1960: The 7th Game, Armed Forces Edition, News and a Ball, Alan King, Two Very Different Types of Singing

Before getting to this week's offering, I wanted to ask if anyone is having trouble downloading files. Two people that read my other blog have reported that when they try to download the files they get an error message saying "od.lk". I am unable to reproduce this downloading from any of my pages, and I am about as far from a computer expert as one can get, so I don't know the solution. This is apparently a problem with the site I use (Opendrive), but I can't find a solution, or even reproduce the issue. Is anyone having this issue, and does anyone know how to fix it? 

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Okay, well last time I asked if the baseball reel I found contained a broadcast that wasn't out there anywhere. It turns out that it is in fact a recording that is not available anywhere but in my basement. There were a lot of comments on this, both in response to the post and in my email. Rather than post them all or summarize them here, I'm going to refer you back to the comments at the bottom of that post, where you can read all about this recording (you'll have to scroll up a bit). Thanks for all of the information and feedback and encouragement to share this tape. 

You will also find comments on other parts of that post, including one from Snoopy, in response to the very short reel I featured, a comment that made me laugh out loud. Thanks for that!

Okay, so this is in fact a recording of the storied final game of the 1960 world series, but rather than the broadcast feed with commercials, it is the Armed Forces Radio feed, with Red Barber and Gordon Bridge doing analysis in place of those commercials. 

I'm going to assume that the recordist noticed that the tape was running out around the sixth inning, and chose to stop recording until the end of the game. I could be wrong about that, but for whatever reason, some pivotal action in the late innings is not heard here, and a whole lot of eighth inning scoring is missed. The sound quality improves and worsens at various points, but overall, it's pretty well recorded. 

Enjoy!!!

Download: The 1960 World Series, Game Seven - 9-13-60 - The Armed Forces Broadcast Version

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Someone asked if I have other games from this series, and unfortunately, I don't know - this tape is one of the many that got soaked in my pipe burst a few years ago, and while that didn't really damage any tapes, it did result in tapes which were originally all with their "brethren" so to speak - tapes I got from the same source - getting all messed up and placed at random in piles. And since about two hundred tapes got wet, it would be quite the chore to figure out if there were other baseball tapes among them. 

One of these days I will post pictures of the as-yet unlistened-to tapes in my basement. You might be astonished by their volume. There is no way I have enough days left on this planet to listen to them all. 

Oh, and a point of interest for some of you comes from someone named Jimmy, who emailed me a link to his archive.org posting of what he describes as "a very rare 1886 baseball game re-creation by Gordon McLendon on the Liberty Broadcasting System, circa 1950". That can be found here. Thanks!

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That baseball blast was the big item for the week, and I'm going to keep the rest of this brief, with several short or relatively short items that don't need a lot of introduction. 

On a falling-apart reel of Scotch Brand tape (I literally had to glue the reel back together to play it and find out what it contained), I found a recording of the 1957 inauguration of Eisenhower and Nixon, followed by the inaugural address. That event seems to be well documented, aurally and visually, elsewhere, so I just kept the part after that, which features a brief newscast and the beginning of the coverage of one of that year's inaugural balls. The station is KOIN, Portland, which has subsequently gone through a whole lot of name changes and which currently spews hateful messaging to the local population. At the time, it was a CBS station.  

Download: KOIN, Portland, 1-20-57 - CBS News and The Inaugural Ball

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Here is an endlessly entertaining little tape. A group of children - siblings? friends? relatives? who knows - spent some time singing a remarkable variety of songs, in a variety of styles, often trying to recreate the sound of the singers who made the songs popular. These range from Broadway hits to Jefferson Airplane (!). In the midst of all of this is a typical 1960's insult flung by one participant at another, for no apparent reason. The sound quality and volume both vary quite a bit - there are moments when the machine clearly was not working correctly - and I have edited out a few sections which were either not recorded on at all or were so quiet that trying to boost them into something listenable was impossible - in all, I streamlined this by about five minutes. Even if you don't (or don't particularly) like children singing for their own amusement, I encourage you to listen to this and see if you don't smile, or laugh, or both.  

Download: Some Children Singing a Variety of Popular Songs

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This one is called "Alan King on 'The Ed Sullivan Show', 6-2-68", and that nearly covers it. But it's worth noting that King (whose popularity I will never understand) mentions the tribute to Irving Berlin the previous week, and Ed's 20th anniversary show the following week. In truth, the Berlin show was several weeks earlier, and this show was actually the first of two planned 20th anniversary shows, according to this comprehensive website. The second half of the anniversary tribute never happened, due to the assassination, that following week, of Robert Kennedy. 

