Breakfast at Sardi's

September 1948 was a pivotal moment in the career of Jack McElroy, and it didn't go well.  But let's start there at the peak, the ABC-TV report on 1948 mentions McElroy and he gets a half page headshot on page 49 between Erwin Canham and Louella Parsons. [SOURCE]  

"All radio was saddened early last year by the sudden death of Tom Breneman, beloved host of Breakfast in Hollywood. A radio institution, Breneman had gained a reputation as a premier showman and it is in the same tradition of show business that his program continues on the ABC network as a cooperative feature with Jack McElroy at the helm."

The New York Times wrote about the change on September 12th that year with more detail and invoking a third name. 

"Jack McElroy, who has been singing on the show and helping out generally, will step into the top position as successor to Garry Moore in running "Breakfast in Hollywood," the program of the late Tom Breneman on WJZ-ABC at 11 A. M. daily. Mr. McElroy will take over on Tuesday. The program will move into the 2 P. M. time with the broadcast of Oct. 4, when Kay Kyser's new program starts in the morning period." 

Breakfast in Hollywood was a morning radio show created and hosted by Breneman. He hosted it from 1941 to 1948 but on three different radio networks at different times: NBC Blue, ABC and Mutual (kinda). When it debuted in January of 1941, newspapers referred to the program as "Breakfast at Sardi's", named for the working restaurant from which the program was broadcast. That first version of the show also two regulars who were staff the hostess, Nell Olson and Bobby Batuga, the Maitre d'. This first version of the show was only 30 minutes long and broadcast from KFWB. 

After it got going, there were two shows every weekday at Sardi's. At 8:00 AM they did a live broadcast to the East Coast, airing at 11:00 AM EST. Then breakfast was served and a second show, heard live in the West, began at 9:30 PST. There was no script, just Breneman asking everyday people questions and taking in the occasional celebrity guest. It was so popular it spawned a copy cat program on Mutual "Luncheon at Sardi’s." That broadcast on WOR from a different, unrelated Sardi's in New York City with a different different, unrelated host, Bill Slater. (More on that another day.) That original building still stands today but it's been a strip club since 1971.

On August 3rd, 1942 the program was picked up by NBC Blue and the program moved to Radio City at 1539 North Vine Street. This site, [LINK] claims that Breneman bought the building and the Hollywood Roof Ballroom next door in 1938, converting them into a radio studio and Tom Breneman’s Hollywood Restaurant. There may be something to it, but 1938 is before the radio program even started at Sardis. (Breneman was also only the "honorary" mayor of Encono. Nice try AI.) I think they just have the year wrong. I also remember that address coming up once before in reference to the Radio Room, cafe. [LINK]  (If you look at this 1948 photo you can see both signs.)

1539 North Vine Street in 1948

These sources are all slightly wrong. The Hollywood restaurant opened initially at 1525 N. Vine St. [SOURCE] In 1945, the Blue Network rebranded as the American Broadcasting Company (ABC). Then in December of 1947 The Hollywood restaurant expanded next door to 1539 Vine, the former Empire nightclub. Four months later in April 1948, Breneman died of a heart attack. There are pictures of the line out front on April 28th learning there would be no show that day. He died 2 hours before show time. [SOURCE]  His name was replaced on the marquee with the words: American Broadcasting Company. You can use these signage changes to date pictures. 

Tom Breneman was born in 1900 and raised in Wayneboro, PA. He later attended Columbia University. He started in vaudeville, and in 1927 he became program director at 1020 KFVD-AM in Culver City, CA. In 1929 he starred in a radio comedy series called
Tom 'n' Wash in which he played three characters. From 1931–1932, he used the on-air name Tom Brennie, and hosted "Laugh Club of the Air" on NBC in New York. A 1931 issue of Radio Digest lists the syndication: WJZ, WBAL, WFAA, WIOD, WGN and KOA. That expanded from there. You can listen to a souvenir album with Breneman hosting here.

