DJ Shorty Fincher

I bumped into Shorty Fincher before, reading about Lucky Lang. Shorty was actually named Luther Clark “Shorty” Fincher and he was born in 1899 in Iukia, MS according to his biography in this song book. I am aware of one other Fincher song book and it's dates with a signature to 1941. [SOURCE] At that time he was on WORK in York, PA. I suspect my song book is the older of the two, being more plain, having possibly a 1937 or 1938 publication.

As is often the case his obituary reveals more information than any other source. He died in 1958 and was 58 years old so his year of birth is accurate. Had he lived to the following November he'd have been 59. At the time he was operating Valley View Park in Hallam, PA. He was also a DJ on WGCB in Red Lion. The obit is probably the source for the alsobooks.com information stating the following

"Fincher came to York county in 1940, and his large car with steer horns on the radiator soon became a common sight. For a time he had a music group called Shorty Fincher and his Prarie Pals. He was heard on WORK and WNOW radio in his early years."

It gives the town he was born in as Iuki, MS which is not what the song book says. I am assuming they're both spelling variations of Iuka, MS. Regardless the family moved to Anniston, Alabama, when he was one year old. He was survived by his wife Alexandra "Sallie" Fincher, four sons: James, Fred,  and Donald; and a daughter Nellie named for his mother. the obit goes on to name all his siblings but hiding his sisters names behind their husbands as a Mrs. so they're not worth including. it was more interesting that many still lived around Anniston, AL but some were local to York or Philadelphia. More here.

One of 14 brothers he and two others started a band, The Cotton Pickers, in 1932. The Cotton Pickers included Shorty, his brother Hamilton (who performed as the comedian "Rawhide"), Alexandra Kaspura as "Lonesome Valley Sally," Florence "Yodeling Flo" Morosco, Dolph Hewitt and Ted Buchanan on guitar.  The Cotton-pickers relocated to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where they had a regular program on KQV-AM. Around then he recorded four sides for Columbia records as the "Crazy Hillbillies Band". [SOURCE] That name is due to a sponsorship from Crazy Water Crystals. He also recorded under the name Colonel Jack [Brinkley] and Shorty's Crazy Hillbillies, as well as six other sides for Okeh. 

If you didn't know, crazy water crystals were a laxative. It was disturbingly popular. The company sponsored radio programs all over the South. The Crazy Mountaineers, Dick Hartman's Tennessee Ramblers, The Crazy Hickory Nuts, The Lone Star Quartet, Shorty's Crazy Hillbillies, The Crazy water Crystal Gang, [SOURCE]  and the Crazy Water Crystal Program itself. Their ads and sponsored programs were aired on WBAP, WPTF, WBT, KRBC and several border blasters as well.

From that 1932 group Dolph Hewitt (aka Adolph Edward Hewitt) went on to a career of his own. He got into WWVA at the age of 16, over a year before Fincher. His first performed with Frankie More and his Log Cabin Gang. In the 1940s Dolph moved to St. Louis and performed at KMOX. That went well and he graduated to an ABC Radio Network slot with Pappy Cheshire’s Ozark Champions. In 1946 he joined Radio Station WLS with the Sage Riders on the National Barn Dance. He recorded several sides for Kapp and Victor records. More here.

Back in Pittsburgh, Hamilton Fincher was hired by Doc Williams as a comedian for his band, the Border Riders. Williams and the Border Riders went to Wheeling, West Virginia, along with Hamilton. Shorty Fincher followed them shortly thereafter with the Cotton Pickers and joined the WWVA Jamboree, which was broadcast on Saturday nights over WWVA from Wheeling. Through WWVA, Fincher also co-hosted his own show, the Shorty & Sally Fincher Jamboree Show, with Lonesome Valley Sally. 

 Some sources report that Shortly was operating an amusement park at Dreamers Beach in Delaware in 1949. But a 1949 issue of Billboard reports that the first Wisconsin folk music park began operation that May in West Bend, WI.  That's about 30 miles from Milwaukee. The issue specifically says that "Valley View Park, which was operated last year by Shorty Fincher, will run this year with Nemo Lippert, of the Range Riders."  That note would put Shortly in Wisconsin in 1948. Nemo Lippert was another country artist from PA. His range Riders performed on WNOW in York. He was later on WTPA-TV in Harrisburg.

