Radio House Books

This is more obscure than it probably should be. I found a book on the imprint "Radio House Books." It's publisher was George W. Stewart, Inc. His operated from at least 1936 and 1951. The earliest book I found was The Stewart Simplified Method of Mimicry and Parlor Amusement. I suspect that's a different Stewart. The other works are all primarily from the 1940s and also primarily non-fiction: history, criticism, economics, sociology and a little bit of English drama. The address in the book plate is 67 W. 44th Street, New York, NY. Note on disambiguation: there was a well-published professor at the University of Iowa by that name, a few notable military men, and a newspaperman. These are all different George Stewarts.

But then there is our George W. Stewart. He was the author of "I Have a book" published in 1940. I found a copy of the Who What Why Is radio text scanned on line. [SOURCE] It refers to the Jerome Still book as "Still in preparation."  

 

In the introduction of The Radio Station, Jerome Still thanks Robert J. Landry which is an interesting connection. Landry even writes the introduction to the book. Landry himself is a mystery. In 1963 - 1979 the editor of Variety was a Robert J. Landry. He also wrote a book This Fascinating Radio Business, published by Bobbs-Merrill in 1946. Back in the 1940s he was the Director of Program writing at CBS.  The 2004 Encyclopedia of Radio confirms they are one and the same. Jerome Sill also thanks Sherman Marshall at WOLF, Nathan Lord of WAVE, and Joseph Creamer of WOR, all unknown radio men today.

Title	Author	Year	link
Who, What, Why Is Radio?	Robert J. Landry	1942	LINK
All Children Listen	Dorothy Gordon	1942	N/A
The Radio Station: Management, Function, Future	Jerome Sill	1946	LINK
Time For Reason About Radio	Lyman Bryson	1948	LINK

The three books are all rare, but none more so than the Dorothy Gordon text. She was the moderator of The New York Times Youth Forum, a weekly radio and television program on WQXR. It aired from 1943 to 1960. In 1960 it was picked up by WNBC-TV and aired until her death in 1970. The program brought together a panel of high school AND/or college students and an adult guest in discussion. Gordon won a McCalls Golden Mike award in 1952 [SOURCE] and a Peabody award in 1963 [SOURCE]. In 1942 the book some classroom discussion guides mention Gordon's book. All together she wrote at least 7 books.

• Sing It Yourself - 1928
• Around The World In Song - 1930
• Dorothy Gordon's Treasure Bag Of Game Song 1939
• Come To France 1940
• Knowing The Netherlands - 1940
• All Children Listen 1942
• You And Democracy - 1951

The Jerome Sill book is easier to find, and will cost half as much as the Gordon text. I saw one with the dust jacket on eBay. This appears to be his only book, thought it's widely quoted in other radio station management texts. A similar Jerome Sill worked in advertising in the 1930s into 1940s writing for Advertising & Selling magazine. There was  Jerome Sill of WMLO Milwaukee who led an independent station revolt in 1947 against a new NAB code. Jerome Sill pops up as the Promotions director of WNEW in 1944, formerly of the Aarons, Sill & Caron an ad agency in Detroit. I think these are all the same man. His letter of protest was widely quoted:

"Should this code be adopted in it's preset form, we might be in the position of being forced to withdraw from the NAB or be dishonest in our tacit acceptance of a code to which we could not sincerely subscribe. We would choose the former course."

If it's him he appears as the general manage of WMIL in Milwaukee in 1953, part owner of WREX in Duluth. He founded WAGE-TV in Greenbay in 1954. There was a Jerome Still who owned WFPG in Atlantic City, New Jersey 1960 and 1961, perhaps the same man. as the primary share-holder of WFPG Inc. he acquired the station in 1956,

 

The interval between the book publishing dates is peculiar. Two books the first year, then none for 3 years, and then one for another two. The Lyman Bryson book does advertise the prior three titles but it's unlike them in other ways. The first three books analyze radio management, and radio programming. Bryson's book is a transcript from a series of talks on CBS from the series "Time For Reason."  The show ran for 27 weekly episodes airing Sunday afternoons from December 1946 to June 1947. Bryson went on to become a frequent guest on the radio game show Information, Please. 

Bryson had been a teacher at Columbia University, but he also moderated The American School of The Air, Invitation to Learning and from 1938 to 1946 he hosted the publish affairs program The Peoples Platform. In many ways it was the adult version of Youth Forum, assembling a panel of laypeople to discuss areas of national interest. Publishers Weekly wrote a review in 1948 in advance of it's February 19th release date.

Some mysteries persist. There was never a fifth book in the series and George W. Stewart seems to stop operating in the early 1950s. The latest books are in a new series, a "Cookery Library" with a series of specialized cook books on coffee and cheese and a random Bible Quiz. In 1951 he published a book about war propaganda and by all appearances, nothing after that.