➦In 1890...radio & film actor/announcer/host/narrator Gayne Whitman was born in Chicago. He appeared in 213 films, while in OTR radio, he played the title role in Chandu the Magician, was a key anouncer for Dupont on NBC’s prestige series Cavalcade of America, and hosted or narrated several lesser known series. He died Aug. 31 1958 at age 68.
➦In 1912...Russ Case born in Hamburg, Iowa (Died – October 10, 1964). He was a trumpeter and bandleader who led jazz and light music orchestras.
His professional career began when he was hired at WOC-AM in Davenport, Iowa to arrange and play trumpet with local bands on broadcasts. He worked with Frankie Trumbauer in Chicago and Paul Whiteman in New York City, then was hired by NBC to arrange for radio and television. He led orchestras which accompanied broadcasts of singers such as Eddy Arnold and Julius LaRosa, but became best known for directing ensembles behind Perry Como, including on his hit single "Till the End of Time".
Case lent his name to dozens of light orchestral albums which were released in the 1950s, and arranged for The Jackie Gleason Show in the 1960s. He also served as conductor for cast recordings of musicals such as Finian's Rainbow, The King and I, The Music Man, My Fair Lady, and Oklahoma!
➦In 1928...Radio performer Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll departed WGN radio in Chicago to head across town to WMAQ radio.
Gosden and Correll were white actors familiar with minstrel traditions. Both men had some scattered experience in radio, but it was not until 1925 that the two appeared on Chicago's WQJ. Their appearances soon led to a regular schedule on another Chicago radio station, WEBH, where their only compensation was a free meal. The pair hoped that the radio exposure would lead to stage work; they were able to sell some of their scripts to local bandleader Paul Ash, which led to jobs at the Chicago Tribune's station WGN in 1925. This lucrative offer enabled them to become full-time broadcasters. The Victor Talking Machine Company also offered them a recording contract.
Since the Tribune syndicated Sidney Smith's popular comic strip The Gumps, which had successfully introduced the concept of daily continuity, WGN executive Ben McCanna thought a serialized version would work on radio. He suggested that Gosden and Correll adapt The Gumps for radio. The idea seemed to involve more risk than either Gosden or Correll was willing to take; neither was adept at imitating female voices, which would have been necessary for The Gumps. They were also conscious of having made names for themselves with their previous act. By playing the roles of characters using dialect, they would be able to conceal their identities enough to be able to return to their old pattern of entertaining if the radio show was a failure.
Instead, they proposed a series about "a couple of colored characters", which, nevertheless, borrowed certain elements from The Gumps. Their new show, Sam 'n' Henry, began on January 12, 1926, and fascinated radio listeners throughout the Midwest. It became so popular that in 1927 Gosden and Correll requested that it be distributed to other stations on phonograph records in a "chainless chain" concept that would have been the first radio syndication. When WGN rejected the proposal, Gosden and Correll quit the show and the station; their last musical program for WGN was announced in the Chicago Daily Tribune on January 29, 1928. Correll's and Gosden's characters contractually belonged to WGN, so the pair was unable to use the character names when performing in personal appearances after leaving the station.
WMAQ, the Chicago Daily News station, hired Gosden and Correll and their former WGN announcer, Bill Hay, to create a series similar to Sam 'n' Henry. It offered higher salaries than WGN as well as the right to pursue the syndication idea. The creators later said that they named the characters Amos and Andy after hearing two elderly African-Americans greet each other by those names in a Chicago elevator. Amos 'n' Andy began on March 19, 1928 on WMAQ, and prior to airing each program, Gosden and Correll recorded their show on 78-rpm discs at Marsh Laboratories, operated by electrical recording pioneer Orlando R. Marsh. Early 1930s broadcasts of the show originated from the El Mirador Hotel in Palm Springs, CA.
For the program's entire run as a nightly series in its first decade, Gosden and Correll provided over 170 male voice characterizations. With the episodic drama and suspense heightened by cliffhanger endings, Amos 'n' Andy reached an ever-expanding radio audience. It was the first radio program to be distributed by syndication in the United States, and by the end of the syndicated run in August 1929, at least 70 other stations carried recorded episodes.
Quinlan was killed in an auto accident after leaving a golf outing during spring training of 1965. He was an avid golfer, and a charity golf tournament in his name has been held in the Chicago area ever since.
In 1984....KSD-AM (now KTRS) in St Louis MO changed call letters to KUSA. The change came under Gannett ownership. After a short-lived all-news format, on which Gannett pulled the plug just as KSD was beginning to build an audience, KSD went to country and adopted the call letters KUSA. The call letters were restored by EZ Communications when it bought KSD-AM/FM in 1993. The call letters were switched back to KSD on October 4, 1993.
Unfortunately, the station lost the call letters again when it was sold to the Dorsey Media Group of St. Louis. EZ’s successor, American Radio Systems, retained the KSD call letters for use on KSD-FM.
➦In 1987...Radio writer Arch Oboler died at age 77. He was best known for the series "Lights Out".
Oboler entered radio because he believed it had great unrealized potential for telling stories with ideas. He thought that the medium was being wasted on soap operas.
In 1933, he wrote a spec script called Futuristics, which satirized the world of the present in light of the future. NBC bought Oboler's script and broadcast it as part of a dedicatory program to NBC's new futuristic headquarters in New York City, Radio City. The broadcast was a success, but it set the stage for Oboler's future run-ins with broadcasters. In the play, one of Oboler's characters lampoons the slogan of American Tobacco. At that time in broadcasting history, making fun of commercials was still taboo
➦In 2003...Harry Harrison aired his last show at WCBS 101.1 FM in NYC.