 In this part of their career, Shorty and Sallie operated their own amusement park in Hellam, PA. Purportedly the park became more of a flea market in the 1960s after Shorty died. In 1953 The Emmitsburg Chronicle of Maryland puts Shorty Fincher and Sallie at a Firemen's carnival and ox roast. The York Dispatch has them at another Firemen's carnival in July of 1954. They were playing the country version of the oldies circuit, but I'm sure they had a good time. I found one obituary that stated Shorty was a disc jockey and salesman for radio station 1440 WGCB-AM in Red Lion, PA. The station signed on in 1950 so that narrows down the time frame. While Shorty died in 1958, Sallie lived until 1987 operating the park for decades after his passing. Joan Concilio of the York Dispatch has been writing a series of articles about the park's history that are highly recommended. [LINK]

Angst and Cooking (Part 2)

I had no idea this cookbook would warrant a part 2 post. But since I wrote that post in 2014 almost everyone mentioned has died. That first post is here; where I spent some time untangling all the Angst's: Alice, Helen, Roy, Bud, Lisa and I'm sure there were others. Just as the prior book was undated, so is this one. It seems intuitive that Volume 1 precedes Volume 2 but there was also a third one that lacks a "volume" appellation though it seems to precede both. Volume 2 has one magnificent difference, four pages of black and white head shots. I picked up this copy at a yard sale

The first  cookbook referred solely to WPAM. Then the first volume of this series lists both WLSH and WPAM on the cover. As you can see this one, Volume II, refers to WLSH on the cover, but mentioned WPAM on the inside text. Missing from my first post was the origin of WLSH. It signed on in 1952 as a 1,000 watt daytimer owned by Miners Broadcasting which also owned 1450 WPAM-AM and 1460 WMBA-AM. Bud Angst oversaw the construction of WLSH, so it's safe to say the Angst's were there from the get-go.  Bud died in 2016 and his obit [LINK] tells us a little more about all that:

"After graduating from high school Bud enlisted in the Coast Guard during WW2 & served as a radio operator in the Mediterranean. After the war Bud made radio his chosen career. Under the banner of Miners Broadcasting Service Bud & his partners established 3 AM radio stations in PA—WPAM Pottsville, WMBA Ambridge, & WLSH Lansford. WLSH signed on the air December 24, 1952 & it's where Bud called "home" for almost 40 years... In 1977 because of FCC duopoly rules, Bud became sole owner of WLSH. Miners Broadcasting Services was replaced by Pocono Anthracite Communications & all ties to WPAM & WMBA were severed."

That really fills in most of the gaps. That Facebook page also has great pictures of WLSH. That same obit mentions the programs that led to these cook books. "Alice's Ask Your Neighbor show spawned 2 very successful cookbooks during the 1970s..." Kelly Monitz Socha at Times News dates one of them to 1978. [LINK] That's further than I got back in 2014. But the Skook News reports that it was printed in 1974. [SOURCE] It further confirms the earlier edition that I found "There was another cookbook before "Volume 1", but it only had 16 pages of local recipes." 10,000 copies of Vol 1 were printed and then 20,000 copies of volume 2.

Alice Angst died in 2020, her obit [SOURCE] confirms that she's Bud's wife and that they met in 1946. She worked at both WPAM and WLSH, where she was the host of the long-running radio talk show, Ask Your Neighbor. It's branding appears on 2 of the 3 editions. Alice and Bud had two daughters, Bonnie (Bim) and Lisa. (Alice contributes a Roman Salad recipe and another for sausage stew.)

Helen Louise (Bouslough) Angst was the WPAM host, she died in 2021. Her obit [LINK] confirmed that she was a book-keeper at WPAM in Pottsville. I had assumed the program was simulcast but all sources confirm that Helen and Alice hosted their own shows, but co-edited the cook books. I think she was Bud's sister. (She contributes a classic Brownie recipe among other items.)