Incidentally, the show had pre-empted by a special for the Sunday following April 4, so there was no show following the assassination of Dr. King. I wonder what they would have done that week. Actually, I kind of shudder to think that maybe nothing special would have been done at all. 

Download: Alan King on 'The Ed Sullivan Show', 6-2-68

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Here's a little more than fifteen minutes of a few female singers with piano accompaniment. Based on the quality of the performances, I'm going to guess (or at least hope) that these singers, who seem to have been shooting for mastery of classical, or at least stage styles of singing, were very early in their training here. 

Download: Female Singers with Piano Accompaniment 

Play:

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Now it's time for our "Acetate of the Month". This is a short disc featuring someone who decided to continue to record (only on one side of the disc), despite the fact that a child was crying for most of its duration. Eventually a different child starts singing "Mockingbird Hill", meaning that this disc is probably from 1951 or 1952. And then the recording space runs out. 

Download: Audiodisc 6 inch Acetate - Home Recording - Child Crying, Mockingbird Hill

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Very short reels will return next time. 

Interesting Radio Recordings from Two Paper Reels, Birthday Time, An Odd Promo, Music in a Bar and at Home, A Little German, and the use of Cactus and Wood Needles

Howdy, 

I'm starting off today with something I find absolutely fascinating. I recently was lucky enough to purchase two paper reels - that is, reels without plastic backing, just paper. Both were Soundmirror reels, from the company I believe was first in producing reel tape for home buyers. Since that company was out of the reel tape business by 1952, and paper reels were gone by 1953, it's always possible that there could be recordings as much as 80 years old on such a tape. 

That's not quite the case here - these recordings are more like 73 years old - but they are fascinating nonetheless. The first one I listened to had an episode of a radio program called "Answers for Americans", which was heard on the Mutual radio network. A panel of experts answered political questions from listeners, with prizes to the listeners whose questions were used. 

Multiple online sites indicate this was a right wing show particularly focused on anti-communism, but this particular episode really just sounds like the questioners, and the experts, getting their bearings at a very scary moment - the weeks after Stalin died - when a lot of questions about any resetting of US/Soviet relations were unsettled. While I'm sure a left-wing show would have sounded much different, I doubt that a mainstream right-down-the-middle show would have been much different at that particular moment. 

Again, your mileage may vary, but boy did I enjoy listening to this. 

Download: "Answers For Americans" On Mutual Radio, Spring, 1953

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The show ended before the tape did, and at the end of it, there is this fragment of some sort of variety program. The man speaking and singing throughout mentions having starred in "Million Dollar Legs", meaning he could conceivably be one of three male stars of that movie. I certainly am not an expert in any of them, but I'm guessing it's Donald O'Connor

Download: Fragment of a Variety Show circa 1953

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The other paper reel was interesting for a different reason. The person who recorded "Answers for Americans" seemingly recorded another episode of that show or something similar, for the conversation (actually it's more like a series of short speeches) is about how a "One-World Government" would be possible, but only if it were to be a "FREE One-World Government", and I'm sure we all know whose definition of "Free" they were using. 

I believe our recordist must have left the machine alone to record, because powerhouse clear channel station WCKY, and its Country and Western format, begins showing up, interfering with the speechifying. Each station struggles to be heard over the other for a time, but eventually, the Cincinnati C & W format wins out, and the speeches are not heard at all for the last few minutes. What is heard is some down-home entertainment, also likely from right around 1953, complete with ads for worthless patent medicines, which are claimed to be able to cure oh so many ills. 

It's hard to listen to at times, but man oh man, is it rewarding in the end. And the far better radio format wins in the end, too. Well, that's what I think, anyway. 

Download: Competing Stations - "One Free World Government" Discussion Vs. Country and Western on WCKY, Cincinnati

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There is nothing written on either of these tapes' boxes, by the way. One last comment - our recordist clearly intended to record the speeches. Why on earth, after listening to the tape and determining that they had not been recorded correctly, didn't he or she use the tape again? Did the recordist enjoy this mish-mash of sounds?!?!?

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And now, for all you "Ed and Frank" fans, here is more from Ed and Frank: an hour of their drummer and electric piano noodling, as recorded at some facility where I'm guessing a lot of beer was consumed, almost exactly 69 years ago. 

Download: Ed and Frank, 7-4-57
Play:

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Or perhaps children's birthdays are more to your liking. This tape is from the 1960's, most likely 1968 based on other material on the reel, some of which I will share at a later date. It's short and (mostly) sweet.

In it, Kay's father tries to get her to talk more than she wants to, we hear some other children and then the requisite singing of "MacArthur Park". No, wait, that's wrong. It's "Happy Birthday". 

