Meet the Beatles! Plus More Beautiful Music, Doing the Dishes, Flood Talk, Webb Pierce, Flex-O-Matic, A Father's Gift, A Banking Milestone and A Few Minutes with Dana

Good day, ya'll, 

A quick thank you - once again - to Eric Paddon, who has again supplied a bit of detail to one of my posts. In this case, he has shared that the "Sunday in New York" program that I shared a few episodes from last time around: 

ran on WCBS Radio weekly from January 10, 1959 to July 19, 1959 per NY newspaper listings. Jordan hosted other programs at the station too and was one of their prominent personalities. WCBS was known as a "middle of the road" station until it became all-news in 1967.

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We're going to start with something that could not be more timely, given that it has been exactly 60 years this month since The Beatles arrived in America to play the Ed Sullivan Show, appear at Carnegie Hall and at the Washington Coliseum, and take the nation by storm. Oddly, I saw nothing in any media this week or this month marking this anniversary - previous "Big" year anniversaries of this arrival have been all over the news and entertainment programs. 

And here, to commemorate the events of that week, is a real audio time capsule, a radio program that must have been put together on the fly. It aired on New York powerhouse Top 40 station WINS-AM. Since it had only been clear that The Beatles were going to be "a thing" for a few weeks at that point, this program had to have been cobbled together in a matter of days, as it clearly aired within the first few days of The Beatles' arrival. From the sounds of what is said here, it would appear that this special aired before the Beatles had played a live show anywhere but perhaps on The Ed Sullivan Show, if that. 

The entire show is not captured here, and I'm not sure how much was missed. When the tape starts, the program is already in progress. The documentary then is heard throughout the first side of the tape, about 26 minutes of it. There is a short gap at that point, then you hear the concluding few minutes from the other side. 

The documentary includes interviews with the band members, a piece featuring some American musicians' reactions and thoughts about the group, interviews with fans, a bit of history of the group, interviews with people who give their input as to why the group is so popular, etc. A couple of the band's early songs are heard. The narrator of the show is Murray the K. The show (as was the bands' first Capitol album) is called "Meet the Beatles"

Enjoy!

Download: "Meet the Beatles" - A WINS Radio Special, February, 1964

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Now, as much as I suspect that will greatly appeal to a lot of people, here is another type of radio broadcast that I have been requested to share, whenever I come across it. The appeal here is more of a mystery to me, but I really strive to offer up what people want to hear. And so, here is a 30 minute slice of some Beautiful Music programming (containing a few items I was surprised to hear amongst such programming) from a station, WFMB, in Springfield, IL. The recording cuts off just before some news is about to start, so there is no way to date this particular segment. 

Download: WFMB, Springfield IL - Beautiful Music Programming

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Almost exactly five years ago, I featured a recording session for a product called the Cannon Flex-O-Matic. And now, here we have eight of the completed ads for that same product. 

Download: Eight Completed Ads for the Cannon Flex-O-Matic

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Now, here's a short home recording that is best summed up by its title, "A Few Minutes with Dana": 

Download: A Few Minutes with Dana

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Next, here's an episode of "The Webb Pierce Show", featuring the country star and his guests in a half hour or so of music. There were actually two TV shows by that name, both apparently produced at WSIX, Nashville, about a decade apart. There's some really great stuff here. The songs performed here, as well as the presence here of the start of "Stop the Music", a game show which aired in the mid 1950's, proves that this recording is from the 1955 edition of the show, rather than 1965 version. 

Download: The Webb Pierce Show (and a Bit of Stop the Music)

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Just up there a li'l bit, about 90 words or so ago, we had a short home recording with Dana. Now, here's another one, a brief (six minute) slice of life with a woman (identified early on as Marge Miller) and (presumably) her husband, as dishes are washed and a bit of homey conversation is engaged in. 

Download: Dishes and Conversation with Marge Miller and Her Husband

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With flooding out west in the news in recent weeks, here's a tape from 1955 featuring Senator Prescott Bush, patriarch of a political family you may be familiar with, being interviewed about flooding that was being told "The worst disaster to ever hit the state of Connecticut".

Download: Senator Prescott Bush Interview About the Flooding in Connecticut, 1955

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And now it's time for our "Acetate of the Month". And this takes a bit of explanation. In 1973, my mother and I visited her oldest brother, Harry Godwin, at his home in Memphis. I've written a bit about Harry before, but he was a larger than life figure, who, being nearly a generation older than my mother (17 years older), fashioned himself in more of a grandfather role to me than an uncle (particularly as I had never known either of my grandparents. 

(That Wikipedia stub overstates his musical career a bit - he was, first and foremost, a manufacturer's rep, and only began working in music - as a lyricist and as a jazz promoter -  in his late forties. I believe it also gets his birthday wrong.)