Tom "Brennie", Radio Digest Jan 1932

His earlier program, Laugh Club was a show with audience participation, and even Billboard called it "one of the very first." So in that way it prefigures Breakfast at Sardi's. I found a 1932 entry in Broadcasting magazine which refers to his latest program the “Tom and Wash Laugh Club.” I don't think that was a formal name, just a confused press release.  [SOURCE] Breneman's obituary reports that he later returned to Hollywood and managed two radio stations and then went to San Francisco in a similar capacity." Those would have been KFVD again and it's sister station KFAC. Those stations were part of the CBS/Don Lee network at the time. In 1937, Breneman he became the host of "Secret Ambition" at KNX. 

Breneman was only 46 years old. Before that fateful day in 1948, the ABC radio series had gone by the name “Breakfast In Hollywood”. After the death of Breneman, Jack McElroy took over.  The format remained largely the same, with a lot of Q&A with the general public. I know it's weird but I suspect that ABC didn't understand why the audience loved Breneman, and picked McElroy because he looked like Breneman; a friendly Lou Costello figure.  Sadly, it didn't work, but you can hear a continuity between the program and later television talk shows like Steve Allen, Jack Paar, even Letterman. 

July 12th 1949 Promo

Without Breneman the chemistry didn't work, and the ratings dropped. I know that ABC booklet says that Jack McElroy took over directly but it's not true. Garry Moore stepped into the role first, and he quit by July 1948. Moore was doing six shows a week for "Breakfast in Hollywood" as well as his regular spot on "Take It or Leave It." When the New York Times reported the change on July 13th, they had not even named a successor. [SOURCE] Consequently the pictures of Garry hosting the program are few. One AP News feature on Moore stated "Unlike Breneman, Garry doesn't kiss the ladies or wear their hats. He has his own line of gags." Cliff Arquette took over briefly followed by John Nelson, Nelson left to host the TV version of Bridge and Groom. Then they tapped Jack McElroy.  Supposedly Arch Presby was also host at one point but I've never been able to corroborate that. 

Jack McCoy NBC Radio Trading card #3 (1953)

McElroy's tenure lasted until the program ended on July 6, 1951. ABC attempted a revival as "Welcome To Hollywood" which debuted on NBC in 1952. Jack McCoy hosted the attempted Saturday morning reboot. Don Rickles was the announcer. Sometimes that's erroneously cited as McElroy again. I found one source that reports George Jessell was the host, in 1953. that might have been a fill-in.  It wrapped permanently in 1954. McCoy died in 1991.

Before Breakfast in Hollywood, Nelson and McElroy were probably best known for an ABC program, "Bride and Groom" where Elroy was a singer and announcer. John Nelson was the program's host. Bride and Groom had an audience participation component which is probably what made NBC think it would work. It ran from November 26, 1945, to September 15, 1950. An obituary in the Circleville Herald says that McElroy was a singer in his hometown of Pittsburgh, KS. His career ourtide these two shows is not well documented. He was born in 1913 and died in 1959 of lung cancer at the age of 45. Arquette later went on to a strange type of fame on Hollywood Squares. He died in 1974 at the age of 68.

Are There Cucumbers After Salad?

 

 

I found this 1978 WDCB schedule online on an eBay. It's gone now. I failed to follow through. But my screen cap grabbed some information about a classic Chicago jazz station from almost 50 years ago. I posted it in Google Drive rather than pound the uneven grid into HTML. [LINK]

What the schedule doesn't say is that 90.9 WDCB was founded as a 5,000-watt station in July 1977. It was barely a year old when this schedule was printed.  I quickly figured out that (R) meant rebroadcast. I initially assumed that the green spaces were some kind of jazz automation. But their official history states that their jazz programming was introduced in the early 1980s. That's two years later. [SOURCE] A college of Dupage description of the station's programming implies that the green spaces are classical. 