Download: Kay's Birthday

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Maybe you can make out the words "Kay's Birthday" on the back of the box: 

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A company called "Magna-Tronics", also probably sometime in the 1960's, promoted a Muzak-like product, which, rather than being for stores, was for radio stations (!) which wanted to simply program someone else's pre-recorded series of bland musical performers for AM or FM broadcast. 

I have no idea how successful this was - it seems like a fool's errand to me - but here is the promotional tape used to sell the program managers on this product. I have one other tape from this company, an actual example of the product that they sent to stations, which I will feature later. 

Download: Magna-Tronics Radio Station Easy Listening Promo Tape

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Quite some time ago - and I can't seem to find the post at the moment - I shared some home recordings of old-timey type music and more recent standards, recorded by some folks who clearly got together frequently and made music... and sometimes recorded it. I have a handful of tapes from these folks, and today I have a second recording by them, about 40 minutes this time, and in this case with all of their names identified on the tape box, and if I can find that box, I will add it to this post. I do have their names in the file name. 

Download: More Music at Home - Bill, Vernene, Dianne, Helen and Flavian, 3/23/62

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Well, this is not the box that goes along with that reel, but it is a box from a tape with some of the same people. They all look more or less like this: 

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And for the last reel today.... I wasn't sure what to do with this but I decided to share it. Maybe someone out there can let all of us know what is being said. As it is titled "A woman speaking "mostly" in German". And that's really and truly all I know about it. 

Download: A Woman Speaking (Mostly) in German

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And finally, here's an Acetate of the Month. It looks like this: 

As you can see. it features what is mostly a blank label from the Acetate company / recording studio, with what might be a family name written in the corner. Note the encouragement to use a "cactus or wood" needle to play this record. WHAT???? Well, a bit of internet sleuthing shows both of these are for real. That's a new one on me!

One side features a bunch of conversations - which definitely sounds like "around the house" type conversations than those that would have taken place in a studio, then a short rendition of "Let Me Call You Sweetheart". Here 'tis: 

Download: Cathedral Latin Acetate - Family Conversations and Let Me Call You Sweetheart

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The flip side is considerably longer, and I've labeled it "Some Sort of Family Skit". That's the best I can do. Maybe someone with better ears than me can make out all of what goes on here. Despite my cluelessness, I still sort of enjoy it. 

Download: Cathedral Latin Acetate - Some Sort of Family Skit

Play:

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Very Short Reels will return next time!

Jingles and Stingers, Birthday Singing, The Jazzy Air Force, Some Medical Lectures, Letter to America, WGN and The Not-So-Fabulous FABIAN

 Happy Almost My Birthday!

I have a real hodge-podge of items today, so let's get right to it!

I ended the last post with some radio material.... well, I started it with radio material too, and only had radio material in it.... so how about starting this one with a neat little tape of some radio jingles and stingers? This tape comes from WGLI, an AM station on Long Island which is long defunct.

There is no date on this box to indicate when this is from, but it sure sounds like the '60's to me. I also get a kick out of the fact that these jingles are contained on a reused United Nations tape box. 

Anyway, here is the tape. I particularly enjoy the itemized numbered intros for each song that would have been in a countdown, and also that, on this tape, they count UP. 

Download: WGLI, Long Island, NY, Jingles and Stingers

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Switching gears pretty harshly, and apropos of my own celebration tomorrow, here are a gang of friends celebrating someone's birthday, by gathering around the piano and singing a whole bunch of songs.  

Download: A Sing-Along Birthday Party

Play: ~~

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Next up, here is a jazzy program from those jazzy folks at the United States Air Force Recruiting Service. It's an odd sort of propaganda, that's for sure, and is titled '"Serenade in Blue". On it, we hear a variety of acts playing a variety of jazzy material, and interspersed with informational bits about such things as ways the Air Force is helping to prevent animal species from becoming extinct, and ways the Air Force is addressing the need to conserve energy (this must be from the 1970s...)

Download: The United States Air Force Recruiting Service - Serenade in Blue

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And now, here's something which is bound to appeal to the largest possible audience. Well, that's not actually true, but I digitized it more than five years ago and haven't yet shared it, so here it is. It is the second tape I've shared (of dozens that I bought somewhere, a LONG time ago), from our friends at the Medical Audio Digest .(Here is the first one.) This one is called "Obstetrics and Gynecology - Hirsutism and Virilism, Management of Endometriosis". I can just see you all getting up to dance now!

