BOB HOPE WITH HIS 1946 CAST, DESI ARNAZ, BARBARA JO ALLEN & jERRY COLONNA.
Hope: He Who Laughs, Lasts
The 1946-47 Season
15th In A Series
Goin’ Fishin’ The wartime boom in business pushed broadcasting’s total revenues up steadily for two years. But the networks were virtually sold out and had little left to sell. With empty shelves, the chains slowed to their lowest revenue gain since 1938. It seemed hypocritical to broadcasters when CBS chief Bill Paley lectured November’s National Association of Broadcasters convention about the evils of over-commercialization.
It was also a difficult time for broadcasters to raise prices. Shedding the wartime handicap of paper rationing gave newspapers and magazines new life as radio’s competitors for the advertising dollar. The networks were left with just one alternative to increase revenues - attract more affiliates to increase coverage and justify higher rates. They went trolling in 1946 for stations in markets where they lacked affiliations and came back with a huge catch by the end of the following year.
The Transcription Transformation. Bing Crosby left NBC’s Kraft Music Hall in May, 1946, determined to record his programs. It didn’t take long for the Academy Award winning actor/singer to find a new sponsor with deep pockets and a new network with a deep need for his star-power. Philadelphia radio and television manufacturer Philco wanted Crosby. And Mark Woods at ABC would take Crosby on any terms - in person or on disc. (1)
Meanwhile, CBS and NBC continued to forbid the recorded production of prime time programs for broadcast, claiming a fear of losing live shows’ superior technical quality, timeliness and spontaneity. What the networks really feared was losing their monopoly of big name stars and big buck sponsors to transcribed shows distributed on disc directly to local stations - cutting the networks out of the picture altogether. But Woods had nothing to lose. Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time began its three year transcribed spin on ABC on October 16th. (2)
It was another turning point for the new ABC which was becoming a viable competitor. In the five years since its split from NBC, followed by its sale to Ed Noble in 1943, the network had grown to 217 affiliates and a 1946 income over $40 Million. (3) On a larger scale, Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time was a turning point for Network Radio. NBC and CBS would reluctantly embrace the new technology and slowly shift to pre-recorded programming. Networks and producers came to rely on the tape recording equipment provided by industry pioneer Ampex. A distributor for Ampex was a newcomer in the electronics field, Bing Crosby Enterprises.
A Network of Record. Transcribed network programming had been the backbone of the Keystone Broadcasting System since 1940. Founded by entrepreneur Michael M. Sillerman., Keystone was a flexible “network” of small market stations in rural areas Sillerman offered his stations in tailored groups to NBC and CBS advertisers for transcribed repeats of their existing programs in areas where network reception was spotty. Among Keystone’s featured programs in 1947 were General Foods’ Burns & Allen Show and Miles Laboratories’ Lum & Abner.
There's No Sin In Syndication. The fear that NBC and CBS harbored of transcribed programs cutting into their control of popular programming was heightened in April when NBC’s owned and operated Chicago outlet, WMAQ, aided the “enemy” and began airing discs of the syndicated Favorite Story starring distinguished actor Ronald Colman. Colman had signed a $150,000, contract with Frederick Ziv’s production and syndication firm. (See Fred Ziv - King of Syndication.) Ziv offered 23 different series of programs to local stations and advertisers with a roster of stars that included network favorites Wayne King, Kenny Baker, Easy Aces and Philo Vance. Over 200 stations bought Ziv shows in 1946 returning revenues of $7.5 Million.
Adding to the program options available to stations, the Lang-Worth, World, RCA-Thesaurus and Atlas transcription services all offered pre-packaged transcribed programs and scripts to stations for their sale to local advertisers. (See “By Transcription…”)
Newly licensed stations began to pop up after World War II, providing a growing market for the syndicators and more competition for network affiliates. The country’s 950 AM stations would nearly double in three years. But as it turned out, neither syndicated programming nor new competitors had immediate impact on the networks’ ratings or revenues. Network ratings held steady and the chains’ revenues increased over the next three years.
The real threat to Network Radio was found lurking in the living rooms of a mere 12,000 homes - television. That number would explode to 4 Million by 1949.
Whose Hues? Television was stalled. Licenses for 44 new stations had been issued, but the industry was on hold, waiting for an FCC landmark decision. Would the country’s video standard remain the RCA system of electronic television that could only promise color in several years? Or would it switch to the incompatible CBS part-mechanical system that produced color but would render all past equipment useless. The decision was finally handed down after 14 weeks of hearings and testimony - RCA won. Current station and set owners could breath easier.
New station construction got underway at full speed and receivers, priced from $225 to $2,500, began flying out of stores in New York, Philadelphia, Schenectady, Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles - the six cities that had operating television stations.
To provide programming, all three New York baseball teams signed home game television contracts for the 1947 season - the Giants with WNBT, the Dodgers with WCBS and the Yankees with DuMont’s WABD. Terms weren’t disclosed, but the three broadcasters promised to pay the teams more money if they could find sponsors for the games. They promptly did - Camel, Chesterfield and Old Gold cigarettes.
To Be Or Not TV. Musicians union boss James Caesar Petrillo was at it again. Members were prohibited from performing on television until a fee structure could be created. Petrillo’s edict not only kept union musicians off live television but also prevented the television showing of any motion pictures that had employed union members which severely limited the number of films that could be broadcast. The boycott remained in effect until March, 1948.
This move coincided with an earlier Petrillo ban against performances on AM/FM simulcasts unless musicians were paid double for their single performances. This overplay of his negotiating hand backfired and pushed broadcasters toward greater use of recorded music and left more union musicians out of work. (See Petrillo!)
Signs of Things To Come. Bob Hope delivered the season's Number One program for the fifth straight season - a record that wouldn't be equalled until Lux Radio Theater matched it from 1947 to 1952.
Meanwhile, NBC’s string of consecutive monthly winners sailed along. It had begun with Major Bowes’ Original Amateur Hour in June, 1935. It encompassed Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy’s two season sweeps of the late thirties, the frequent firsts by Jack Benny and extended through the glory days of Tuesday’s terrific trio - Bob Hope, Fibber McGee & Molly and Red Skelton. The streak reached a whopping 120 months - equivalent to twelve consecutive ten month seasons - when the inevitable finally happened.
Lux Radio Theater - the only hour-long program in the season’s Top 50 - produced the month’s highest ratings in June, 1947. That, in turn, began a string of 15 consecutive monthly wins for Lux and CBS - the longest since Edgar Bergen’s 22 month streak on NBC from 1937 to 1939. (See The Monthlies.)
Earlier in the season, Red Skelton set a record of a different kind. Skelton’s 15.3 in September was the lowest rating yet recorded for a month’s Number One show. It was an early glimpse of ominous things yet to come for Network Radio.
Spin & Win. Phil Harris had been with Jack Benny since 1936, serving as the comedian’s wise-cracking band leader and establishing his character as a hard drinking ladies’ man. NBC scored a the season’s biggest win with a new program when Harris walked across the hall moments after his appearances with Benny to co-star with his wife, movie musical queen Alice Faye, in their new sitcom immediately following Benny’s Number One program.
Iowa based hair products maker F.W. Fitch had drifted away from its eight year old Fitch Bandwagon format the previous season when the program’s focus shifted from a rotation of popular dance bands to comedy. Comedienne Cass Daley pushed Bandwagon’s ratings into the season’s Top 20 in 1945-46. But the idea of segueing from the top rated Benny show into its own spinoff was too hard for Fitch and NBC to resist.
The brash Harris and his beautiful, soft-spoken wife debuted late September in a sitcom format that gave each of them a solo musical number at breaks in the storyline. The couple went on to chalk up six Top 50 seasons, beginning with two years in which their program remained The Fitch Bandwagon in name only. Rexall Drugs assumed their sponsorship in 1948 and the series became The Phil Harris & Alice Faye Show.
Jack’s Back. Jack Benny boosted his ratings another 20% to his first Number One finish on Sunday in six years. After two seasons and sacrificing the ratings of Kate Smith and Adventures of The Thin Man, General Foods gave up its CBS timeslot opposite Benny and removed whatever competition those programs offered. Wrigley took the half hour on CBS for Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch which appealed more to kids than adult audiences.
Benny’s writers kept his show fresh with stunts - like his March 16th broadcast when he assembled a "Million Dollar Quartet" - singers Bing Crosby, Dick Haymes, Andy Russell and Dennis Day - for only $3,000. Russell, the only member of the quartet without a radio show of his own on which Benny could make a reciprocal appearance, was the only guest Benny had to pay. The show drew a healthy chunk of publicity and a 28.5 rating. (See Sunday At Seven.)