During that visit, which perhaps I will write about elsewhere someday, I was delighted to find a drawer full of homemade acetates, mostly the five and seven inch variety, which Harry and his children had made in the 1940's and 1950's. Harry allowed me to tape record them for my posterity, during that visit, and so I did so, introducing each of them myself with a tiny be of explanation

And so, we have a hybrid here - a reel to reel tape of an acetate. In this case, as you'll hear, Harry tells a familiar story for his younger children (he had six kids from two marriages) on one side, then dedicates a short Robert Louis Stevenson poem to one of those children on the other side. 

Download: Harry Godwin - The Three Little Pigs and The Lamplighter

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And finally, a "Very Short Reel". Here's an ad celebrating 60 years of banking in northern Arkansas. 

Download: First Federal, Arkansas, 60th Anniversary Ad, 1994

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Queen Elizabeth in Chicago, A Labor Day Address, A Demo Reel, Gynecology and "The Dong With the Luminous Nose"

First, I wanted to thank the several people who wrote, either via the comment box or via e-mail, to share their thoughts on last months "BLOWOUT" post. I appreciate the kind words, the thoughts on that format, and the general reactions and impressions of my site. They are all deeply appreciated. It was a small sample, but the general feeling seems to have been that such a post, in which I share a huge volume of material, about which I have relatively little to say, and therefore with minimal text, is a welcome offering. I may do such a post as often as once every other post, at least until I've used up a significant portion of the 400 or so items I have waiting for sharing. For my other posts, I think I will try to cut down on the amount of typing I do, unless there is really something specific I want to pass along.

And now, on with the countdown: 

When I heard the news about Queen Elizabeth, one of my first thoughts was "I should share that tape of the time she visited Chicago". I've owned this five inch reel for decades, digitized it over two years ago, and if I could find it, I would scan the tape box for you. 

Elizabeth visited Chicago for a 16 or so hour visit, after visiting multiple sites in Canada. She arrived, as you'll hear, on a boat in Lake Michigan, and crossed Lake Shore Drive into Grant Park. For decades, that crosswalk was known as "Queen's Crossing", until the city removed the crosswalk and the stop light, a few years ago. I'll let the tape tell the rest of the story. 

Download:  Coverage of Queen Elizabeth's Visit to Chicago, 7-6-59

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As long as I'm sharing that tape, I thought I'd let you hear what was on the rest of that reel. Here's a short segment of WGN radio show called "Midnight Ticker", from the same day as the Queen's visit. 

Download: Peggy Cass on "Midnight Ticker", 7-6-59

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And, as often happens, the remainder of the tape actually contains something which was recorded earlier, and then partially erased by the later material. Here is the tail end of the final episode of "The Gisele MacKenzie Show, a television show which ended its run on March 28th, 1958

Download: The Gisele MacKenzie Show (Final Episode) with Cameraman Lee Mossman and Miyoshi Umeki - 3-28-58

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We also just celebrated Labor Day, and in honor of that, here is a broadcast Labor Day speech by the Vice President of the AFL-CIO, just a short 58 years ago. 

Download: Albert J Hayes, Vice President of AFL-CIO - Labor Day Address, 9-7-64

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For those of you who, like me, can't get enough of all things Top 40 Radio, I have just the thing for you. Here is a demo reel produced by (or on behalf of) Lee Sherwood, a journeyman DJ, Radio personality and radio executive. This sampling was put together in April of 1971, and is "scoped" - that is, the songs are cut out of the equation. Just listening to this, you can tell that he was that "journeyman", as I described him - still early in his career, this tape represents stops at several different stations. 

Download: Lee Sherwood's Demo Reel, 4-17-71

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Here's a performance of an old bit of nonsense verse with guitar. When I first spooled out this next tape, as soon as the person began reciting the poem, I thought, "I KNOW THOSE WORDS". When I was a kid, one of my favorite books was "The Complete Nonsense of Edward Lear", a fantastic collection of prose, poetry and drawing which I still adore to this day. And for whatever reason, the performer here decided to do a little rendition of "The Dong With a Luminous Nose". The words aren't quite in the order here that they are in my book, but it's certainly the same Edward Lear poem. 

Download: Unknown - Edward Lear's 'The Dong With a Luminous Nose', with Guitar

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And now for something aggressively esoteric. Somewhere along the way I obtained a batch of reels which contain medical lectures and symposiums, under the umbrella title "Audio Digest". These would be sent on a monthly basis to doctors in various specialties, addressing issues within those specialties, from various aspects. The example I have today - this was the tape on the top of the pile, and one of only two of these that I've listened to so far - is on Obstetrics and Gynecology. It is a mind-numbing 57 minutes long, but I am really trying to give a sample of everything in my collection so..... ENJOY!!!

Download: Audio Digest - Obstetrics and Gynecology, Volume 15, Number 13

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And finally, here is our "Very Short Reel" for the day. It is, simply, an ad for a local bank. Here 'tis: 

Download: Pepper-Tanner - Community Bank and Trust Company Ad

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