Radio Convention Day Two, Part Two

What a day! What an evening!

After an altogether enjoyable lunch, I sat with the same people for the next couple of shows.

First was another live radio performance of "I Remember Mama", with Rosemary Rice reprising her role on the very same show. Very touching story of a turn-of-the-century Norwegian family struggling to make ends meet.

Next we heard a lost episode of "Gunsmoke" from 1952 called "Dodge City Killer". Matt Dillon's friend got married to an Indian woman... there were all sorts of racial remarks and relatively sexist statements... but it goes with the era... Westerns certainly aren't my favorite kind of radio plays, but it certainly was fun to listen to anyway. It was performed without any background music, as that's how it was originally intended... or so they said.

Right after this there was a presentation via short movie clips of how Big Bands were a big part of radio ever since the invention of the thing. He started out showing clips of performers from the 1920's who made up a large portion of the broadcast schedules... ordinary Joes who could sing or play an instrument. And then there were clips from early broadcasts from the 1930's with the orchestras in full tuxes and the audience behind a glass window, for fear that someone might cough or applaud during the show and completely ruin it... lol! And then it ended with shows from the '40's... this time more clips from movies and live, casual performances... it was a whirlwind tour, and very fun to listen to... especially that clip of Artie Shaw's band... wow! That was great!

After a bit of a break, the cast again got on stage for the two-part premiere episode of "I Love a Mystery". The director had to get special permission of the "Morse Estate" that owns the show in order to perform it. It was first broadcast in 1939 (I think), but because of references to China, the first part was dropped from programming in the 1950 re-production... and we were the first to hear it since. That alone made it rather cool, even though I was a little confused about the plot... it didn't seem to resolve at the end... But all in all, it was intriguing and well performed.

We then had about an hour break before dinner for the silent auction to wrap up. I busied myself with putting the finishing touches on the previous post and relaxing a bit.

Dinner was just great! My salmon was soft, juicy and tender, lying on a bed of rice along a side of grilled cherry tomatoes and veggies. YUMM! I met some very nice people at my table number nine... a couple of the cast members were there and a very nice younger gentleman who had seen a bit of Remember WENN before. He was in love with old time radio and had been in the army... we had lots to talk about :) He gave me a few suggestions for finding radio shows online as well. I thought for sure that he was around my age, but it turned out he was married with three kids! With one in college! lol! That was a bit of a shocker.

Anyway, after ice creame and a bit of tea, the people in charge said all their thankyous to all of the special guests and gave them their gifts and awards. And then Eddie Carroll and the rest of the cast went up onstage for the grand finale, a recreation of the Jack Benny Show. For all of you who know it already, unlike me, yes, it was Fabulous! It was great, great, great! But even funnier than the show itself for me, was afterwards when Eddie got up after all the applause and thanked us all for coming out and supporting this organization that is taking care not to forget our "very important heritage". Couldn't agree more. But then he launched into a hilarious story, just for fun, about a conversation he had with Lucille Ball at a rehearsal for one of the later episodes of 'I Love Lucy'. They talked about Jack Benny, who was good friends with them both. I was on the verge of tears because of laughing... it certainly was a perfect grand finale to a great weekend of fun.

Great times!

Jp