The Songbird’s Swan Song. Kate Smith was Network Radio’s “grand old lady” at 39. General Foods brought Smith back to Sunday’s CBS schedule opposite NBC’s Bob Burns at 6:30. It was the singer’s last attempt to recapture the popularity that had led to ten Top 50 seasons on CBS including four in the Top 20. It failed. Her half hour variety show could only manage single digit ratings. General Foods cancelled both Smith’s Sunday show and her weekday quarter hour chat programs in June, thus ending their decade-long sponsor/star relationship. She also left CBS Radio forever after 16 consecutive years with the network.
But “The Songbird of The South” was far from finished. Smith moved on to Mutual, ABC and NBC with a half dozen different talk and music shows - many of them sustaining - until 1958. Meanwhile, she enjoyed a decade of television popularity with a constant stream of daytime and prime time shows on NBC-TV and CBS-TV throughout the 1950's. (See Kate's Great Song.)
A CBS Double Dip. Hildegarde’s Raleigh Room format was moved intact from NBC’s Wednesday schedule to Sunday at 9:00 on CBS. Hildegarde’s new soup-sponsored Campbell Room suffered the season’s worst drop of a Top 50 star. The “incomparable” one lost half her NBC audience and fell from 40th to 126th place. Her show was cancelled in April with a measly 5.9 average rating for its abbreviated season. (See Busted In Rank.)
Texaco picked up another NBC orphan to replace its struggling Texaco Star Theater headlining tenor James Melton at 9:30 on CBS. Eddie Bracken was still a Paramount Films comedy star and his earlier NBC series was a Top 50 entry before Standard Brands cancelled it in May, 1945. Bracken was another ratings disappointment for CBS - losing a third of his earlier NBC audience and falling from 39th to 83rd place. Like Hildegarde, Bracken was gone from Network Radio in April. Neither returned except for an occasional guest appearance
There’s No Mystery To It. Woodbury had cancelled Hollywood Mystery Time as its follow-up to Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal the previous January. But the company kept one element of the program for a new quarter hour show on ABC at 9:15 - Louella Parsons’ Hollywood news and interviews with the stars. The syndicated columnist had no problem lining up headline guests and registered double digit ratings over her first full season as a solo. She remained in the timeslot for seven seasons, recording Top 50 finishes twice.
Ratings To Die For. Henry Ford didn’t care about ratings. Ford Motors, after all, had sponsored the Greenfield Chapel Children’s Choir and Early American Dance Music in prime time - both rating duds but pleasing to the octogenarian industrialist‘s ears. Ford had also sponsored the Detroit Symphony ‘s Sunday Evening Hour concerts on CBS for eight seasons. The program returned a respectable 9.8 average against NBC‘s powerful lineup but was dropped in 1942 when the car company cut back its consumer advertising for the duration.
Ford revived the Sunday night concerts on ABC in 1946, averaging a meager 2.1 rating against Edgar Bergen’s 22.8. Yet, on the night of March 16, 1947, the symphony’s rating shot up ten fold. The sudden surge in popularity was created by the Network Radio debut of the program’s guest soloist, Margaret Truman. President Harry Truman was fiercely proud of his 22 year old daughter’s soprano singing voice which had been met with mixed critical response. The public was obviously curious and turned out in numbers that must have even gratified Henry Ford. Unfortunately, Ford didn’t have much time to gloat. He died three weeks later..
Boo! Born on Blue in 1940 and shuffled around the CBS schedule since 1943, Inner Sanctum was given new life to scare its listeners to death when Emerson Drugs’ Bromo Seltzer cancelled Vox Pop and moved the spooky anthology into the strong CBS Monday lineup where it became a Top 20 program for three seasons. (See Inner Sanctum.)
Inner Sanctum was Suspense with its tongue in cheek. Narrator “Raymond The (G)Host” was played for macabre laughs by Raymond Edward Johnson while some of radio’s best studio actors played Sanctum’s stories for every blood-curdling chill they could wring out of the scripts and organist Lew White scored every story to its fullest melodramatic peak. (5)
Veteran radio director Himan Brown is credited with Inner Sanctum’s memorable opening and closing to Raymond’s chamber of horror stories - a loud, elongated squeaking door - while Emerson ad agency BBDO created the sponsor’s unforgettable signature, a “locomotive” that chanted, “Bromo Seltzer...Bromo Seltzer...Bromo Seltzer,” produced with engineer Gilbert Wright’s Sonovox process.
Mixing Milk With Pop. Monday had become NBC’s repository for institutional advertisers DuPont, Firestone, Bell Telephone and Carnation - all sponsoring prestige programming that drew single digit ratings against the powerful CBS schedule. Like Bell’s Telephone Hour, Carnation’s Contented Hour was never longer than 30 minutes but it had one of the longest runs in network history. Sponsored by the Pacific Coast Condensed Milk Company of Seattle, the series began in 1932 as programs of light classics featuring soloists from the concert stage and opera.
Contented Hour enjoyed two Top 50 seasons before pop music began squeezing out the classics in ratings. By the mid-thirties Contented was regularly beaten in its10:00 timeslot by the Guy Lombardo and Wayne King orchestras’ syrupy Lady Esther Serenade on CBS. In response, Contented Hour began leaning more toward standard and traditional music - then into pop when Canadian arranger/conductor Percy Faith took over the show in 1941. The conversion was completed in 1946 when singer Buddy Clark joined the cast as its singing co-host. But the competition got tougher. Lady Esther Cosmetics replaced its saccharin Serenade with Screen Guild Players. The new CBS show buried Faith and Clark in the ratings.
Nevertheless, the two made beautiful music together and apart. Clark had three hit records in the spring and summer of 1947, including the million selling Linda. Faith had several hit singles and a dozen best selling albums. Ironically, both stars of Carnation’s NBC show recorded for the same label, Columbia Records - owned by CBS.
NBC’s Block Party. NBC established Tuesday as the night for comedy much as CBS dramas dominated Mondays. The network’s comedy block had been anchored for ten years by Fibber McGee & Molly. Jim and Marian Jordan celebrated their 500th broadcast as Wistful Vista’s leading citizens in February. Bob Hope joined the NBC block in 1938 and Red Skelton came along in 1941. With the additions of A Date With Judy in 1944 and Amos & Andy a year later, NBC had a solid lock on two and a half consecutive hours of Tuesday prime time. It would take another four seasons for CBS to catch up.
My Time Was Your Time. At 45, Rudy Vallee’s time had passed. His Top Ten ratings of the thirties and Top 20's of the early forties had steadily sunk since he returned from Coast Guard duty in 1944. Nevertheless, Philip Morris cancelled handsome 27 year old crooner Johnny Desmond in 1946 and moved Vallee into its vacant Tuesday 8:00 p.m. timeslot on NBC.
Unlike Vallee’s earlier days when his program was known for introducing newcomers to radio, his continuing co-star on this show was 50 year old Ruth Etting, another voice from the past looking for a comeback. Their effort was met with listener apathy, losing the time period to the CBS newspaper drama Big Town. Sponsor Philip Morris pulled the plug in April and replaced “The Vagabond Lover” with comedian Milton Berle. Vallee left Network Radio after 13 seasons but returned for six months in 1955 - as a Sunday night disc jockey on CBS.
Crosby Brims With Hope. Bing Crosby’s weekly price of $35,000 for his transcribed half hour series on ABC was considered worth the expense by Philco to introduce its new line of postwar television sets. Philco was fresh from a three year sponsorship of ABC’s all-star variety show, Radio Hall of Fame - a costly flop in the late Sunday afternoon ratings. The company needed Crosby’s audience and endorsement value for the high stakes game of marketing television sets against industry pioneer RCA.
Philco Radio Time’s mid-October premiere on ABC paired the 43 year old crooner with guest Bob Hope, his sidekick in Paramount’s successful Road comedies and star of the season’s Number One radio show. Their fourth film together, The Road To Utopia, had been released in late spring and they were already promoting their next, The Road To Rio. ABC told the press beforehand that the two stars’ ad-lib antics ran the first recorded show two minutes overtime - but sponsor Philco “generously” edited out its commercials so listeners could enjoy the Crosby and Hope merriment without interruption.
The program’s stars, hype and listener curiosity resulted in a 24.0 rating - the highest figure that ABC had drawn for a variety show since the height of its Blue Network days in the early 1930's. Crosby gave ABC October’s fourth most popular program and he appeared to be headed for his third consecutive Top Ten season. But Philco Radio Time’s ratings dropped 40% over subsequent weeks with low priced guests Spike Jones, the Les Paul Trio, trumpeter Rafael Mendez, Ezio Pinza and folk singer Burl Ives. The show got back on track in late November with a succession of headliners - Judy Garland, Jimmy Durante, Al Jolson and Maurice Chevalier. Crosby finished the season in 13th place among the Top 50 shows and ABC had cause to celebrate.. The celebration didn’t last long - the worst season of Crosby’s 21 year network career was just ahead.