"The radio station was founded as a 5,000-watt station in late 1977, and its original format was a mix of classical, educational, and news programming. Jazz programming was introduced in the early 1980s and became the primary format by the end of the decade. Since then, WDCB's format has expanded to include roots rock, bluegrass, Celtic, folk, blues, new-age, acid jazz, Afro-Cuban jazz, big band, world music and old-time radio shows, though straight-ahead jazz makes up about 75% of its music programming. The educational programming was dropped in 2001, and classical music continued to be heard on the station on weekends until late 2005. In recent years, some of the more eclectic and niche programming has been phased out for a stronger emphasis on jazz and blues."

But neither of those theories panned out. As it turns out WDCB had a time share agreement with 90.9 WEPS. WEPS started out on 88.1 in Elgin, IL and moved to 90.9 in 1960 increasing power from 10 to 360 watts. WEPS moved to 88.9 MHz frequency in 1987, after reaching an agreement with WDCB, where the college paid 40k to enable WEPS to move and both stations to begin full-time operations. WEPS became a Wisconsin public radio affiliate in 2024 and post-Covid only recently began having students back in the studio. [SOURCE]

The 1978 schedule is full of gems. The Captain Horatio Hornblower program was a BBC production which only aired in the US on CBS, ABC, and Mutual. The Lives of Harry Lime similarly only broadcast it's full series in the US. The Black Museum and Secrets of Scotland Yard were also 1950s BBC radio dramas. I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again was a BBC radio comedy sketch program. It wrapped in 1973 so this was a rebroadcast like the rest of their BBC programming. 

Another oddball in the schedule was "Communicom News". A 1978 issue of The Courier [SOURCE] identifies the program as "...compiled in the WDCB-FM newsroom with the assistance of United Press International."  "Kerkrade '74 World Music" turns out to be an ongoing music festival held at Kerkrade in the Netherlands. They had LPs, and perhaps a transcription series. The show "Keyboard Immortals" is a program that started on KFAC in Los Angeles in 1968. It was created by audio geek Joseph Tushinsky from his huge archive of Welte piano rolls. It was hosted by piano impresario Felix de Cola, who actually has a great radio voice. 

There is very little online about Doc's Jazz City. I wish I knew more.  That Courier issue only mentions that it still exists in August 1978. Another issue of The Courier from February 1978 describes the program as "new." [SOURCE] It still appears in this 1983 schedule with the host finally named as Doc Snyder; who I believe to be Robert Doc Snyder a professor at Wisconsin State University-Oshkosh. His obituary states that "n 1966, Snyder created WRST (Wisconsin Radio Station of the Titans) out of a former lumber company office near the Fox River."  He died in 2008. [SOURCE] [SOURCE]

 

But the most mysterious program on the schedule is "Are There Cucumbers After Salad?" That program is also mentioned in The Courier in 1978. It describes it merely as "a series presenting experimental music and hosted by Thaxter Douglas, a community resident." Thax was only 20 years old at the time but Thaxter Elliott Douglas III is alive today and still making art. He's a performance artist and published poet stalking Chicago indie venues to this very day. There is literally a documentary about this guy. More here, here and here. 

 

Victory Belles

I read a short blurb, a sales pitch really, that claimed that Victory Belles was the first all female radio program in America.  It could certainly be true. It's a very small category in radio history and it's not one that's gotten adequate coverage anywhere. I have one fantastic resource on the topic, but In it's effort to be canonical the Encyclopedia of Women in Radio 1920-1960 by Leora and Luther Sies contains no narrative on the topic.

Victory Belles was a comedy, dancing and musical variety show on KNX-AM in Los Angles. It was hosted by Lurene Tuttle, but had a number of other recognizable names on the team.The Radio Gold Index lists only two known recorded episodes [SOURCE]  Both are 30 minutes long, one from December 1942 and one in May 1943. This would indicate that even as a weekly program that dozens of episodes were lost. the best account we have of their activities is actually first hand from Peggy Gilbert who performed on the program and did a USO tour with the group. Her biography, Peggy Gilbert & Her All-Girl Band by Jeannie Gayle Pool, covers much of that time period.

