8:30 30 NBC
26t 42 Professor Quiz/Craig Earl 12.4 Nash Kelvinator Refrigerators Sat 9:00 30 CBS
26t 24 Your Hit Parade 12.4 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sat 10:00 45 CBS
29 26 Lowell Thomas News 11.3 Sun Oil M-F 6:45 15 Blue
30 28 Vox Pop 11.1 Sterling Drug/Molle Shaving Cream Tue 9:00 30 NBC
31t 43 Ben Bernie Show 10.9 US Rubber Wed 8:30 30 CBS
31t N Kay Kyser College of Musical Knowledge 10.9 American Tobacco Wed 10:00 60 NBC
33t N Benny Goodman’s Swing School 10.7 RJ Reynolds/Camel Tue 9:30 30 CBS (5)
33t N Hollywood Playhouse 10.7 Andrew Jergens/Woodbury Soap Sun 9:00 30 Blue
35t 17 Boake Carter News 10.6 Philco Radios MWF 7:45 15 CBS
35t 17 Your Hit Parade 10.6 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Wed 10:00 60 NBC
37 22 Pick & Pat’s Model Minstrels 10.3 US Tobacco/Model Mon 8:30 30 CBS
38t 73 Manhattan Merry Go Round 9.8 Sterling Drug/Dr Lyons Tooth Powder Sun 9:00 30 NBC
38t 27 Maxwell House Showboat 10.3 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 9:00 60 NBC
38t 32 Uncle Ezra’s Radio Station 9.8 Miles Laboratories/Alka Seltzer MWF 7:15 15 NBC (6)
41 N Interesting Neighbors/Jerry Belcher 9.7 Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:30 30 NBC (7)
42 46 Voice of Firestone 9.5 Firestone Tires Mon 8:30 30 NBC
43 27 Wayne King Orchestra 9.4 Lady Esther Cosmetics Mon 10:00 30 CBS
44 45 Court of Human Relations 9.3 True Story Magazine Fri 9:30 30 NBC
45 N Paul Whiteman Show 9.1 Liggett & Myers/Chesterfield Fri 8:30 30 CBS
46t 57 National Barn Dance 9.0 Miles Laboratories/Alka Seltzer Sat 9:00 60 Blue
46t 38 Russ Morgan Orchestra 9.0 Philip Morris Cigarettes Tue 8:00 30 NBC
48t N Hour of Charm/Phil Spitalny 8.8 General Electric Mon 9:00 30 NBC (8)
48t 34 Lum & Abner 8.8 Horlick Malted Milk MWF 7:30 15 Blue (9)
50 34 Kate Smith Hour 8.7 General Foods/Calumet & Swansdown Thu 8:00 60 CBS
(1) First Nighter Sep-Dec Campana Balm Fri 9:30 30 CBS
(2) Fibber McGee & Molly Sep-Mar Johnson Wax Mon 9:00 30 NBC
(3) Amos & Andy Sep-Dec Pepsodent Toothpaste M-F 7:00 15 NBC
(4) Robert Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Oct-Apr General Foods Sat 8:00 30 NBC
(5) Benny Goodman’s Swing School Jan-Mar RJ Reynolds Tue 10:00 30 CBS
(6) Uncle Ezra’s Radio Station Sep-Dec Miles Laboratories MWF 7:00 15 Blue
(7) Interesting Neighbors Sep-Dec Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:45 15 NBC
(8) Hour of Charm Sep-Mar General Electric Mon 9:30 30 NBC
(9) Lum & Abner Sep-Nov Horlick Malted Milk M-F 7:30 15 Blue
This post is in part abridged from Network Radio Ratings, 1932-1953.
Copyright © 2012 & 2019, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com