A Big Name & Big Ratings. Dennis Day was the second member of Jack Benny’s cast to spin off into his own NBC sitcom in 1946 while remaining with the cast of Benny’s highly rated Sunday night show. A Day In The Life of Dennis Day had the longest title in Network Radio and enjoyed five consecutive Top 50 seasons. Like Phil Harris, the 30 year old Day played his spinoff sitcom in the same character he established on the Benny show. Day portrayed a naive, dim-witted lad with a golden Irish tenor’s voice in a format that allowed him a song or two in every show.
Colgate’s Lustre Creme Shampoo debuted the NBC show on Thursday at 7:30 then upgraded its timeslot to Wednesday at 8:00 in January, 1947, when Jergens Lotion cancelled Mr. & Mrs. North and vacated the time period. Day held his own in NBC’s strong Wednesday lineup but the network would regret the loss of sleuths Pam and Jerry North the following season.
College Drop Outs. American Tobacco used a new Frank Morgan vehicle, The Fabulous Doctor Tweedy, as Jack Benny’s 1946 summer replacement with satisfactory results. The tobacco company and NBC agreed that the sitcom with a college setting would be a natural lead-in for Wednesday’s slowly fading Kay Kyser College of Musical Knowledge. Kyser’s Colgate show was cut to 30 minutes and pushed ahead on NBC’s schedule to 10:30, making room for Morgan’s absent minded Professor Tweedy at 10:00 - sponsored by American’s Pall Mall Cigarettes. Morgan gave his new comedy the old college try against Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time on ABC but fell short. He lost over 40% of his previous season’s Kraft Music Hall audience - when, ironically, he filled in for Crosby. (See Frank Morgan.)
Without the strong lead-in provided for six seasons by Mr. District Attorney, Kyser’s College lost 30% of its 1945-46 ratings. Both Morgan and Kyser were ten year veterans of Network Radio. Both dropped out of the season’s Top 50 for the only time in their network careers.
The Other Morgan. At 31, Henry Morgan was considered by ABC to be the modern day Fred Allen - a cynic with a cerebral sense of humor. Morgan’s barbs - often directed against sponsors - had been the cause for a career full of firings by advertisers and stations around the country. His early network attempts on Mutual and ABC were critical successes but developed little more than a cult audience. Morgan was given ABC’s best timeslot in January - following Crosby’s Philco Radio Time. The comedian’s off the wall half hour featuring sidekicks Arnold Stang and Art Carney was sponsored by Eversharp’s Schick razors and blades. Despite the network’s high hopes and hype, Here’s Morgan lost 50% of Crosby's lead-in audience and was gone at the end of the season.
Shore Leaves. Ford picked up Dinah Shore and moved her Top 50 NBC show to CBS on Wednesday, pitting the popular singer against the radio’s highest rated crime series, Mr. District Attorney. Shore’s lead-in, Frank Sinatra, had dipped to single digit ratings and she couldn’t do any better, losing 35% of her NBC audience and dropping to 83rd place for the season. Shore left Ford and CBS at the end of the season. Four years later she re-emerged in her most renowned role - as an NBC-TV singing star and spokesperson for Ford’s arch-competitor, Chevrolet.
Wednesday’s Winner. The highest rated broadcast of the year aired on ABC on Wednesday, September 18, when Heavyweight Champ Joe Louis defended his title against challenger Tami Mauriello at Yankee Stadium. Gillette sponsored the fight that recorded a 33.0 Hooperating. But the razor blade company didn’t get much of Don Dunphy’s blow-by-blow report for its money - Louis knocked out Mauriello in the first round.
The News Is Out. Thursday of 1946-47 became the first time since Friday of the 1932-33 season that no newscast was ranked among a weeknight’s Top Ten programs. It was also the first time that a Multiple Run program failed to make the weeknight list.
Haymes Over Hall’s Ratings. CBS was still scouting for new singers and packaged a winner for automotive equipment manufacturer Autolite. Dick Haymes, 30, was the former band singer with Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and Harry James with a budding film career as the crooning leading man in 20th Century Fox musicals. Haymes was supported in his new radio show by popular vocalist Helen Forrest and Gordon Jenkins’ studio orchestra. The three scored their first of two Top 50 seasons on Thursday night at 9:00.
Haymes edged out Kraft Music Hall which dropped nearly half the ratings that were generated by Bing Crosby when he left the show in May. Thursday’s Number One show of the previous two seasons, Music Hall struggled with comedians Edward Everett Horton and Eddie Foy, Jr., supported by Eddie Duchin’s band and guests stars with bigger box office names than their hosts - Edgar Bergen, Fred Astaire, Irene Dunne, Ginger Rogers, Marlene Dietrich, Edward G. Robinson, William Powell, etc.
The Names Sound Familiar... While NBC and CBS tangled in a tight race at the top of Friday’s ratings, ABC was investing in its future with two studio crime dramas. This Is Your FBI, sponsored by the Equitable Life Assurance Society, was ABC’s sound alike to The FBI In Peace & War, but unlike the CBS show, it was endorsed by the Federal agency. The program’s creator, Jerry Devine, was a welcome guest in the bureau’s Washington headquarters to research its cases and techniques. During the two series’ runs their ratings were close - The FBI In Peace & War scored an average 11.2 to This Is Your FBI’s 10.8. But the ABC show accomplished something on Friday that its higher rated twin couldn’t match on Thursday - it eventually became its night’s Number One program. (See FBI vs. FBI.)
General Foods gave up trying to fight Jack Benny on Sunday and pulled The Adventures of The Thin Man back to the safety of CBS on Friday and back into the season’s Top 50. Less than a point behind The Thin Man in Friday’s ratings was another detective series loosely based on Dashiell Hammett’s writings, ABC’s The Fat Man. In reality, the overweight sleuth was created by producer Ed Rosenberg. The Fat Man enjoyed four Top 50 seasons and was Friday’s Number One program twice, all sponsored by Norwich Pharmacal’s Pepto Bismol. Veteran radio actor J. Scott (Jack) Smart was typecast as the show’s hero - Smart he stood only 5'9" tall and weighed 270 pounds. (6) (See The Curse of Dashiell Hammett.)
There He Is.... Bristol Myers and ABC took a struggling quiz with rotating hosts from Mutual, Break The Bank, and made it the showcase for their “new” postwar star, 32 year old Bert Parks. Actually, Parks was no stranger to Network Radio - he had become the youngest CBS staff announcer in 1933 at age 19. By 24 he was the announcer/singer and foil for Eddie Cantor. When he enlisted in the Army in 1940, Parks had seven years of network experience to his credit. But few of his assignments allowed him do what he did best - host programs and interact with contestants with his gift of ad-lib. (7)
Break The Bank was a simple general knowledge quiz for teams of two contestants - often married couples. It was similar to the Take It Or Leave It format that awarded mounting cash prizes for each correct answer - but with one important difference. Phil Baker’s quiz topped off at $64 - a paltry sum where Parks and his contestants were just getting started toward Bank’s jackpot of $1,000 or more - often much more. The show made news during its first ABC season by awarding nearly $5,800 to one couple who correctly recited the last line to “A Visit From Saint Nicholas” aka “The Night Before Christmas.” It was the largest cash amount yet awarded by a radio program. (8) Within a year Break The Bank would be among the season’s Top 50 shows and part of ABC’s winning Friday lineup.
More Hush Money. Ralph Edwards had created a monster on Truth Or Consequences with the previous season’s “Mr. Hush” contest. He topped it with “Mrs. Hush” in early 1947 by allowing listeners to Saturday’s Number One show to participate in the game and by adding a charity angle to the giveaway. Edwards invited his home audience into the chase for the contest’s mounting jackpot of prizes, telling them to submit letters that completed the sentence, “We should all support the March of Dimes because....” He coyly added that although it wasn’t really necessary, listener donations to the charity accompanying contest entries would be gratefully accepted
.
Each week three letters were chosen and those listeners were given a crack at identifying the mystery woman from clues she had recorded in hushed tones. With every incorrect answer the jackpot grew to include a new Ford convertible, a Cessna airplane, a mink coat and diamond ring, a camping trailer and a television set. By mid-March the jackpot contained 23 huge prizes with a total value over $17,500, when a Chicago housewife correctly revealed “Mrs. Hush” to be Clara Bow, the “It Girl” of silent films.
But the real winners of the contest were Edwards himself and the March of Dimes. Before Bow was identified Truth Or Consequences ratings had jumped into the 20's and the charity had collected $555,000 from over 700,000 contest entries. (See Truth Or Consequences.)
Parade’s March In April. Three months short of ten full seasons on CBS, American Tobacco abruptly moved Your Hit Parade to NBC in April. It also shifted the show’s production from New York to Hollywood - a concession in its rumored negotiations to bring Frank Sinatra back as its star the following season. The rumor proved to be true.