Download: Audio Digest, Obstetrics and Gynecology - Hirsutism and Virilism, Management of Endometriosis

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Next up, this is called "Audio Letter from Frank Smith in Australia to Larry in America", and I suspect that's all that needs to be said: 

Download: Audio Letter from Frank Smith in Australia to Larry in America

Play:

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Here's an oddity I just came across. Please know in advance that the recording quality here is quite poor. Who remember Fabian? I don't mean who remembers who he was - I was born in 1960 and I know who he was. But who remembers hearing his songs on the radio and seeing his early films when they were new? I sure don't. I have looked to see if this program exists at all online, particularly in better quality, but have not found it. 

Well, this is a somewhat backhanded documentary about Fabian, made after he had moved into movies, but entirely focused on his "singing" career. As alleged in those days and as still clear as day, the man simply couldn't sing. But that didn't stop him from having a half dozen hits, including a few top tens, entirely because he looked the part, which was what his handlers were talking about. 

You'll hear from the man himself, who clearly knew and felt like he was in over his head and didn't want to be there. The recording cuts off suddenly, just as Hollywood (where he did considerably better) was beckoning, so I don't think this is the entire show. But it's mighty interesting, if you can get past the terrible sound quality. 

Download: Documentary on Fabian

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And now a "Very Short Reel". 

What we have here is a Brief Segment of what was then a Chicago and midwestern powerhouse station (and now an insufferable embarrassment), WGN Radio, from July, 1953. The end of one song (a vocal) is heard, then a Freddy Martin Orchestra instrumental, which is back-announced as being the last song on a 20 minute program of music. This is followed by about 90 seconds of news, the contents of which date the recording nicely, reporting, as it does, on the imminent truce in the Korean War.

Download: Brief Segment of WGN Radio, July, 1953

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The Immaculate Reception, A NASA Flashback, Lloyd Nolan Sells, Partying Like It's 1959, and a Whole Lotta Comments

 Boy, Howdy! Do I have a lot of comments, clarifications, corrections and great thoughts from readers/listeners to get to. It's been ages since I got caught up on these. I like to catch folks up on these, because readers may have looked at an individual page and missed the comments, or, equally likely, may have looked at a page before the comments were made. If you left a comment you really think I should feature here - and I don't do so - apologies in advance. 

<and yes, the promised football tape is here today - thanks for all the feedback on that.>

If this rehashing of comments is not of interest to you, by all means skip down to the first media player/download down there and have at it. 

I think I'll do this post by post. 

Here are some things that were said in response to this January 20th post (which was actually not, as I thought it was, my 250th post - it was # 247):

In response I heard from Snoopy, who let me know that the piano piece I didn't recognize is The Theme from "The Apartment". 

Chad offered up that the brief segment of Pittsburgh radio station KQV (heard on the same tape as the piano player) is from the spring of 1963, probably just before Easter weekend, which was in the middle of April that year. He adds that the two guys pretending to run their own obscene radio station have Pittsburgh accents.

An anonymous poster says that the interview that wasn't (from the end of the post) has to be from 1970, without explaining why, but I have no reason to doubt this. 

Finally, Josh offered up a link to a vintage religious broadcast, also digitized from a reel, which is found here. 

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Then, 11 days later, on January 31st, I posted again, and heard from Mike that the KHJ promo tape I offered up as a "very short reel" are bogus. He suggested comparing them with the real (reel?) deal at this page and at this YouTube posting. 

Also, if you follow the link to that post and scroll down to the comments, Eric wrote a bunch, too much for me to share here, about the dates and other minutiae regarding some elements of the featured tape. 

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My March 19th post got a lot of comments: 

Eric was as helpful as ever with dates, and confirmed that I was one year off on the Steve Allen/Ella Fitzgerald tape. It was from 4/25/56, almost exactly 70 years ago. He also noted that Gene Rayburn, who would later become much more well known, can also be heard on that clip. 

Multiple readers chimed in on the KNX segment. The finally named commenter "Easy Bake Oven" reports that I digitized the reel sides in reverse order, and that the second part was recorded before the first part, as I shared them. Chad points out that the deejay and the date are right there for the taking on the tape itself: Steve Marshall, and 7/26/74. Mike identifies the format as "Mellow Rock" and further identifies that linked to the wrong Wikipedia page. A station later known as KNX was playing country at that time, but this is not that KNX - this one is now KCBS. Spiritof76 contradicts my statement that no one in Chicago had this format by identifying two that did - WBBM-FM and WSDM. (I do remember WSDM - it called itself both "Wisdom" and "Smack Dab in the Middle" (of the dial) at different points and had all female deejays for a while, including Linda Ellerbee, although I don't recall their format at all - my main memory of the station is that it was the first Chicago home of Dr. Demento.)