But what were Victory Belles?  The USO recruited and screened young ladies to socialize and sometimes work at the USO. In June of 1942, Life Magazine profiled the practice making it look more like a sock hop  and less like a blind date. But the ladies were also typists, waitresses on the bases. The program just re-used the jargon. You can actually hear one episode online here. Peggy Gilbert wasn't the only star in the troupe. From those two episodes we have a few names we know appear. I list them below with a short radio bio.

Lurene Tuttle - A vaudeville actress that made the leap to radio whose career was long enough to lead into TV and film. She portrayed most of the females voices on the  The Adventures of Sam Spade program. She also appeared on The Great Gildersleeve, Blondie, Brent House, The Cass Daley Show, Duffy's Tavern, Glamour Manor, Maisie, the Red Skelton Show, Suspense, Doctor Christian, Lux Radio Theater. Note.. she later appears on the Dukes of Hazard TV program

Mabel Todd - Probably the same Mabel Todd from the The Komedy Kingdom. Was doign films as early as 1936, seems to have left performing behind by 1946.

Martha Mears - She appears in over 30 films and more than a dozen radio programs including: The Colgate House Party, The Old Gold Program, The General Foods Show, Bob Ripley, Joe Penner, Phillip Morris, Radio Rodeo, and the Dr. Pepper 10-2-4 Ranch program

The Music Maids - a revolving troupe that appeared mostly in films including  Hoosier Holiday (1943), Girl Crazy (1943) and Hit Parade of 1943. Notice the tight grouping.  At different times the line up included Denny Wilson, Jeanne Darrell, Alice Ludes, Patt Hyatt, Virginia Erwin, Alice Sizer, Bobbie Canvin, Dottie Messmer.It's hard to say which were on the team when they appeared on Victory Belles.

The Taylor Maids - Another trio with a changing line up. They appeared in a few films as well:  Cowboy Canteen (1944), Artistry in Rhythm (1944) and So's Your Uncle (1943). A Newspaper ad from 1954 lists their names as Beverly, Patti, and  Shirley. It's probably the same trio.

Bea Turpin and her Eight Jills Of Jive - Somewhat obscure. As a group they have no appearances other than on Victory Belles. Bea Turpin appeared in at least one pre-1920 black & white film. In Peggy Gilbert's book the name is given as "Bee Turpin." She reports that Bee played piano. This can be corroborated by radio listings for KFAC-AM in 1934 and 1935 in Sacramento.

Wilhelmina Gould - Even more obscure. SPERDVAC lists her name only on the Victory Belles Episode. Corroborated by Peggy Gilbert, but without detail.

Beverly of "Reveille With Beverly" - Beverly "Ruby" Ross was the start of the 1943 film Reveille With Beverly. It was a flick about a 5:30 AM radio show with swing music, dedicated to the local servicemen. Sound familiar? It was based on a real "Reveille with Beverly" radio show hosted by the very real Jean Ruth Hay. More here.

Ona Munson - Ona is listed as a producer on the program. Just two years later Ona Munson had her own eponymous 15 minute show, the Ona Munson Show, a.k.a. Open House also on CBS. She had appeared in the movie Gone With the Wind in 1939 and was surely the most famous of all the names attached to Victory Belles. Her only other big radio gig was on the program Big Town, which ran from 1937 to 1952. Ona joined the program in 1940 and stayed through to the end.

The First Black Radio Announcer (Part 3)

Bass Harris was the first black radio host on the west coast. Each book, and article states that he first was on air at KING-AM in Seattle. Every source I can find repeats that claim. the problem is that either the year of the call letters are wrong.  The biographical information is so spare that it's no help.  He was the son of a local minister, and his program was at least initially brokered time. Hard data is so elusive that I sometimes doubt he existed.  The book Entrepreneurs of Profit and Pride put him on air in the Seattle market for 15 years. Despite the absence of Terra-firma, Radio Ink listed him as one of the 16 African American DJs who were on air in the 1940s. 