Saturday night time for the Lucky Strike program on NBC was cleared when The Roy Rogers Show left the air. The overworked “King of The Cowboys” had been cranking out musical adventures for Republic Pictures at a clip of one every seven weeks for three years after the studio lost his stable mate Gene Autry in a contract dispute. Rogers’ 9.2 rating for Miles Laboratories’ Alka Seltzer was little better than the 9.0 registered by the final NBC season of National Barn Dance, which Miles cancelled in September after 13 years. Your Hit Parade hardly missed a beat in its network switch, delivering a 30% increase in ratings over Rogers’ show to NBC. The weekly countdown of hits would remain a Saturday Top Ten show in its new home for the next five seasons.
The News Behind The News. Seven of the Top Ten Multiple Run programs were news and news commentaries. But the ratings of those newscasts had dwindled since the end of World War II. Lowell Thomas led all Multiple Runs but turned in his lowest season rating in nine years, an 11.3. H .V. Kaltenborn and Gabriel Heatter had their lowest ratings in seven years and NBC’s News of The World with John W. Vandercook and Morgan Beatty finished with its lowest rating since its debut five years earlier. Only Mutual’s conservative voice, Fulton Lewis, Jr., had a fractional gain in his numbers.
News would always have a presence in Multiple Run programming but it was the final season in which Thomas or any of his colleagues would be Number One in the category.
(1) ABC had no policy against transcribed programs. Just the opposite, ABC had encouraged the technology earlier in the year by introducing a recording/rebroadcasting technique to its affiliates to avoid the confusion caused by Daylight Saving Time differences among cities.
(2) Philco Radio Time's first two seasons were broadcast from disc and the third from tape.
(3) ABC had 143 affiliates when Noble bought the network in 1943 and billings were $24.9 Million. Under Mark Woods’ leadership the network’s affiliate roster had grown over 50% and its billings increased over 60%.
(4) Despite his own show’s success, Phil Harris remained in Jack Benny’s cast until 1952.
(5) Johnson entered the Army in 1946 and was replaced for the remainder of Inner Sanctum’s run by Paul McGrath.
(6) Hammett only collected royalties for the use of his name and the “inspiration” for the character, based on Sidney Greenstreet’s fat villain, Kasper Gutman, in the film version of Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon. Jack Smart was a natural to star in the 1951 Universal film, The Fat Man, co-starring two young studio contract players, Rock Hudson and Julie London.
(7) Joining the Army as a private in 1940, Bert Parks emerged four years later as a captain with a Bronze Star for service under fire in the Burmese/Indo-China theater, setting up communications links for forces under the command of General “Vinegar Joe” Stillwell.
(8) The correct answer with the often missed words underscored: “But I heard him exclaim ere he drove out of sight - Happy Christmas to all and to all a goodnight.”
Top 50 Network Programs - 1946-47
C.E. Hooper, Semi-monthly Reports, Sep 1946-Jun 1947
Total Programs Rated 6-11 p.m.: 199. Programs Rated 13 Weeks & Ranked: 169
33,998,000 Radio Homes 89.9% Coverage of US One Rating Point = 340,000 Homes
1 1 Bob Hope Show 27.6 Lever Bros/Pepsodent Tue 10:00 30 NBC
2 2 Fibber McGee & Molly 26.4 Johnson Wax Tue 9:30 30 NBC
3 6 Jack Benny Program 25.8 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sun 7:00 30 NBC
4 7 Fred Allen Show 23.4 Standard Brands/Tenderleaf Tea Sun 8:30 30 NBC
5 4 Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy 22.8 Standard/Chase & Sanborn Sun 8:00 30 NBC
6 3 Red Skelton Show 22.2 Brown & Williamson/Raleigh & Kools Tue 10:30 30 NBC
7 14 Amos & Andy 22.1 Lever Bros/Rinso Laundry Soap Tue 9:00 30 NBC
8 5 Lux Radio Theater 21.9 Lever Bros/Lux Soap Mon 9:00 60 CBS
9 9 Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal 20.8 Jergens Lotion Sun 9:00 15 ABC
10 10 Screen Guild Players 20.0 Lady Esther Cosmetics Mon 10:00 30 CBS
11 11 Mister District Attorney 18.5 Bristol Myers/Vitalis Hair Tonic Wed 9:30 30 NBC
12 N Phil Harris & Alice Faye Show 17.9 F.W. Fitch/Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:30 30 NBC
13 N Bing Crosby Philco Radio Time 17.6 Philco Radios & Refrigerators Wed 10:00 30 ABC
14 35 Duffy’s Tavern 16 9 Bristol Myers/Ipana & Vitalis Wed 9:00 30 NBC
15t 34 Burns & Allen Show 15.2 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 8:30 30 NBC
15t 19 Great Gildersleeve 15.2 Kraft Foods/Parkay Margarine Wed 8:30 30 NBC
17 19 Truth Or Consequences 14.8 Procter & Gamble/Duz Laundry Soap Sat 8:30 30 NBC
18 16 Take It Or Leave It 14.5 Eversharp Pens & Pencils Sun 10:00 30 CBS
19 12 Eddie Cantor Show 14.4 Pabst Beer Thu 10:30 30 NBC
20 21 Joan Davis Show 13.9 Lever Bros/Swan Soap Mon 8:30 25 CBS
21 25 Big Town 13.7 Sterling Drug/Ironized Yeast Tue 8:00 30 CBS
22t 24 Judy Canova Show 13.5 Colgate Palmolive Peet/Halo Shampoo Sat 10:00 30 NBC
22t 36 Suspense 13.5 Roma Wines Thu 8:00 30 CBS
24t 42 Inner Sanctum 13.3 Emerson Drug/Bromo Seltzer Mon 8:00 30 CBS
24t 17 Abbott & Costello Show 13.3 RJ Reynolds/Camels Thu 10:00 30 NBC
26t 22 Aldrich Family 13.2 General Foods/Grapenuts Cereal Thu 8:00 30 CBS
26t 49 Fanny Brice Baby Snooks Show 13.2 General Foods/Jello Fri 8:00 30 CBS
26t 28 Life of Riley 13.2 Procter & Gamble/Dreft Laundry Soap Sat 8:00 30 NBC
29t 37 Bob Hawk Show 13.1 RJ Reynolds/Camel Mon 7:30 30 CBS
29t 38 A Date With Judy 13.1 Lewis & Howe/Tums Antacid Tue 8:30 30 NBC
31 47 The FBI In Peace & War 13.0 Procter & Gamble/Lava Hand Soap Thu 8:30 25 CBS
32 28 People Are Funny 12.7 Brown & Williamson/Raleighs & Kools Fri 9:00 30 NBC
33 32 Your Hit Parade 12.6 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sat 9:00 30 NBC (1)
34 N A Day In The Life of Dennis Day 12.5 Colgate/Lustre Cream Wed 8:00 30 NBC (2)
35 43 Blondie 12.4 Lever Bros/Super Suds Laundry Soap Sun 7:30 30 CBS
36t 13 Jack Haley & Eve Arden's Village Store 12.3 Sealtest Dairies Thu 9:30 30 NBC
36t 39 Mr & Mrs North 12.3 Andrew Jergens/Woodbury Soap Wed 8:00 30 NBC
38t N Casey Crime Photographer 11.8 Anchor Hocking Glass Thu 9:30 30 CBS
38t 43 Manhattan Merry Go Round 11.8 Sterling Drug/Dr Lyons Tooth Powder 9:00 30 NBC
40t 84 Dick Haymes Show 11.7 Autolite Spark Plugs Thu 9:00 30 CBS
40t 23 Dr Christian 11.7 Vaseline Wed 8:30 25 CBS
42t 26 Can You Top This? 11.6 Colgate Shave Cream Sat 9:30 30 NBC
42t N Kraft Music Hall 11.6 Kraft/Philadelphia Cream Cheese Thu 9:00 30 NBC
44 43 American Album of Familiar Music 11.4 Sterling Drug/Bayer Aspirin Sun 9:30 30 NBC
45 40 Lowell Thomas News 11.3 Sun Oil M-F 6:45 15 NBC
46 85 Gangbusters 11.2 Waterman Pens Sat 9:00 30 ABC
47 78 Adventures of The Thin Man 11.1 General Foods/Sanka Coffee Fri 8:30 25 CBS
48 53 We The People 11.0 Gulf Oil Sun 10:30 30 CBS
49t 56 Doctor IQ 10.9 Mars Candies Mon 10:30 30 NBC
49t 49 Jimmy Durante & Garry Moore Show 10.9 Rexall Drugs Fri 9:30 30 CBS
(1) Your Hit Parade Sep - Mar Lucky Strike Cigarettes Sat 9:00 45 CBS
(2) A Day In The Life of Dennis Day Sep - Dec Lustre Cream Shampoo Thu 7:30 30 NBC
This post is in part abridged from Network Radio Ratings, 1932-1953.
