The Linit Bath Club Revue: The Mammoth Department Store (CBS, 1932)
Here’s a treat for any old-time radio fan—the oldest known surviving program hosted by the singular satirist, in whose spotlight sketch he plays a man with a sometimes unenviable profession: managing a department store . . . on the day after Christmas. Cast: Portland Hoffa, Sheila Barrett, Roy Atwell, Charles Carlile. Announcer: Ken Roberts. Music: Lou Katzman Orchestra, Mary Leaf at the organ. Writer: Fred Allen.
TWO MORE CHRISTMAS RADIO ORNAMENTS . . .
The Whistler: The Christmas Bonus (CBS, 1944)
The popular mystery-twist series—as good as it gets for a show in which you know from the outset who’s going to do it, most of the time, with the lure being the usually spellbinding way in which the crime unfurls in the first place—offers a surprising Yuletide twist in which redemption comes in stranger places than reindeer and elves.
Six months after his release from prison for a one-time petty crime, successful department store clerk Michael Cobb's (unknown) holiday spirit is shattered when, following a series of thousand-dollar cash thefts from the store, he's fired suspiciously by a superior who thinks his recent past means guilty until proven innocent.
But a music box playing "Silent Night" that he buys as a Christmas present for his wife (Cathy Lewis), while trying to shake a pair of detectives he discovers following him, may turn from a farewell to the life he might have had into the punctuation for the proof of his innocence—and a jarring revelation, tied to his severance pay and to a loan a store co-worker repaid him—after he allows himself to be distracted from a small plot to get even.
Additional cast and writers: Unknown. The Whistler: Joseph Kearns. Announcer: Bob Anderson. Music: Wilbur Hatch Orchestra. (Note: This episode is introduced, mistakenly, as "Lies and Consequences," which was the name of an episode that aired two weeks previous.)
The Henry Morgan Show: The Day After Christmas (NBC, 1948)
The cheerfully cantankerous comedian's opening monologue does a subtly racy job of setting it up:
Not so many Christmases ago, we broadcast a little Christmas story for children. And, ah, it was definitely for children, but we heard later that a number of grownups sneaked out of bed and listened.
Welllllll, you know how parents are, kids. Just when you think they're asleep, they come out of the bedroom with all kinds of excuses. They want a drink of water . . . or, uh, there's a tiger in the room . . . or, their blanket fell on the floor, or something. So this year, ah, we might as well let 'em stay up and listen.
But parents---no snickering. We're not gonna stand for a lot of grownups listening to the radio and shaking their heads doubtfully, as though we were making the whole thing up. Now, kids, if you notice your mommy or your daddy saying things like, um, "ohhhhh, nonsense! or, uh, "Well, that couldn't happen," just look 'em in the eye and say, "I find this story thoroughly credible!"
Of course, I don't have that kind of trouble with my parents. If they say "oh, nonsense!" to me, I just don't give 'em tickets to my show.
Then, the story: Little Joey sits examining the ruins of an electric train "that took a dozen graduate engineers to put together" . . . and which his father wrecked when the kid let the old man fool around with it until he came up with a theory about how to make it run different. "What's a theory?" asks little Norman. "I dunno," answers Joey. "Something ya father has when tells ya to hand him a screwdriver."
All little Norman had to worry about was getting Santa into the house---because they had not a chimney but radiators. What the kids had to worry about was being careful what they wished for.
Especially if they were audacious enough to ask Congress for it.
But for further details, you'll just have to listen.
Cast: Arnold Stang, Pert Kelton, Fran Warren, Ben Brower, Art Carney, Jack Albertson, Joan Gibson. The children: Butch Cabell, David Anderson, Joan Laser. Music: Bernie Green Orchestra. Writers: Henry Morgan, Carroll Moore, Jr., Aaron Ruben, Joseph Stein.
. . . AND, FURTHER CHRISTMAS CHANNEL SURFING . . .
Various Artists: The Christmas Package (NBC, 1943)—Coordinated with the U.S. War Department, this charming 1943 holiday half-hour, hosted by film star Linda Darnell, features music by the Andrews Sisters, Ginny Simms, and Lena Horne; messages from the Army and Navy's chiefs of chaplains; a comedy monologue from Bob Hope ("our Santa Claus for tonight---the man who's been trying to get me on his lap all afternoon to whisper what I want for Christmas," cracks Darnell); and, a sweet but not sugary holiday sketch from Jim and Marian Jordan as Fibber McGee, Molly, and Teeny ("Whatcha doin' Mister?") with the Wistful Vista kids. Writers and director: Unknown.