In that era many of the few programs hosted by African Americans were on brokered time. That's how Harris broke into the radio biz. He paid his way, then sold enough spots to make it profitable by running a show that attracted those dollars. All sources claim that his program debuted in 1933 on KING-AM in Seattle. But there was no KING-AM in Seattle in 1933, or even 1943. KING-AM didn't sign on until 1949, which did sign on at 1090. White's Radio log lists the station at 10,00 watts actually in the Spring of that year. In the Broadcasting yearbook for 1949, KING is listed as having been started inexplicably in 1927.  But it fills in some small details. They were clearly a share-time broadcasting only 6:00 AM to noon.

Interestingly KRSC-AM and KIRO-AM were founded in 1927. KOMO-AM launched in 1926. KFOA-AM was on as early as 1923. Another source puts him on 1300 KOL-AM in the 1940s. But KOL-AM wasn't on 1300, it was on 1270. On the upside, at least KOL existed in 1933 all 1000 watts of it. KOL-AM is presently on 1300 so I am assuming that's a failure of memory and not of math. regardless the KOL reference cites the program as called Bass Harris's  House of Joy. He mixed pop sides with swing and played both black and white artists in 15-minute blocks.

Some of the confusion may come from a rather unpleasant set of frequency and call changes in the Seattle market painfully shuffling heritage calls around the metro. For several decades the 1090 kHz frequency in Seattle was home to KING-AM, founded in the late 1940s by broadcasting pioneer Dorothy Stimson Bullitt. KING-AM was known as the "Mighty 10-90," featuring great radio personalities such as Frosty Fowler, Ray Court, Mark Wayne and late night talk with Irving Clark.  It became a talk station in 198s.  As of 2004, 1090 became KPTK-AM still airing news/talk.

After all the conjecture I find Bass Harris in a radio schedule in the Long Beach Press-Telegram Newspaper.  He's listed on 710 KMPC-AM October 11th 1952 at 8:00 PM between the St. Francis Hour and a program called "Dance Time." The Book Swingin' on the Ether Waves identifies his KMPC program as "Bass Harris At Home." An article in the Los Angeles Sentinel called him a "longtime star of stage and radio."  If true, he would have already been on air for about 20 years. His program was described as follows:

"Harris will intersperse his own humorous and philosophical poems and monologues with the latest recordings and guest stars."

He appears on 1330 KFAC-AM .according to the August 22nd 1953 issue of Radio Today he had a program at 9:00 AM that Saturday following Unity View and preceding the Federation of Churches program. KFAC was largely classical during the week. In 1955 in another issue of Radio Today I find him on air at 640 KFI-AM at 8:00 AM on a Saturday after the news and before a program called "Jump Jump."  There the trail ends after two long and mysterious decades.

The June Foray

June Foray is still alive, she's 92 and even still working in the voice-over industry that made her famous. She is best known as the voice of many animated characters including both Natasha Fatale and Rocky the Flying Squirrel, Cindy Lou Who, and Jokey Smurf. She was born in 1917, in Boston, the second of three children. She was first on the radio at the age of 12 in a local Radio drama on WBZA.

The WBZA calls are not a typo, but they may be unfamiliar even to Boston-area readers. WBZ and WBZA were sisters stations in Boston. The callsign was first used in in 1924. In March of 1931, WBZ and WBZA swapped call letters moving WBZ to Boston and WBZA to Springfield. WBZA carried a simulcast of WBZ until it went dark in 1962. June claims to have been on the station at the age of 12 that would have been about 1929, which fits right into the window. More here. In an article in Nostalgia Digest she indicated that the first appearance was not on WBZA but another unnamed Boston area station but that WBZA was at least contemporary to the appearance. She was quoted as follows:

"Well my teacher had a radio show and I was on it. Then there was a weekly radio show on WBZA, the local station. They had a group of actors and I had the hubris to call them..."