Copyright © 2012 & 2019, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
The 1946-47 Season
15th In A Series
Goin’ Fishin’ The wartime boom in business pushed broadcasting’s total revenues up steadily for two years. But the networks were virtually sold out and had little left to sell. With empty shelves, the chains slowed to their lowest revenue gain since 1938. It seemed hypocritical to broadcasters when CBS chief Bill Paley lectured November’s National Association of Broadcasters convention about the evils of over-commercialization.
It was also a difficult time for broadcasters to raise prices. Shedding the wartime handicap of paper rationing gave newspapers and magazines new life as radio’s competitors for the advertising dollar. The networks were left with just one alternative to increase revenues - attract more affiliates to increase coverage and justify higher rates. They went trolling in 1946 for stations in markets where they lacked affiliations and came back with a huge catch by the end of the following year.
The Transcription Transformation. Bing Crosby left NBC’s Kraft Music Hall in May, 1946, determined to record his programs. It didn’t take long for the Academy Award winning actor/singer to find a new sponsor with deep pockets and a new network with a deep need for his star-power. Philadelphia radio and television manufacturer Philco wanted Crosby. And Mark Woods at ABC would take Crosby on any terms - in person or on disc. (1)
Meanwhile, CBS and NBC continued to forbid the recorded production of prime time programs for broadcast, claiming a fear of losing live shows’ superior technical quality, timeliness and spontaneity. What the networks really feared was losing their monopoly of big name stars and big buck sponsors to transcribed shows distributed on disc directly to local stations - cutting the networks out of the picture altogether. But Woods had nothing to lose. Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time began its three year transcribed spin on ABC on October 16th. (2)
It was another turning point for the new ABC which was becoming a viable competitor. In the five years since its split from NBC, followed by its sale to Ed Noble in 1943, the network had grown to 217 affiliates and a 1946 income over $40 Million. (3) On a larger scale, Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time was a turning point for Network Radio. NBC and CBS would reluctantly embrace the new technology and slowly shift to pre-recorded programming. Networks and producers came to rely on the tape recording equipment provided by industry pioneer Ampex. A distributor for Ampex was a newcomer in the electronics field, Bing Crosby Enterprises.
A Network of Record. Transcribed network programming had been the backbone of the Keystone Broadcasting System since 1940. Founded by entrepreneur Michael M. Sillerman., Keystone was a flexible “network” of small market stations in rural areas Sillerman offered his stations in tailored groups to NBC and CBS advertisers for transcribed repeats of their existing programs in areas where network reception was spotty. Among Keystone’s featured programs in 1947 were General Foods’ Burns & Allen Show and Miles Laboratories’ Lum & Abner.
There's No Sin In Syndication. The fear that NBC and CBS harbored of transcribed programs cutting into their control of popular programming was heightened in April when NBC’s owned and operated Chicago outlet, WMAQ, aided the “enemy” and began airing discs of the syndicated Favorite Story starring distinguished actor Ronald Colman. Colman had signed a $150,000, contract with Frederick Ziv’s production and syndication firm. (See Fred Ziv - King of Syndication.) Ziv offered 23 different series of programs to local stations and advertisers with a roster of stars that included network favorites Wayne King, Kenny Baker, Easy Aces and Philo Vance. Over 200 stations bought Ziv shows in 1946 returning revenues of $7.5 Million.
Adding to the program options available to stations, the Lang-Worth, World, RCA-Thesaurus and Atlas transcription services all offered pre-packaged transcribed programs and scripts to stations for their sale to local advertisers. (See “By Transcription…”)
Newly licensed stations began to pop up after World War II, providing a growing market for the syndicators and more competition for network affiliates. The country’s 950 AM stations would nearly double in three years. But as it turned out, neither syndicated programming nor new competitors had immediate impact on the networks’ ratings or revenues. Network ratings held steady and the chains’ revenues increased over the next three years.
The real threat to Network Radio was found lurking in the living rooms of a mere 12,000 homes - television. That number would explode to 4 Million by 1949.
Whose Hues? Television was stalled. Licenses for 44 new stations had been issued, but the industry was on hold, waiting for an FCC landmark decision. Would the country’s video standard remain the RCA system of electronic television that could only promise color in several years? Or would it switch to the incompatible CBS part-mechanical system that produced color but would render all past equipment useless. The decision was finally handed down after 14 weeks of hearings and testimony - RCA won. Current station and set owners could breath easier.
New station construction got underway at full speed and receivers, priced from $225 to $2,500, began flying out of stores in New York, Philadelphia, Schenectady, Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles - the six cities that had operating television stations.
To provide programming, all three New York baseball teams signed home game television contracts for the 1947 season - the Giants with WNBT, the Dodgers with WCBS and the Yankees with DuMont’s WABD. Terms weren’t disclosed, but the three broadcasters promised to pay the teams more money if they could find sponsors for the games. They promptly did - Camel, Chesterfield and Old Gold cigarettes.
To Be Or Not TV. Musicians union boss James Caesar Petrillo was at it again. Members were prohibited from performing on television until a fee structure could be created. Petrillo’s edict not only kept union musicians off live television but also prevented the television showing of any motion pictures that had employed union members which severely limited the number of films that could be broadcast. The boycott remained in effect until March, 1948.
This move coincided with an earlier Petrillo ban against performances on AM/FM simulcasts unless musicians were paid double for their single performances. This overplay of his negotiating hand backfired and pushed broadcasters toward greater use of recorded music and left more union musicians out of work. (See Petrillo!)
Signs of Things To Come. Bob Hope delivered the season's Number One program for the fifth straight season - a record that wouldn't be equalled until Lux Radio Theater matched it from 1947 to 1952.
Meanwhile, NBC’s string of consecutive monthly winners sailed along. It had begun with Major Bowes’ Original Amateur Hour in June, 1935. It encompassed Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy’s two season sweeps of the late thirties, the frequent firsts by Jack Benny and extended through the glory days of Tuesday’s terrific trio - Bob Hope, Fibber McGee & Molly and Red Skelton. The streak reached a whopping 120 months - equivalent to twelve consecutive ten month seasons - when the inevitable finally happened.
Lux Radio Theater - the only hour-long program in the season’s Top 50 - produced the month’s highest ratings in June, 1947. That, in turn, began a string of 15 consecutive monthly wins for Lux and CBS - the longest since Edgar Bergen’s 22 month streak on NBC from 1937 to 1939. (See The Monthlies.)
Earlier in the season, Red Skelton set a record of a different kind. Skelton’s 15.3 in September was the lowest rating yet recorded for a month’s Number One show. It was an early glimpse of ominous things yet to come for Network Radio.
Spin & Win. Phil Harris had been with Jack Benny since 1936, serving as the comedian’s wise-cracking band leader and establishing his character as a hard drinking ladies’ man. NBC scored a the season’s biggest win with a new program when Harris walked across the hall moments after his appearances with Benny to co-star with his wife, movie musical queen Alice Faye, in their new sitcom immediately following Benny’s Number One program.
Iowa based hair products maker F.W. Fitch had drifted away from its eight year old Fitch Bandwagon format the previous season when the program’s focus shifted from a rotation of popular dance bands to comedy. Comedienne Cass Daley pushed Bandwagon’s ratings into the season’s Top 20 in 1945-46. But the idea of segueing from the top rated Benny show into its own spinoff was too hard for Fitch and NBC to resist.
The brash Harris and his beautiful, soft-spoken wife debuted late September in a sitcom format that gave each of them a solo musical number at breaks in the storyline. The couple went on to chalk up six Top 50 seasons, beginning with two years in which their program remained The Fitch Bandwagon in name only. Rexall Drugs assumed their sponsorship in 1948 and the series became The Phil Harris & Alice Faye Show.
Jack’s Back. Jack Benny boosted his ratings another 20% to his first Number One finish on Sunday in six years. After two seasons and sacrificing the ratings of Kate Smith and Adventures of The Thin Man, General Foods gave up its CBS timeslot opposite Benny and removed whatever competition those programs offered. Wrigley took the half hour on CBS for Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch which appealed more to kids than adult audiences.
Benny’s writers kept his show fresh with stunts - like his March 16th broadcast when he assembled a "Million Dollar Quartet" - singers Bing Crosby, Dick Haymes, Andy Russell and Dennis Day - for only $3,000. Russell, the only member of the quartet without a radio show of his own on which Benny could make a reciprocal appearance, was the only guest Benny had to pay. The show drew a healthy chunk of publicity and a 28.5 rating. (See Sunday At Seven.)
The Songbird’s Swan Song. Kate Smith was Network Radio’s “grand old lady” at 39. General Foods brought Smith back to Sunday’s CBS schedule opposite NBC’s Bob Burns at 6:30. It was the singer’s last attempt to recapture the popularity that had led to ten Top 50 seasons on CBS including four in the Top 20. It failed. Her half hour variety show could only manage single digit ratings. General Foods cancelled both Smith’s Sunday show and her weekday quarter hour chat programs in June, thus ending their decade-long sponsor/star relationship. She also left CBS Radio forever after 16 consecutive years with the network.