I wrote enough about Bud last time he was a beloved local figure in local radio, politics and civil society in the coal country around Lehighton. (He contributes one recipe for Broken leg hot punch.) Al Sword later worked at WTHT and became a newspaper reporter. It's hard to find more information about him despite the unique name. But Walter Reabold died in 2003 at the age of 76, he had long since left radio and was the manager for Progressive Merchants in Lehighton. (His wife Sarah contributed a good donut recipe, and a meatloaf with sausage to the cookbook.) Jack Meyers remains obscure. Sales people are like that.

Mark Osif remains a mystery but Mike Berzosky was still with WLSH as late as 1982 evidences by issues of the Hazelton Standard-Speaker newspaper. The Carbon-Tamaqua Unit of the American Cancer Society had it's seventh telethon back in 1986 and that too listed Mike Berzosk, though it's the last time I can find his name in print. He hosted the The Dutch Trader radio program, and it ran for at least 20 years so that makes sense. Jerry Tray pops up in a few sorts articles in the late 1980s, but most prominently in 1980 in a Pottsville Republican newspaper article about an FCC investigation putting him at WPAM and WZTA under Curran Communications apparently after leaving WLSH.

"Another former Curran Communications employee, Jerry Tray, told The REPUBLICAN that he had been ordered on numerous occasions by James J.  Curran Jr. to slant the news. Tray, who worked at radio station WZTA, Lansford, and who was fired in June, 1979, for having a "bad attitude..."

I found one great article about Howard Ondick, the man had guts. When ordered by a judge to stop recording a public meeting Ondick said "no."  Hilarity did not ensue. But under pressure in a room of reporters the prison commission backed down. [SOURCE] The man has chutzpah. His name later appears in conjunction with WPPA and WAVT in Pottsville, I'm pretty confident that's the same news man.

Billie Schuetrumpf got married to Michael Harakel and fades from the record. Michael's obit mentions that she was still alive in 2017. Her name is one of the few here who also appears in that pre-duopoly edition of the cook book along with Theresa Homick and Mary Jane Yeager who are absent here. (Except that Yeager contributed a recepie for Lime French Dressing.) Lisa Angst Long Kowalsi passed in 2022, she had was the owner of her own accounting firm LA Long and Associates. Evelyn C. (Kenlin) Kowatch died just last year. She had been the Postmaster for the Andreas United States Postal Office and was retired. 

Herb Davis is one of several in radio with that name notably at WCKY and "Mr. Money" on the Channel 20 daily game show in DC "Dialing for Dollars. He is neither of those gents. Barbara (DeGiosio) Giantesano survived her husband Richard in 2020. Stella DiFebo died in 1992. Her obit says that she was born in Italy and was known locally as "Aunt Stella" as a frequent contributor to the "Ask Your Neighbor" cooking show on WLSH in Lansford. (She contributes very meaty recipes for venison, beef brisket, leg of lamb, bacon ribs.)
 

In 1989, Bud sold WLSH radio to Harold G. Fulmer III of Allentown. The Fulmer family continues to own & operate WLSH today. In 2014 WLSH and the American Cancer Society partnered to reprint the Great Radio Ask Your Neighbor Cookbook so in addition to my yellowed copies, there are fresh printings out there. They printed another 1,000 copies, and they're more affordable then the local collector items that are going for $50 now.

Works Cited

 

I've been at this for almost 20 years now and gradually I've noticed that this blog has been cited a few times as a primary source. I do quite a bit of original research so why not? It's nice that it gets added to the cannon so to speak. So it has come to pass that I've tried to catalog all these citations and well, there are a lot more than I expected.

Wikipedia has been pilfering my content for years without attribution. But real authors cite their sources, so this URL has been appearing in nonfiction books, and even school text books almost since it's inception in 2005. The tally is Eight books, 14 periodicals and a whole bevy of thesis papers.