Her first work in Network radio was about 15 years later in 1943 on Cavalcade of America a program sponsored by DuPont about American history. In 1945 she was on Smile Time, a comedy program on the Don Lee Network and simultaneously on the Buster Brown gang Program on NBC. She went on to appear on Lux Radio Theater and an innumerable list of programs. She appeared on Steve Allen's 15-minute morning program in LA, on 1330 KFAC-AM. In 1948 when Steve Allen launched "It's a great Life" on CBS Radio June came too. She stuck with radio while she moved in to TV work even picked up a spot on the Stan Freberg radio show in 1957 also on CBS.

In 2008 the ASIDFA gave out it's first June Foray award and June was it's first recipient. The award is given to "individuals who have made a significant and benevolent or charitable impact on the art and industry of animation." More recently she made the web 2.0 leap in October 2006, she appeared in the podcast "The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd" portraying Susan B. Anthony. Last year she finally wrote her autobiography "Did You Grow Up With Me, Too?"

Damn you Bill Gavin!

My major complaint of radio is it's increasingly homogeneous content. Brands are trademarked and xeroxed coast to coast, programs are syndicated, playlists centralized and tightened, DJs are voice-tracked and sat-cast. I have examined the history of radio and I have arbitrarily selected a precipice and a guilty party.Bill Gavin was in San Francisco when he took the Billboard list of the top 30 selling records and turned it into a radio show at KNBC. Then he started writing to DJs across the country and asking them to send him their top 10 lists. Many complied. Radio stations reached out to Bill and asked him to consult for them with this "top 10" data. KYA went for it as did KCBQ in San Diego. This collated list became known as the Bill Gavin Record report. For anyone that actually enjoyed regional diversity this was the beginning of the end.

Before the Gavin report the most important sources for information on hits were juke boxes and Dick Clark's American Bandstand. Bill took those concepts and went big and homogeneous. His sheet was serviced weekly by mail. Bill was looking at it as a radio programmer. His tip sheet was to improve listenership by playing the right music. There were other charts out there, Bill's were just better.His tip sheet was not like the trade magazines like Billboard Magazine and George Albert's Cash Box.

Cash Box had been running since 1942 and collated jukebox play. It was focused on vending machine owners. Billboard was much older, starting in 1894 but was initially marketed to the bill posting industry. It branched out into media as they were billboard buyers. Only in 1961 did they re-focus on the record industry. Their first music chart launched in 1940, Btu it mixed sales AND airplay. Bill got into programming with the playlist for the show Lucky Lager Dance Time. In 1941 Lucky Lager sponsored their teen-targeted program on KFAC. It was very similar to the Lucky Strike Hit Parade running since 1935. But Bill had a hand up on the competition. Bill had a Top 1o countdown. Lucky Strike just followed the Billboard Chart. Bill didn't want to ape Billboard.

The program was carried on 48 West Coast stations. What made the program odd was that it was scripted out of 1330 KFAC-AM but then hosted locally by announcers on the local stations. Bill was known to critique local hosts if he felt they weren't right for the program. It was carried by KMOD, KGO, KSEI, KTRB, KGW, KPOI,KVOA, KSFO. Bills tip sheet begot the end of local programming and the rapid expansion of both Top 40 radio, and radio consultants. In 1945 KFAC dropped the program to go all-classical but Bill wasn't ready to let go. His tip-sheet grew into a trade magazine.

Bill Gavin died in 1985 at the age of 77. His eponymous trade rag floundered in the late 90s as radio chains like Infinity and Clear Channel refused to participate in their conference and made their own centralized playlists. In February of 2002 it's British parent corporation pulled the plug. Lucky Lager is still bottled today and is at least available regionally on the West coast.