But “The Songbird of The South” was far from finished. Smith moved on to Mutual, ABC and NBC with a half dozen different talk and music shows - many of them sustaining - until 1958. Meanwhile, she enjoyed a decade of television popularity with a constant stream of daytime and prime time shows on NBC-TV and CBS-TV throughout the 1950's. (See Kate's Great Song.)
A CBS Double Dip. Hildegarde’s Raleigh Room format was moved intact from NBC’s Wednesday schedule to Sunday at 9:00 on CBS. Hildegarde’s new soup-sponsored Campbell Room suffered the season’s worst drop of a Top 50 star. The “incomparable” one lost half her NBC audience and fell from 40th to 126th place. Her show was cancelled in April with a measly 5.9 average rating for its abbreviated season. (See Busted In Rank.)
Texaco picked up another NBC orphan to replace its struggling Texaco Star Theater headlining tenor James Melton at 9:30 on CBS. Eddie Bracken was still a Paramount Films comedy star and his earlier NBC series was a Top 50 entry before Standard Brands cancelled it in May, 1945. Bracken was another ratings disappointment for CBS - losing a third of his earlier NBC audience and falling from 39th to 83rd place. Like Hildegarde, Bracken was gone from Network Radio in April. Neither returned except for an occasional guest appearance
There’s No Mystery To It. Woodbury had cancelled Hollywood Mystery Time as its follow-up to Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal the previous January. But the company kept one element of the program for a new quarter hour show on ABC at 9:15 - Louella Parsons’ Hollywood news and interviews with the stars. The syndicated columnist had no problem lining up headline guests and registered double digit ratings over her first full season as a solo. She remained in the timeslot for seven seasons, recording Top 50 finishes twice.
Ratings To Die For. Henry Ford didn’t care about ratings. Ford Motors, after all, had sponsored the Greenfield Chapel Children’s Choir and Early American Dance Music in prime time - both rating duds but pleasing to the octogenarian industrialist‘s ears. Ford had also sponsored the Detroit Symphony ‘s Sunday Evening Hour concerts on CBS for eight seasons. The program returned a respectable 9.8 average against NBC‘s powerful lineup but was dropped in 1942 when the car company cut back its consumer advertising for the duration.
Ford revived the Sunday night concerts on ABC in 1946, averaging a meager 2.1 rating against Edgar Bergen’s 22.8. Yet, on the night of March 16, 1947, the symphony’s rating shot up ten fold. The sudden surge in popularity was created by the Network Radio debut of the program’s guest soloist, Margaret Truman. President Harry Truman was fiercely proud of his 22 year old daughter’s soprano singing voice which had been met with mixed critical response. The public was obviously curious and turned out in numbers that must have even gratified Henry Ford. Unfortunately, Ford didn’t have much time to gloat. He died three weeks later..
Boo! Born on Blue in 1940 and shuffled around the CBS schedule since 1943, Inner Sanctum was given new life to scare its listeners to death when Emerson Drugs’ Bromo Seltzer cancelled Vox Pop and moved the spooky anthology into the strong CBS Monday lineup where it became a Top 20 program for three seasons. (See Inner Sanctum.)
Inner Sanctum was Suspense with its tongue in cheek. Narrator “Raymond The (G)Host” was played for macabre laughs by Raymond Edward Johnson while some of radio’s best studio actors played Sanctum’s stories for every blood-curdling chill they could wring out of the scripts and organist Lew White scored every story to its fullest melodramatic peak. (5)
Veteran radio director Himan Brown is credited with Inner Sanctum’s memorable opening and closing to Raymond’s chamber of horror stories - a loud, elongated squeaking door - while Emerson ad agency BBDO created the sponsor’s unforgettable signature, a “locomotive” that chanted, “Bromo Seltzer...Bromo Seltzer...Bromo Seltzer,” produced with engineer Gilbert Wright’s Sonovox process.
Mixing Milk With Pop. Monday had become NBC’s repository for institutional advertisers DuPont, Firestone, Bell Telephone and Carnation - all sponsoring prestige programming that drew single digit ratings against the powerful CBS schedule. Like Bell’s Telephone Hour, Carnation’s Contented Hour was never longer than 30 minutes but it had one of the longest runs in network history. Sponsored by the Pacific Coast Condensed Milk Company of Seattle, the series began in 1932 as programs of light classics featuring soloists from the concert stage and opera.
Contented Hour enjoyed two Top 50 seasons before pop music began squeezing out the classics in ratings. By the mid-thirties Contented was regularly beaten in its10:00 timeslot by the Guy Lombardo and Wayne King orchestras’ syrupy Lady Esther Serenade on CBS. In response, Contented Hour began leaning more toward standard and traditional music - then into pop when Canadian arranger/conductor Percy Faith took over the show in 1941. The conversion was completed in 1946 when singer Buddy Clark joined the cast as its singing co-host. But the competition got tougher. Lady Esther Cosmetics replaced its saccharin Serenade with Screen Guild Players. The new CBS show buried Faith and Clark in the ratings.
Nevertheless, the two made beautiful music together and apart. Clark had three hit records in the spring and summer of 1947, including the million selling Linda. Faith had several hit singles and a dozen best selling albums. Ironically, both stars of Carnation’s NBC show recorded for the same label, Columbia Records - owned by CBS.
NBC’s Block Party. NBC established Tuesday as the night for comedy much as CBS dramas dominated Mondays. The network’s comedy block had been anchored for ten years by Fibber McGee & Molly. Jim and Marian Jordan celebrated their 500th broadcast as Wistful Vista’s leading citizens in February. Bob Hope joined the NBC block in 1938 and Red Skelton came along in 1941. With the additions of A Date With Judy in 1944 and Amos & Andy a year later, NBC had a solid lock on two and a half consecutive hours of Tuesday prime time. It would take another four seasons for CBS to catch up.
My Time Was Your Time. At 45, Rudy Vallee’s time had passed. His Top Ten ratings of the thirties and Top 20's of the early forties had steadily sunk since he returned from Coast Guard duty in 1944. Nevertheless, Philip Morris cancelled handsome 27 year old crooner Johnny Desmond in 1946 and moved Vallee into its vacant Tuesday 8:00 p.m. timeslot on NBC.
Unlike Vallee’s earlier days when his program was known for introducing newcomers to radio, his continuing co-star on this show was 50 year old Ruth Etting, another voice from the past looking for a comeback. Their effort was met with listener apathy, losing the time period to the CBS newspaper drama Big Town. Sponsor Philip Morris pulled the plug in April and replaced “The Vagabond Lover” with comedian Milton Berle. Vallee left Network Radio after 13 seasons but returned for six months in 1955 - as a Sunday night disc jockey on CBS.
Crosby Brims With Hope. Bing Crosby’s weekly price of $35,000 for his transcribed half hour series on ABC was considered worth the expense by Philco to introduce its new line of postwar television sets. Philco was fresh from a three year sponsorship of ABC’s all-star variety show, Radio Hall of Fame - a costly flop in the late Sunday afternoon ratings. The company needed Crosby’s audience and endorsement value for the high stakes game of marketing television sets against industry pioneer RCA.
Philco Radio Time’s mid-October premiere on ABC paired the 43 year old crooner with guest Bob Hope, his sidekick in Paramount’s successful Road comedies and star of the season’s Number One radio show. Their fourth film together, The Road To Utopia, had been released in late spring and they were already promoting their next, The Road To Rio. ABC told the press beforehand that the two stars’ ad-lib antics ran the first recorded show two minutes overtime - but sponsor Philco “generously” edited out its commercials so listeners could enjoy the Crosby and Hope merriment without interruption.
The program’s stars, hype and listener curiosity resulted in a 24.0 rating - the highest figure that ABC had drawn for a variety show since the height of its Blue Network days in the early 1930's. Crosby gave ABC October’s fourth most popular program and he appeared to be headed for his third consecutive Top Ten season. But Philco Radio Time’s ratings dropped 40% over subsequent weeks with low priced guests Spike Jones, the Les Paul Trio, trumpeter Rafael Mendez, Ezio Pinza and folk singer Burl Ives. The show got back on track in late November with a succession of headliners - Judy Garland, Jimmy Durante, Al Jolson and Maurice Chevalier. Crosby finished the season in 13th place among the Top 50 shows and ABC had cause to celebrate.. The celebration didn’t last long - the worst season of Crosby’s 21 year network career was just ahead.