The Raleigh Cigarette Program Starring Red Skelton: Christmas Trees (NBC, 1945)—Somewhere in the middle of bantering about Raleigh's then-contest to win a new Chevrolet (you had to complete the sentence, "We should all buy Victory Bonds because . . .," in twenty-five words or less), Red (Skelton) and company manage to swap Christmas gifts, Anita Ellis manages to sing "Toyland," and Clem Kadiddlehopper ("I wish they had winter in the summer, then it wouldn't be so cold") lands a gig selling Christmas trees around the corner. Additional cast: Lurene Tuttle, Verna Felton, GeGe Pearson. Guest star: Arthur Q. Bryan. Music: David Forrest. Director: Keith McLeod. Writers: Edna Skelton, Jack Douglas, Ben Freedman, Johnny Murray.
Fibber McGee & Molly: Spending Christmas at Home (NBC, 1953)—It's where Molly (Marian Jordan) decides she'd rather spend it with McGee (Jim Jordan), who is just as bent on taking her out for a fancy holiday dinner. Doc: Arthur Q. Bryan. Wimpole: Bill Thompson. Announcer: John Wald. Writers: Phil Leslie, Ralph Goodman.
FINALLY, A NEWS REPORT OF A BANDLEADER'S TRAGEDY . . .
NBC News from Around the World: The Allies Push Back, and Glenn Miller is Missing (NBC, 1944)
Even on Christmas can tragedy strike, and if only to remind us never to take our blessings—on holidays or otherwise—for granted, this only known World War II-era newscast to have been delivered on Christmas Day and survive for 21st century listening is worth a hearing, perhaps only once, because although it isn't the lead its most significant story will impact American popular culture dramatically.
Glenn Miller's disappearance over the English Channel, after departing southeastern England in a plan that flew into fog, is reported ten days after the plane disappeared. The popular bandleader, who gave up his civilian aggregation and hitmaking career to form and lead his equally renowned American Band of the Allied Expeditionary Force, went down with others 15 December in a single-engine UC-64 Norseman plane while en route Paris to bring together a Christmas performance before Allied soldiers stationed there.
There will be numerous theories, conspiracy and otherwise, as to just why the UC-64 went down; the single most likely and plausible one being that the plane may have been hit in an unintentional friendly fire barrage, flying through a designated military shuttle zone which was nonetheless too close to British aircraft—aborting a raid on Seigen, Germany—jettisoning a reported hundred thousand incendiary materials at least one of which might have hit the Miller plane when it inadvertently veered off course for a short but fatal period.
Miller (he had achieved major's rank and been decorated several times, including a Bronze Star) and the others aboard the UC-64 will never be found. His status will remain missing in action for decades; he will leave his wife and two adopted children behind; a simple white marker will honour his memory in Arlington National Cemetery.
The news is broken from American military sources in France; the AEF band will play the Christmas show in Miller's memory. It is a harsh piece of Christmas war news to an America which had made Miller a beloved music legend before he entered the Army Air Force. It will also provoke a small but persistent round of conspiracy theories that will arise in the wake of the bandleader's death. They will not persist quite so firmly as the legacy of Miller's music will.
Elsewhere today: As a reported Nazi renewal push turns out to have been a propoganda exaggeration, the Allies stop a German push against the U.S. First Army; Allied bombers attack German supply columns; a recap of President Roosevelt's Christmas Eve message.
As many news broadcasts as will survive from World War II, this will prove just about the only one to have survived that was broadcast on Christmas itself. It may be too sober a way to finish a Christmas worth of old time radio listening. But perhaps that sobriety reminds us, even in the 21st Century, that there are men and women yet who can be home for Christmas if only in their dreams, because they are still stationed or in action around the world, in the service of their country.
To those men and women, and to the families and friends who miss them in presence, though they be home in spirit, we say thank you for your service, now and always, and may you never again have to be home for Christmas, for Hanukah, for any holiday you cherish and observe from your heart and soul, in your dreams alone.
Reporter: James Stephenson, NBC New York.
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