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My most recent post, from March 31st, also drew a lot of comments. Most of them consisted of confirmations that people would like to have the football game I asked about, and that will be forthcoming, but there was also a request for an older clip that was formerly available on WFMU (and I will look for that, and there was this from Eric: 

The University of Portland and Lewis and Clark baseball game was played Tuesday, May 1, 1956. Portland led 8-2 after three innings and won 14-5. Pete Ward who played nine seasons in the major leagues mostly with the White Sox was on the Lewis and Clark team.

So it is 70 year old baseball, not 75 year old. Thank you for the additional information. 

There are some other, one-shot comments on older posts, but I'm going to save those for next time. Thanks to everyone who has written in - I'd be doing this anyway, I think, but reading the comments and knowing that there are people who care about this stuff makes my day. And my week. And my year. 

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Okay, so here it is. What I wrote at the end of last month should serve as an adequate introduction to this very historical and apparently rare piece. At the time, I was asking if this was indeed rare, and I got a lot of feedback that it is. Thanks to those who wrote to encourage me to post this. Here's what I wrote: 

I have found in my collection a nearly complete recording of the radio broadcast coverage of the legendary "Immaculate Reception" football game from 12/23/72. This is the Pittsburgh radio call, and while commercials (and half time) were not recorded, and the person recording also began editing the time in between plays at the end to save tape, the entire call from start to finish is on the tape with the exception of a few moments between those plays near the end.  

That description covers it well. Here is that tape. 

Download: Jack Fleming and Myron Cope: Oakland Raiders at Pittsburgh Steelers on WTAE, Pittsburgh, 12-23-72

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At the end of side one - and just a little bit at the end of side two - there were fragments of other, previously recorded games, as our recordist had clearly been recording games for some time, and erasing those which were no longer of interest. Here is a composite of the ends of the two sides - what is heard after the 12-23-72 recording on each side ends: 

Download: Odds and Ends from Other Football Broadcasts

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Here is the tape box, indicating that person's history of recording games on that particular reel of tape: 

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Switching gears pretty hard, here's a fun little tape, in which Lloyd Nolan records a few ads for Depositor's Trust. This was clearly recorded (since he mentions it) during the run of the groundbreaking show "Julia" (1968-71), which I call as the first sitcom I went out of my way to watch every week, and that I loved. That the title character's son  - a major part of the show - was a year or so younger than me was probably part of the appeal. Just a little side comment from your trusty curator. 

Download: Lloyd Nolan - Ads for Depositor's Trust

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Here is a composite of the parts of the front and back covers that had writing: 

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With the recent successful NASA mission, I thought it might be nice to share the following tape. Following John Glenn's successful flight, he and his family were welcomed to a reception with President Kennedy, Vice President Johnson and many others, three days after that flight. There are extensive recordings /videos of that event available. But this is something just a bit different - this is in depth coverage of the various participants moving from Cape Canaveral, to the site of that event. Narrating the action (and at one point getting humorously confused by what he's seeing), well, I believe that's Walter Cronkite (and "the action" is used loosely here), but someone out there is sure to correct me if I'm wrong. 

Download: John Glenn Goes to Meet President Kennedy Following His Flight, 2-23-62

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Now, lemme ask you somethin'. Do you like parties? Do you like the 1950's? Do you like friends? Do you like recordings of friends at a 1950's party? Then this tape is for YOU!

Download: A Friendly Party Gathering, 1959

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Note: Based on the tape box below), this would appear to be some of the same people who were heard on the 1960 "Johnson-Mort" wedding anniversary tape that I shared in this post. 

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And now, a "Very Short Reel". I have named this "A Bit of Singing and a Bit of Counting", and that pretty much sums it up. 

Download: A Bit of Singing and a Bit of Counting

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A 1971 Radio Announcer Demo, One Last Visit from Antony Bilbow, Talking to Roy, Music at Home, It's Daddy's Birthday and He's the Most Tip Top Top Cat!

Happy Valentine's Day Weekend - I love my reader/listeners, and I love this hobby. 

Dee-Jay Announcer Demo Tapes always seem to be pretty popular around here, so I will start with a vintage 1971 tape compiled by Chuck Martin. I featured him in part of my "Very Short Reel" in my very last post, but here he is again in a somewhat lengthier tape. He was reading ads in that previous tape, but here he is doing the full DJ thang. However, I've just noticed that, while that previous tape had jingles from KHJ, the Chuck Martin section was apparently from WNHC, New Haven, as is this aircheck. This station is now a public radio station, is part of Yale University and is now known as WYBC.