In 1953, Harrison worked at WCFL as a summer replacement, yet remained there eight months, substituting for the permanent DJs. Harrison became program director at WPEO, Peoria in 1954 and hosted the morning show as the "Morning Mayor of Peoria." In just six months, Harrison made WPEO the top station.
Often, he scored the highest ratings on WMCA. WABC program director Rick Sklar took note. In 1968, when WABC morning man Herb Oscar Anderson left the station, Rick Sklar hired Harrison to replace him.
Every year, Harrison played seasonal songs, such as his holiday greeting "May You Always” in the winter (the Amy records single of this song made the Billboard Christmas charts in 1965), and Allan Sherman's summer camp novelty, "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh", throughout the summer months.
WABC personalities included, along with Harrison, Charlie Greer, Scott Muni, Bob Lewis, Lundy, Johnny Donovan, Dan Ingram, "Cousin Brucie" Bruce Morrow, Chuck Leonard, Bob Cruz, Frank Kingston Smith, and Roby Yonge, and others.
Harrison had a number of "trademark" phrases, such as "Morning, Mom", "Every brand new day should be opened like a precious gift", "Stay well, stay happy, stay right here" and "Harry Harrison wishing you the best... because that's exactly what you deserve!”
Harrison was let go from WABC as the station changed direction in November 1979
On April 25, 1997 New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani issued a proclamation, naming April 25 "Harry Harrison Day" in honor of the second "Mayor."
On March 19, 2003, after a 44-year career in New York radio, Harrison left WCBS-FM, saying "I am not retiring." His farewell to his loyal radio friends (from 5:30 to 10:00am) was held before a live audience at the Museum of Television and Radio in New York City. It offered old airchecks plus guest appearances by WCBS-FM colleagues Don K. Reed, Bobby Jay, Steve O'Brien, Randy Davis and Dan Taylor, his replacement, as well as his son and daughter, Patti. Harrison took phone calls from Bob Shannon, Mike Fitzgerald, Ed Baer, and Ron Lundy.
Shortly after he left WCBS-FM, Harrison's long-time wife, Patti, who he had always referred to as "Pretty Patti" on the air, died.
Harrison returned to WCBS-FM with a Saturday morning show in 2004. It offered two hours of variety and two hours of Beatles music and memories.
On Memorial Day, May 30, 2005, Harry and "Cousin" Bruce Morrow were guests on WABC Radio’s annual Rewound show. Four days later, on June 3, WCBS-FM ended its "oldies" format, in favor of the new "Jack" format. However, as a result of listener disapproval, the WCBS-FM Oldies format was brought back on July 12, 2007, in a 'Classic Hits' modernized form.
Harry Harrison was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2019 and died January 28, 2020.
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| 1996 |
Rivers was a veteran of 17 years in country radio, most of it spent at WQYK-FM Tampa, Fla., where he served, at various times, as PD, morning host and VP/GM. His career also included a stint as PD/morning host at WMZQ Washington, D.C.
The industry heaped awards on him, including the rare double honor as top personality of the year in both the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music.
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| 2004 |
Rivers died after going to sleep March 19 in Chicago, where he worked the last year of his life as operations manager at WUSN-FM. According to his mother, The cause of death was bronchial asthma, a chronic condition he battled much of his life.
He started working the 7 p.m. to midnight shift at Tampa's WQYK-FM . By 1990, at just 24, he had moved up to program director, launching WQYK's era of ratings dominance and eventual recognition by the CMA as the nation's top country station.
➦In 2005...Morris Blum died from cancer at age 95. Blum started WANN-AM in 1947 in Annapolis, Maryland and pioneered the idea of black programming, playing gospel and rhythm and blues.
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| Morris Blum |
"When my father returned home, he witnessed a lot of racism and recognized the barriers many in the Annapolis community faced. He loved nothing more than having guests in the air studio who had never spoken their mind freely before. This was an amazing thing for African-Americans, too."
Carl Snowden, a civil rights activist and former Annapolis City councilman, told the Baltimore Sun that Blum "spent the better part of his life fighting against bigotry. He averted a catastrophe in Annapolis at the time of Dr. Martin Luther King's death in 1968. He opened the station and allowed the African-American community to come of the radio and voice its concern. There were uplifting comments that allayed fear here."
➦In 2006...William Charles Beutel died at age 75 (Born - December 12, 1930). He was a radio, television reporter, journalist and anchor. He was best known for working over four decades with the American Broadcasting Company, spending much of that time anchoring newscasts for WABC-TV in New York City. He also was an ABC radio network newscaster before ABC Radio's split into 4 networks on January 1, 1968. After the split he reported on the American Contemporary Network as did his Eyewitness partner Roger Grimsby.
After a stint in the Army, Beutel graduated from Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire and then studied law at the University of Michigan Law School, though he left Michigan without obtaining his law degree. While Beutel was in law school, he wrote Edward R. Murrow a letter saying, "I very much wanted to be a radio journalist." Beutel received a letter back advising him to go to the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. His first radio job was in Cleveland before moving to CBS Radio in New York City in 1957.
➦In 2012…Entertainment journalist and one-time radio personality Norman Mark died of multiple myeloma at the age of 72.
To many Chicagoans, Mark may have been best known for his work for more than a decade as WMAQ-Ch. 5's entertainment reporter and film critic. But Mr. Mark also had worked for 13 years as a writer and TV critic at the Chicago Daily News, hosted radio shows on WIND-AM and WAIT-AM during the late '70s and '80s, wrote both fiction and nonfiction books, and contributed freelance articles to the Chicago Sun-Times.
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