A Big Name & Big Ratings. Dennis Day was the second member of Jack Benny’s cast to spin off into his own NBC sitcom in 1946 while remaining with the cast of Benny’s highly rated Sunday night show. A Day In The Life of Dennis Day had the longest title in Network Radio and enjoyed five consecutive Top 50 seasons. Like Phil Harris, the 30 year old Day played his spinoff sitcom in the same character he established on the Benny show. Day portrayed a naive, dim-witted lad with a golden Irish tenor’s voice in a format that allowed him a song or two in every show.
Colgate’s Lustre Creme Shampoo debuted the NBC show on Thursday at 7:30 then upgraded its timeslot to Wednesday at 8:00 in January, 1947, when Jergens Lotion cancelled Mr. & Mrs. North and vacated the time period. Day held his own in NBC’s strong Wednesday lineup but the network would regret the loss of sleuths Pam and Jerry North the following season.
College Drop Outs. American Tobacco used a new Frank Morgan vehicle, The Fabulous Doctor Tweedy, as Jack Benny’s 1946 summer replacement with satisfactory results. The tobacco company and NBC agreed that the sitcom with a college setting would be a natural lead-in for Wednesday’s slowly fading Kay Kyser College of Musical Knowledge. Kyser’s Colgate show was cut to 30 minutes and pushed ahead on NBC’s schedule to 10:30, making room for Morgan’s absent minded Professor Tweedy at 10:00 - sponsored by American’s Pall Mall Cigarettes. Morgan gave his new comedy the old college try against Bing Crosby’s Philco Radio Time on ABC but fell short. He lost over 40% of his previous season’s Kraft Music Hall audience - when, ironically, he filled in for Crosby. (See Frank Morgan.)
Without the strong lead-in provided for six seasons by Mr. District Attorney, Kyser’s College lost 30% of its 1945-46 ratings. Both Morgan and Kyser were ten year veterans of Network Radio. Both dropped out of the season’s Top 50 for the only time in their network careers.
The Other Morgan. At 31, Henry Morgan was considered by ABC to be the modern day Fred Allen - a cynic with a cerebral sense of humor. Morgan’s barbs - often directed against sponsors - had been the cause for a career full of firings by advertisers and stations around the country. His early network attempts on Mutual and ABC were critical successes but developed little more than a cult audience. Morgan was given ABC’s best timeslot in January - following Crosby’s Philco Radio Time. The comedian’s off the wall half hour featuring sidekicks Arnold Stang and Art Carney was sponsored by Eversharp’s Schick razors and blades. Despite the network’s high hopes and hype, Here’s Morgan lost 50% of Crosby's lead-in audience and was gone at the end of the season.
Shore Leaves. Ford picked up Dinah Shore and moved her Top 50 NBC show to CBS on Wednesday, pitting the popular singer against the radio’s highest rated crime series, Mr. District Attorney. Shore’s lead-in, Frank Sinatra, had dipped to single digit ratings and she couldn’t do any better, losing 35% of her NBC audience and dropping to 83rd place for the season. Shore left Ford and CBS at the end of the season. Four years later she re-emerged in her most renowned role - as an NBC-TV singing star and spokesperson for Ford’s arch-competitor, Chevrolet.
Wednesday’s Winner. The highest rated broadcast of the year aired on ABC on Wednesday, September 18, when Heavyweight Champ Joe Louis defended his title against challenger Tami Mauriello at Yankee Stadium. Gillette sponsored the fight that recorded a 33.0 Hooperating. But the razor blade company didn’t get much of Don Dunphy’s blow-by-blow report for its money - Louis knocked out Mauriello in the first round.
The News Is Out. Thursday of 1946-47 became the first time since Friday of the 1932-33 season that no newscast was ranked among a weeknight’s Top Ten programs. It was also the first time that a Multiple Run program failed to make the weeknight list.
Haymes Over Hall’s Ratings. CBS was still scouting for new singers and packaged a winner for automotive equipment manufacturer Autolite. Dick Haymes, 30, was the former band singer with Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and Harry James with a budding film career as the crooning leading man in 20th Century Fox musicals. Haymes was supported in his new radio show by popular vocalist Helen Forrest and Gordon Jenkins’ studio orchestra. The three scored their first of two Top 50 seasons on Thursday night at 9:00.
Haymes edged out Kraft Music Hall which dropped nearly half the ratings that were generated by Bing Crosby when he left the show in May. Thursday’s Number One show of the previous two seasons, Music Hall struggled with comedians Edward Everett Horton and Eddie Foy, Jr., supported by Eddie Duchin’s band and guests stars with bigger box office names than their hosts - Edgar Bergen, Fred Astaire, Irene Dunne, Ginger Rogers, Marlene Dietrich, Edward G. Robinson, William Powell, etc.
The Names Sound Familiar... While NBC and CBS tangled in a tight race at the top of Friday’s ratings, ABC was investing in its future with two studio crime dramas. This Is Your FBI, sponsored by the Equitable Life Assurance Society, was ABC’s sound alike to The FBI In Peace & War, but unlike the CBS show, it was endorsed by the Federal agency. The program’s creator, Jerry Devine, was a welcome guest in the bureau’s Washington headquarters to research its cases and techniques. During the two series’ runs their ratings were close - The FBI In Peace & War scored an average 11.2 to This Is Your FBI’s 10.8. But the ABC show accomplished something on Friday that its higher rated twin couldn’t match on Thursday - it eventually became its night’s Number One program. (See FBI vs. FBI.)
General Foods gave up trying to fight Jack Benny on Sunday and pulled The Adventures of The Thin Man back to the safety of CBS on Friday and back into the season’s Top 50. Less than a point behind The Thin Man in Friday’s ratings was another detective series loosely based on Dashiell Hammett’s writings, ABC’s The Fat Man. In reality, the overweight sleuth was created by producer Ed Rosenberg. The Fat Man enjoyed four Top 50 seasons and was Friday’s Number One program twice, all sponsored by Norwich Pharmacal’s Pepto Bismol. Veteran radio actor J. Scott (Jack) Smart was typecast as the show’s hero - Smart he stood only 5'9" tall and weighed 270 pounds. (6) (See The Curse of Dashiell Hammett.)
There He Is.... Bristol Myers and ABC took a struggling quiz with rotating hosts from Mutual, Break The Bank, and made it the showcase for their “new” postwar star, 32 year old Bert Parks. Actually, Parks was no stranger to Network Radio - he had become the youngest CBS staff announcer in 1933 at age 19. By 24 he was the announcer/singer and foil for Eddie Cantor. When he enlisted in the Army in 1940, Parks had seven years of network experience to his credit. But few of his assignments allowed him do what he did best - host programs and interact with contestants with his gift of ad-lib. (7)
Break The Bank was a simple general knowledge quiz for teams of two contestants - often married couples. It was similar to the Take It Or Leave It format that awarded mounting cash prizes for each correct answer - but with one important difference. Phil Baker’s quiz topped off at $64 - a paltry sum where Parks and his contestants were just getting started toward Bank’s jackpot of $1,000 or more - often much more. The show made news during its first ABC season by awarding nearly $5,800 to one couple who correctly recited the last line to “A Visit From Saint Nicholas” aka “The Night Before Christmas.” It was the largest cash amount yet awarded by a radio program. (8) Within a year Break The Bank would be among the season’s Top 50 shows and part of ABC’s winning Friday lineup.
More Hush Money. Ralph Edwards had created a monster on Truth Or Consequences with the previous season’s “Mr. Hush” contest. He topped it with “Mrs. Hush” in early 1947 by allowing listeners to Saturday’s Number One show to participate in the game and by adding a charity angle to the giveaway. Edwards invited his home audience into the chase for the contest’s mounting jackpot of prizes, telling them to submit letters that completed the sentence, “We should all support the March of Dimes because....” He coyly added that although it wasn’t really necessary, listener donations to the charity accompanying contest entries would be gratefully accepted
.
Each week three letters were chosen and those listeners were given a crack at identifying the mystery woman from clues she had recorded in hushed tones. With every incorrect answer the jackpot grew to include a new Ford convertible, a Cessna airplane, a mink coat and diamond ring, a camping trailer and a television set. By mid-March the jackpot contained 23 huge prizes with a total value over $17,500, when a Chicago housewife correctly revealed “Mrs. Hush” to be Clara Bow, the “It Girl” of silent films.
But the real winners of the contest were Edwards himself and the March of Dimes. Before Bow was identified Truth Or Consequences ratings had jumped into the 20's and the charity had collected $555,000 from over 700,000 contest entries. (See Truth Or Consequences.)
Parade’s March In April. Three months short of ten full seasons on CBS, American Tobacco abruptly moved Your Hit Parade to NBC in April. It also shifted the show’s production from New York to Hollywood - a concession in its rumored negotiations to bring Frank Sinatra back as its star the following season. The rumor proved to be true.