Download: Chuck Martin - Announcer Demo Reel on WNHC, October, 1971

Play:

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The three sets of stories by Antony Bilbow that I've shared have been quite popular, at least with some reader/listeners. You will find the other three posts, and this one, at this link. Sadly, this is the last of the four sets of stories I will be able to offer, as their ain't no more. Last summer I received two comments, on anonymous, one from Sunnymanchester, both containing information about the shows. I have combined those comments here:

The Antony Bilbow recordings seem to have been regularly featured in the "Morning Story" slot on the BBC's Light Programme throughout the 1960s. Many thanks for making them available! Going by the listings for "Morning Story" on https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/ many of which include the story titles - it looks like it's a compilation of these recorded over several years, not necessarily in chronological order. The series was originally called "Worthington" when it started in 1954, but by the mid 60s it included other stories, including Bilbow reading a few by other authors.

Thanks for that information! 

Here for his swan song, Antony Bilbow.

Download: Antony Bilbow - Stories on English Radio, Volume 4

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Now, for those who enjoy audio letters, I have something I think is very special. For those who don't, feel free to move on. 

More than seven years ago, I made the top feature of one of my posts a tape from a man named Roy, living in Alaska, circa 1957 or 1958. That post is here, and here is what I wrote at that time. 

I will let the delights and idiosyncrasies of this tape reveal themselves to you, but I do want to add that I'm pretty sure that I own the tape he was responding to!!! That'd be a first, I think, and if I can find it, it'd be a wonderful bookend with this tape. Everything he mentions from "your tape" (i.e. the one he previously received) sounds familiar to me, so I just need to track it down. 

Well, it took longer than I might have expected, but here is that tape. Listening to this one and then going back and listening to Roy's tape is sort of like hearing a conversation that took place over many miles, nearly 70 years ago. 

Download: Audio Letter to Roy

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For those down-home folks, here are a couple of fellows playing together, on accordion and guitar. SO I've called it "Accordion and Guitar. I spent most of the day yesterday working on that file name. 

Download: Unknown - Accordion and Guitar

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And now it's time for an "Acetate of the Month". This is a wisp of a record, at 66 seconds it is almost as short as the extremely short "Very Short Reel" below it. This is a Voice-O-Graph record, no doubt made it a both in some sort of store (perhaps a department store or 5- and 10-cent store - something like that). As I've written before, such machines were still around when my grandmother visited us, and we made such a record, circa 1967. 

I suspect this is from several years before that, but really have no way of knowing anything but the date - May 29th - the singer/speaker - "Billy" - and the recipient - "Dad". The sound quality is atrocious, as is Billy's sense of pitch while singing "Happy Birthday". I actually can't make out much of what he says and sings after that song - perhaps some listener will be able to decipher it. 

Download: Voice-O-Graph 6 Inch Acetate - Billy Sings Happy Birthday to Daddy, May 29

Play:

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And finally, a VERY short, "Very Short Reel". It would appear that this tape either had its genesis in the Hanna-Barbera studios, or at the very least passed through there. It contains the music bed for the theme to the relatively unsuccessful H-B cartoon "Top Cat" (which only lasted one season), followed by what I assume is "tag" music to be used to introduced or come out of an episode, or perhaps to be heard over the final credits. Any guesses as to who the "T.T." listed on the box (below) is/was would be welcome. 

If anyone has is any doubt that this is the actual arrangement and performance of that theme's backing track, a comparison with the show's opening should convince you. 

Download: Unknown - 'Top Cat' Main Title Music and Tag

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A Remarkable Document of Radio, Television (and a Home Visit and a Church Service, Too) in 1970! Plus, KHJ!

Greetings!

I have something extra special today - at least I find it to be extra special, and I think a good portion of the audience for this site will, as well. I only have one reel (plus the almost mandatory "very short reel") today, but it is just over four hours long and is both a treasure and amazing example of something I might be willing and able to share more of if there is interest. 

For those who don't dig this, I will have a more varied program of taped wonderment next time around. Although this is pretty damn varied. 

The story behind this offering goes back well over 30 years ago, and involves the Mammoth Music Mart. I have mentioned this wondrous sale at least a dozen times in various posts and on the multiple blogs I've written for or current write. The explanation I've given for it is here. 

The short version is that this an immense tent sale, which ran for 25 years on the North Shore of Chicago, with literally all formats of recorded sound for sale, in support of ALS research. And whoo boy did they have reel tapes. I would go there for the whole day with my best pal Stu and both of us would pore over the tapes. 

One of those years - I'm guessing around 1990 - we found that someone had donated a remarkable set of tapes. Perhaps the recordist had died and the family had donated all of his tapes (I'm absolutely going to assume this recordist was a man - precious few women would have been this obsessed with collecting sound). 