Text	Author	Publisher	Year
Cue the Sun!: The Invention of Reality TV	Nussbaum, Emily	Penguin Random House	2024
The Beautiful Spy: The Life and Crimes of Vera Eriksen	Tremain, David	History Press	2019
Radio After the Golden Age: The Evolution of American Broadcasting Since 1960	Cox, Jim	McFarland & Company	2013
White Robes and Burning Crosses: A History of the Ku Klux Klan from 1866	Newton, Michael	McFarland & Company	2014
Marketing Recorded Music: How Music Companies Brand and Market Artists	Donham, Tammy	Routledge	2006
Sound Recording and Reproduction	Russell, Jesse	Lennex Corp	2012
Pengembangan Media Audio/Radio	Ajar, Bahan	Susilaning	2022
Guglielmo Marconi: Marquess, Radio, Invention of radio, History of radio	McBrewser, John	Apphascipt	2009

 

But that's just books, what about magazines, newspapers and other periodicals. Well there are even more. This is just what I'm aware of, there's probably more out there:

Periodical/ Issue	Article	Author	Year
Discuts: Numero 3	De: Mysterieux Discques!	Malbert, Alexis	2011
The WASHRAG; Vol. 22, Issue 08	News Briefs	Wireless Association of South Hills	2020
DX News, Vol 89, Issue 01	The Sale of WMBI in Chicago	MacHard, Kenneth	2021
The Resonator. Vol 7, No. 9	The Way We Were	Belghaus, Fred	2022
The Resonator. Vol 7, No. 10	The Way We Were	Belghaus, Fred	2022
The Resonator. Vol 5, No. 6	The Way We Were	Belghaus, Fred	2020
The Resonator. Vol 5, No. 5	The Way We Were	Belghaus, Fred	2020
Galene 61, Number 80	Bulletin del'Association	Galene 61	2016
Radiorama, Number 114	RadiDal 1982 dalla parte del Radioascoltorama	Radiorama	2021
SARA News, June 2021	From NAA to Today: A Breif Look at Commercial and Military Call Letters	Lynch, Jim	2021
The Barn No. 351	Beaumont Amateur Radio Club	Horzepa, Stan	2022
Paper Radio, No 12	First Broadcast From a Train	Moe, Frederick	2014
ARSC Journal Vol. 44, No. 1	Let's Go Surfing	Brooks, Tim	2013
The Blurb	Did You Know?	Phil-Mont Mobile Radio Club	2021

The Lost Lost World

I'm reading the book The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner. It's not about running. It's a book by Alan Sillitoe about the bleak working class life in Nottingham, England; published in 1959. It's not about radio. (It's not about music either, though Sillitoe has inspired both The Smiths and the Arctic Monkeys.) My copy is a very crumbly Signet paperback which may not survive this reading. It's not about radio. But there was a passing reference which is relevant to our on-going radio theme here:

"The governor would have a fit if he could see me sliding down the bank because I could break my neck or ankle, but I can't not do it because its the only risk I take and the only excitement I ever get , flying flat out like one of them pterodactyls from the 'Lost World' I once heard on the wireless..."

This seemed to be a reference from life. Alan Sillitoe, having been born in 1928 could have heard the Lost World on the BBC either as a youth or an adult, or both. The reference even contextualizes the time and place of the novel.But which broadcast was he referring to?

The Lost World was written by Arthur Conan Doyle and first published in 1912, [LINK]. So it wasn't new, but already becoming a classic when Sillitoe was a young man. The Lost World has been translated into a radio drama many times. Ever popular, "Lost Worlds" have become their own sub-genre of science fiction. Because of that timeline, we have the interesting question of which version Sillitoe was referring to. Sillitoe would have been about sixteen in 1944, the same age as the fictional protagonist Colin Smith. For that reason I favor the first two broadcast versions, and generally the 1944 BBC broadcast. Sillitoe would have been 21 for the 1949 version and already on a military pension in France recovering from tuberculosis.

I've collated multiple sources which describe various radio versions of the Lost World, those include: the Conan Doyle website, and the books Carbon Dates by Donald F. Glut, and  Dinosaurs by the Decades by Randy Moore. The sources all reference different but largely overlapping catalogs of the different radio adaptations. The three  that predate the Sillitoe book are from 1938, 1944 and 1949. That first 1938 radio script of Lost World was written by the playright Mervyn Mills and broadcast by the BBC as six, 45-minute episodes from 2 November, 1938 on Wednesday. (Mills also wrote the pulp novel Long Haul.) 