Saturday night time for the Lucky Strike program on NBC was cleared when The Roy Rogers Show left the air. The overworked “King of The Cowboys” had been cranking out musical adventures for Republic Pictures at a clip of one every seven weeks for three years after the studio lost his stable mate Gene Autry in a contract dispute. Rogers’ 9.2 rating for Miles Laboratories’ Alka Seltzer was little better than the 9.0 registered by the final NBC season of National Barn Dance, which Miles cancelled in September after 13 years. Your Hit Parade hardly missed a beat in its network switch, delivering a 30% increase in ratings over Rogers’ show to NBC. The weekly countdown of hits would remain a Saturday Top Ten show in its new home for the next five seasons.
The News Behind The News. Seven of the Top Ten Multiple Run programs were news and news commentaries. But the ratings of those newscasts had dwindled since the end of World War II. Lowell Thomas led all Multiple Runs but turned in his lowest season rating in nine years, an 11.3. H .V. Kaltenborn and Gabriel Heatter had their lowest ratings in seven years and NBC’s News of The World with John W. Vandercook and Morgan Beatty finished with its lowest rating since its debut five years earlier. Only Mutual’s conservative voice, Fulton Lewis, Jr., had a fractional gain in his numbers.
News would always have a presence in Multiple Run programming but it was the final season in which Thomas or any of his colleagues would be Number One in the category.
(1) ABC had no policy against transcribed programs. Just the opposite, ABC had encouraged the technology earlier in the year by introducing a recording/rebroadcasting technique to its affiliates to avoid the confusion caused by Daylight Saving Time differences among cities.
(2) Philco Radio Time's first two seasons were broadcast from disc and the third from tape.
(3) ABC had 143 affiliates when Noble bought the network in 1943 and billings were $24.9 Million. Under Mark Woods’ leadership the network’s affiliate roster had grown over 50% and its billings increased over 60%.
(4) Despite his own show’s success, Phil Harris remained in Jack Benny’s cast until 1952.
(5) Johnson entered the Army in 1946 and was replaced for the remainder of Inner Sanctum’s run by Paul McGrath.
(6) Hammett only collected royalties for the use of his name and the “inspiration” for the character, based on Sidney Greenstreet’s fat villain, Kasper Gutman, in the film version of Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon. Jack Smart was a natural to star in the 1951 Universal film, The Fat Man, co-starring two young studio contract players, Rock Hudson and Julie London.
(7) Joining the Army as a private in 1940, Bert Parks emerged four years later as a captain with a Bronze Star for service under fire in the Burmese/Indo-China theater, setting up communications links for forces under the command of General “Vinegar Joe” Stillwell.
(8) The correct answer with the often missed words underscored: “But I heard him exclaim ere he drove out of sight - Happy Christmas to all and to all a goodnight.”
Top 50 Network Programs - 1946-47
C.E. Hooper, Semi-monthly Reports, Sep 1946-Jun 1947
Total Programs Rated 6-11 p.m.: 199. Programs Rated 13 Weeks & Ranked: 169
33,998,000 Radio Homes 89.9% Coverage of US One Rating Point = 340,000 Homes
1 1 Bob Hope Show 27.6 Lever Bros/Pepsodent Tue 10:00 30 NBC
2 2 Fibber McGee & Molly 26.4 Johnson Wax Tue 9:30 30 NBC
3 6 Jack Benny Program 25.8 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sun 7:00 30 NBC
4 7 Fred Allen Show 23.4 Standard Brands/Tenderleaf Tea Sun 8:30 30 NBC
5 4 Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy 22.8 Standard/Chase & Sanborn Sun 8:00 30 NBC
6 3 Red Skelton Show 22.2 Brown & Williamson/Raleigh & Kools Tue 10:30 30 NBC
7 14 Amos & Andy 22.1 Lever Bros/Rinso Laundry Soap Tue 9:00 30 NBC
8 5 Lux Radio Theater 21.9 Lever Bros/Lux Soap Mon 9:00 60 CBS
9 9 Walter Winchell’s Jergens Journal 20.8 Jergens Lotion Sun 9:00 15 ABC
10 10 Screen Guild Players 20.0 Lady Esther Cosmetics Mon 10:00 30 CBS
11 11 Mister District Attorney 18.5 Bristol Myers/Vitalis Hair Tonic Wed 9:30 30 NBC
12 N Phil Harris & Alice Faye Show 17.9 F.W. Fitch/Fitch Shampoo Sun 7:30 30 NBC
13 N Bing Crosby Philco Radio Time 17.6 Philco Radios & Refrigerators Wed 10:00 30 ABC
14 35 Duffy’s Tavern 16 9 Bristol Myers/Ipana & Vitalis Wed 9:00 30 NBC
15t 34 Burns & Allen Show 15.2 General Foods/Maxwell House Thu 8:30 30 NBC
15t 19 Great Gildersleeve 15.2 Kraft Foods/Parkay Margarine Wed 8:30 30 NBC
17 19 Truth Or Consequences 14.8 Procter & Gamble/Duz Laundry Soap Sat 8:30 30 NBC
18 16 Take It Or Leave It 14.5 Eversharp Pens & Pencils Sun 10:00 30 CBS
19 12 Eddie Cantor Show 14.4 Pabst Beer Thu 10:30 30 NBC
20 21 Joan Davis Show 13.9 Lever Bros/Swan Soap Mon 8:30 25 CBS
21 25 Big Town 13.7 Sterling Drug/Ironized Yeast Tue 8:00 30 CBS
22t 24 Judy Canova Show 13.5 Colgate Palmolive Peet/Halo Shampoo Sat 10:00 30 NBC
22t 36 Suspense 13.5 Roma Wines Thu 8:00 30 CBS
24t 42 Inner Sanctum 13.3 Emerson Drug/Bromo Seltzer Mon 8:00 30 CBS
24t 17 Abbott & Costello Show 13.3 RJ Reynolds/Camels Thu 10:00 30 NBC
26t 22 Aldrich Family 13.2 General Foods/Grapenuts Cereal Thu 8:00 30 CBS
26t 49 Fanny Brice Baby Snooks Show 13.2 General Foods/Jello Fri 8:00 30 CBS
26t 28 Life of Riley 13.2 Procter & Gamble/Dreft Laundry Soap Sat 8:00 30 NBC
29t 37 Bob Hawk Show 13.1 RJ Reynolds/Camel Mon 7:30 30 CBS
29t 38 A Date With Judy 13.1 Lewis & Howe/Tums Antacid Tue 8:30 30 NBC
31 47 The FBI In Peace & War 13.0 Procter & Gamble/Lava Hand Soap Thu 8:30 25 CBS
32 28 People Are Funny 12.7 Brown & Williamson/Raleighs & Kools Fri 9:00 30 NBC
33 32 Your Hit Parade 12.6 American Tobacco/Lucky Strike Sat 9:00 30 NBC (1)
34 N A Day In The Life of Dennis Day 12.5 Colgate/Lustre Cream Wed 8:00 30 NBC (2)
35 43 Blondie 12.4 Lever Bros/Super Suds Laundry Soap Sun 7:30 30 CBS
36t 13 Jack Haley & Eve Arden's Village Store 12.3 Sealtest Dairies Thu 9:30 30 NBC
36t 39 Mr & Mrs North 12.3 Andrew Jergens/Woodbury Soap Wed 8:00 30 NBC
38t N Casey Crime Photographer 11.8 Anchor Hocking Glass Thu 9:30 30 CBS
38t 43 Manhattan Merry Go Round 11.8 Sterling Drug/Dr Lyons Tooth Powder 9:00 30 NBC
40t 84 Dick Haymes Show 11.7 Autolite Spark Plugs Thu 9:00 30 CBS
40t 23 Dr Christian 11.7 Vaseline Wed 8:30 25 CBS
42t 26 Can You Top This? 11.6 Colgate Shave Cream Sat 9:30 30 NBC
42t N Kraft Music Hall 11.6 Kraft/Philadelphia Cream Cheese Thu 9:00 30 NBC
44 43 American Album of Familiar Music 11.4 Sterling Drug/Bayer Aspirin Sun 9:30 30 NBC
45 40 Lowell Thomas News 11.3 Sun Oil M-F 6:45 15 NBC
46 85 Gangbusters 11.2 Waterman Pens Sat 9:00 30 ABC
47 78 Adventures of The Thin Man 11.1 General Foods/Sanka Coffee Fri 8:30 25 CBS
48 53 We The People 11.0 Gulf Oil Sun 10:30 30 CBS
49t 56 Doctor IQ 10.9 Mars Candies Mon 10:30 30 NBC
49t 49 Jimmy Durante & Garry Moore Show 10.9 Rexall Drugs Fri 9:30 30 CBS
(1) Your Hit Parade Sep - Mar Lucky Strike Cigarettes Sat 9:00 45 CBS
(2) A Day In The Life of Dennis Day Sep - Dec Lustre Cream Shampoo Thu 7:30 30 NBC
This post is in part abridged from Network Radio Ratings, 1932-1953.
Copyright © 2012 & 2019, Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com