And what amazing tapes they were. This person had recorded virtually anything that appealed to him or interested him, off the radio, off of TV, from personal conversations, from in-the-field (i.e. lectures given at national parks while on vacation), and more. He was Chicago-area based, but recorded things when he was in other cities and towns, too. 

He seemed to be particularly interested in advertisements, which crop up repeated between other recordings, often not bothering to record whatever show was being sponsored by those ads. And he also seems to have been more than a little ADHD - recordings of certain things go on and on and then are interrupted by something else, mid thought. Just as you think you're going to hear the whole program - whatever it was - you don't. Other times, he might record something at length - in today's offering, he does this with a Frank Sinatra movie - and then would erase part of it with something else, resulting in a segment of tape that has xx number of minutes of movie, then x minutes of something else, then xx minutes more of the movie. It's REALLY scattered. 

And he also appears to have recorded things on other tapes - perhaps cassettes - and transferred them to his reels, so that the order of things recorded is not always chronological.

He decorated nearly all of the boxes with pictures of albums and performers. Here is the box cover for the tape I'm sharing today: 

 And he kept METICULOUS notes about what was on the tapes, almost to the point of obsession, but not always in the most helpful manner - a page of notes might have the first section of the tape listed on the right hand side, then the second part on the left hand side, the a bit more of the contents listed on the back of the same paper. He also sometimes listed the number (of the tape recorders odometer) where something starts, but other times just wrote in sections ("1" "2", etc.), often, as with this offering, regarding the same side of the same tape. 

Here's the big news - I have hours and hours and hours of this stuff. Between Stu and I, we bought well over two dozen of this man's tapes (this one is labeled "#53", but the ones we own start in the single digits and go well into the hundreds - sadly we were not able to get the full collection). And what I'm sharing today is only one channel (of four) on one tape. The left channels are almost always recorded at 3 3/4 IPS, which on this tape means nearly two hours to a side. The right channels were recorded later, presumably after he got another machine, and they are almost always recorded at 1 7/8 IPS, meaning, in this case, nearly four hours to a side. This tape alone has nearly 10 hours of material on it, and my friend and I have more than 25 of these tapes!

So, if anyone is interested, let me know, and I will do my best to digitize more of these and share them again. Understand, though, that it takes hours to go through these, first. And not all of them are as interesting or as varied as this one, although many are. 

This particular tape comes from the tapes my friend Stu bought (we each bought about half of them). I have had Stu's tapes in my house for about ten years, having promised to listen to them and give them back and, well, I still haven't done that. I listened to all of mine 25-30 years ago, long before digitizing was a choice. Thanks to Stu for allowing me to have these tapes all this time, and for agreeing to let me share this tape. 

In the case of this tape, I have scanned all of the content notes, and they are below. I think I have posted them here in order. Most of what is on this tape is from 1970, but the first material in this offering is from 1969. Some of the highlights, in order (there are myriad commercials listed, during and in between these segments): 

A program featuring the work of young Black poets

Recordings made during visits to Jacksonville and Miami, including some music and other things from local radio, including news of Moratorium day the day before (this was actually in 1969 - the date on the sheet is wrong)

The Frank Sinatra Movie I mentioned

Recordings from a Christmas Eve Church Service

Kukla, Fran and Ollie on Chicago Public Television (this is extraordinarily wonderful - I love KFO)

Al Capp being the A$$hole that he was., or at least had become, by 1969-70.  

Coverage of portions of the 1970 Super Bowl and Post-Game

Part of a Tonight Show Episode

A local Chicago newscast from 1/20/70

Segments of a few sitcoms

A home recording of a visit from a family member

More news, specifically about the end of the Chicago Seven trial

A few more shows, including a documentary on beavers narrated by Henry Fonda. I have not been able to identify that show called "Change" in the notes. 

Recordings of part of an Ecology forum which took place at Northwestern University. 

Here you go - let me know if you'd like me to delve further into this collection. 

Download: 1969-1970 Media Variety

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Well, that was a heavy meal. How about a light dessert? This little tape is pretty wonderful in its own right. It comes from Los Angeles Top 40 powerhouse KHJ. The tape starts with a few internal promos, for special programming and for a contest they were running at the time (this tape is dated 10/18/75), presumably read by Chuck Martin, whose name is on the box (see below). The rest of the tape contains KHJ production music - backing music for sports reports and for news breaks, and then typewriter noises, presumably also for news reports. The tape ends with two PAMS style KHJ "stingers". 

Download: KHJ - Ads, Jingles, Sports Themes and News Backing, 10-18-75

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Post 250: Country Radio in 1965, Some Fun Home Recordings, Pete Returns Yet Again, Right Wing Commentary and The Moritz Family!

Good Day!