Title	Episodes	Station/Release	Year	Link
The Lost World	6	BBC	1938	N/A
The Lost World	6	BBC	1944	N/A
The Lost World	6	BBC Light Programme	1949	N/A
The Lost World	5	BBC	1952	N/A
The Lost World	1	BBC	1958	N/A
Dinosaurs!	4	MGM/Leo the Lion Records	1966	LINK
The Lost World	3	BBC Radio 4 Classic Serial)	1975	LINK
The Lost World	1	BBC1 (BBC for Schools)	1975	LINK
The Lost World	3	(RNZ) Radio New Zealand	1980	N/A
The Lost World	3	Audio book & VHS	1997	LINK
The Lost World	2	BBC Radio 4 Classic Serial	2011	LINK

In 1944 BBC Secretary Peggy Wells wrote a six, 25-minute episode version, which was broadcast live in April and May that year. Wells contributions to radio are under-appreciated, she adapted world by Noel Coward, H.E. Bates, A.A. Milne, Jane Austen, Graham Greene, Hugh Williams, Thomas Anstey Guthrie and she also contributed works to the program Saturday Night Theater plays on BBC into the 1970s. There is no complete source for her contributions though she appears multiple times in the book Women Writers Dramatized by H. Philip Bolton. She started at the BBC before 1945, and by the 1970s her name literally appeared in the BBC Handbook. More here.  

That 1944 version was a dramatic reading starring Carr as the sole narrator, playing the part of all characters. Carr is better known today as a writer of detective novels. Born in the US in 1906, he relocated to England in the 1930s. There became an author, and in addition to his 52 detective novels, also wrote radio plays. His scripts appeared in the Suspense series, and other works for the BBC. In the 1940s he even hosted the series Murder by Experts, which was broadcast on WOR for the Mutual network. More here.

Carr was a genuine fan of Doyle. In 1945 he wrote radio adaptions for two other Doyle tales: The Adventure of the Speckled Band, and Silver Blaze. Later in 1948, Doyle's son, Adrian granted Carr access to family papers so that he could write an official biography of Arthur Conan Doyle published in 1949: The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. 

Peggy Wells revised her 1944 script in 1949 for producer Ayton Whitaker for a live October broadcast on the BBC Light Programme. The cast included with narrator Richard Williams, and actors: Abraham Sofaer, Ivor Barnard, Lewis Stringer, Cyril Gardiner.  In 1952 an adaptation by John Keir Cross was broadcast in five 20-minute episodes. (He was the author of Angry Planet) More here. According to Robert Lewis Taylor, writing for the New Yorker in 1951, [SOURCE] Adrian Doyle specifically requested that John Dickson Carr act in an advisory capacity for the1944 radio adaptation. Carr's biography, The Man who Explained Miracles, by Douglas Greene does not credit Whitaker or Wells leading to some dubious attribution in secondary sources.

The 1958 version is poorly documented. But the basic facts are known and documented on the BBC website. It was broadcast on Thursday January 2nd, 1958 at 5:00 PM on BBC Home Service Basic, on the program Children's Hour. Generally described as "excerpts" it was adapted by Marion MacWilliam and Ian G. Ball. The cast included: Olive Shapley as host, Hilda Lewis, Effie Morrison, Joan Fitzpatrick, Cuthbertson Leonard Maguire, David Webster and Eileen McCallum.

In 1975, Barry Campbell was commissioned to revise Peggy Wells' 1944 scripts and convert them into three, 55-minute episodes. But by then Well's 2nd episode script was already lost. It had to be creatively reconstructed before the broadcast. That versions cast included Francis de Wolff, Gerald Harper, Kevin McHugh, and Carleton Hobbs. Campbell adapted enough fiction into radio dramas that he has his own Discogs page.

I have also read that a second radio adaptation was released in 1975 as part of the "BBC for Schools" program which was not the same. The BBC Schools series aired from 1957 into 1983. But this specific broadcast does not seem to be well documented. Beyond being highly plausible, all I've found is a passing reference in an issue of Educational Television International magazine. 

The 1980 RNZ broadcast an adaptation produced by Peggy Wells and Barry Campbell. Peggy Wells would have to have been in her late 60s at this point in her career and without a doubt the most experienced adapter of the text. Campbell had revised the text only 5 years earlier for his version. The team up is interesting, clearly they knew each other from their time at the BBC. This version starred Terrence Cooper as Professor Challenger and was complete with incidental score and dinosaur audio effects. (Some sources incorrectly cite the broadcast date as 1982.) More here.

Terrence Cooper died in 1997 and likely missed the next popular adaptation aka the New Zealand version. This adaptation differs from the original version significantly. It was produced by The Alien Voices, a radio drama company and they performed live with a full team of foleys for sound effects. Alien Voices was founded by Star Trek actors Leonard Nimoy and John de Lancie. All the characters are played by actors from the Star Trek TV series. You can actually buy an audio book version of this one which I do recommend. 

The most recent version was on the BBC in 2011. That versions cast included Jamie Glover, Brian Robb Jonathan Forbes, Jasmine Hyde, Jane Whittenshaw, Nyasha Hatendi and Vinicius Salles. More here. Out of all those 11 versions, somewhat inexplicably the only one which was officially endorsed by the estate of Arthur Conan Doyle was the 1966 LP version (CH-1016) that came out in 1966 on MGM/ Leo the Lion records. It was narrated by Basil Rathbone. More here.

Cassette Magnetic Shield

tapemuzik.de

I had to transfer some cassette spools last year into new shells. In the process I noticed that new and old magnetic shields are very different sizes. Most are flat and roughly 25 mm x 12 mm. I've seen a few that had rounded angles on the outside edges but that seemed to just hold it in place inside the shell.

My thesis is that these have maintained roughly the same dimensions, but have decreased in thickness over time. I don't own a gaussmeter (dang) so I can't measure the effectiveness. I'm using a cheap Fowler caliper that uses a 1⁄1000  scale so we are doing this in thousandths like a luthier. I'm also using a mix of blank stock and retail cassettes to see if there's any difference there. This does require in some cases that I destroy the shell to access the magnetic shield. For their sacrifices we give our thanks.
 

artist/title	MFR	Year	size
The James Gang / Passin' thru	AMPEX	1972	30 thou
J. Geils Band	N/A	1973	28 thou
Rolling stones - Beggars Banquet	N/A	1976	25 thou
Certron HD90	Certron	1977	24 thou
SONY CHF 90	SONY	1978	30 thou
Maxell UD II 100	Maxell	1981	20 thou
Jorma Kaukonen (bootleg)	N/A	1982	28 thou
Rich Little - Comedy Edition	Radioshack	1983	9 thou
Maxell UDS II 90	Maxell	1985	21 thou
JVC dynarec GI-90	JVC	1988	21 thou
FUJI DR-II 90	FUJI	1990	22 thou
Rhino Humpers - Intense	N/A	1994	12 thou
P.U.S.A.	N/A	1996	12 thou
Reach the Sky - s/t	N/A	1997	10 thou
WKDU Live Vol 1	N/A	2013	11 thou
Allston Pudding - localz only	N/A	2014	15 thou
Tankini - dousuk	N/A	2017	12 thou
Heavy Discipline - demo	N/A	2019	10 thou
Strange Mono- bail fund benefit	N/A	2023	21 thou
Magnetic Responsibility / Naan Cul	N/A	2023	12 thou

I kept commercial tapes to a minimum in the sample because their date of manufacture is harder to narrow down. The few I kept are slot or coffin cases which more definitively date to the 1970s. Hypothetically some may date to the late 60s. Despite the haphazard sample, the trend here is pretty clear. I think the overage thickness has decreased by about 30-40%.  The thinnest shields are either very new or from old novelty recordings. (I'm looking at you Rich Little.)  

 While reading up on this I found a Billboard article from 1986. The article quoted Glenn Maenza, the manager of electronic engineering for CBS records and IEEE member. [SOURCE]

"Cassette quality is not affected by elimination of the shields since the shield typically reduced the 60/120 Hz level from -23 to -26 dB, relative to audible threshold levels..."

Maezenza did go on to say that he wasn't advocating removal of the shield. But ever cheaper manufacturing delivered the change anyway. Today new blank tapes (if you can find them) often have no shield at all!  Starting around 2015, I started noticing new blanks from TDK, Sony and Maxell completely lack the shield. Usually you can't tell from the audio alone. But depending on your deck and how close the motor is to your read head, you might pick up more 60 Hz noise with these newer, cheaper tapes. But if you're using cassettes... you're probably not a hard-core audiophile anyway.

**I may expend this article if I find more reliably dated recent blank tape stock.