This is, to my amazement and pleasure, my 250th post to this site. I had hoped to share something extremely precious to me for this post, but I did not have enough time to do as I wanted, and it will have to wait for another day. Hopefully, another post loaded with a variety of goodies will suffice. 

Before getting to those, I want to thank a few people who stopped by to comment. In particular, thanks to Josh, who has commented on several postings, ever since getting wind of this site a month or more ago. He is particularly interested in religious recordings, primarily sermons I think, and has left several comments about the various Christian-related tapes I've posted recently. There are too many comments to repost here, but if you look in my recent postings, you'll find at least five comments from him. He also provided links to his own site where he shares sermon recordings, and his own podcast, for those who might like to dive deeper into such things, Thanks, Josh! I will continue to keep you in mind with regard to featuring those sorts of tapes when I find them. 

And quickly - quite appropriately for my 250th post, an anonymous poster let me know that, over a year ago, in this post, I shared my 1000th downloadable file for y'all. Cool! And in answer to a question about the touch tone tape, from JimmyLee, I will share that that particular tape was included in two full boxes of tapes I bought many years ago, all of which were for internal use by Bell Telephone, so I assume it was for some sort of training purposes. I have shared many of those tapes here, over the years. 

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I'll start today with a favorite sort of tape among readers and listeners, the vintage music radio station recording. In this case, it's 50 minutes or so of radio from Canton, Ohio. Most of this recording is from WHOF, which was a country station at the time. I didn't included it in the name of the file, but this is almost certainly from the fall of 1965, as the then-future # 1 (and resolutely awful) country hit "Giddyup Go" is the pick of the week. 

The station is changed a few times, including at least once, briefly, to a top 40 station, and then there is a twirling of the dial in the last few minutes. And then, at the very, very end, we get a piece of what all this radio station recording was erasing - the last few moment of some sort of band rehearsal. 

Download: WHOF, Canton, OH (Mostly)

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Here's a set of home recordings (with some radio and other music thrown in) that I think is pretty interesting and almost stunningly weird in one aspect. It's also REALLY random and so I've labeled it as a "Hodgepodge". I'm going to describe this one in detail, because I think it's worth it. Leaving out a few very short moments in between the longer segments, here's a rundown of what you'll hear: 

A few microphone tests, then a young girl reading some text about tapes and tape recorders. 

A man reading a very bawdy poem, a slightly off color limerick and a shaggy dog story about the old west.

A different man claiming to be broadcasting on radio station S-H-I-T and who tells a lame joke, and another man, identified as being from Shit University, who tells another lame joke, both of them about men having a lack of sexual prowess. 

After several very short things, a stage band plays three songs.

Some radio recordings, including KQV in Pittsburgh (one of the oldest radio stations in the world), including a pop song I don't recognize, a devilish "drive safely" PSA, some DJ patter and the start of a Brenda Lee record. 

A pianist fumbles her way (she speaks at one point, making clear it's a girl who is playing) through "Exodus", fumbles even more so through a piece I don't recognize, then falls back on a little piano piece that nearly everyone knew how to play in the 1960's, and which was popularized as "Down at Papa Joe's" at one point, before playing part of Moonlight Sonata", then cycles through various other pieces, returning to the "Papa Joe's" music after more struggles.

Then it's the REAL high point of this tape. If it was ever your dream to hear a flute player and a trombone play "Danny Boy" together (and at first, not lining up the tune together), particularly with the trombonist trying, and not always succeeding, to play in the upper register of his instrument, this is your moment. 

Back to the pianist, whose work was partially erased by the flute/trombone duo. She's onto the "Heart and Soul" chords (another piece every kid knew how to play on piano in the 1960's). 

Then, a man tells the story of John F. Kennedy from a clear position of clear distaste for the man and his politics, identifying Kennedy as Italian for some reason (using a national origin slur), and ending with a tasteless joke. 

Finally, a man recites a little piece of nonsense doggerel. We're now at Fink university, but before any further silliness can be captured, the tape ends. 

Quite a little compendium, there. It astonishes me that the people who decided to record some off color material chose to do so on a tape that a teenage girl was also clearly using and probably listening to. 

Download: Early to Mid 1960's Hodgepodge of Home Recordings

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Next, remember Pete? I featured two tapes of Pete, featuring his off key warbling, badly tuned guitar and generally odd ways, here... and here.

Well, glory be, I have found another tape of Pete. This one features a different side of the man, and yet the same absurdities - and some other ones - shine through. Just as on the previous shared tapes, in this case, Pete set out to re-record some of his other tapes onto the four separate monaural channels of a five inch reel. 

My big question here is.... WHO was he doing this for? The impression I get is that he was just trying to consolidate some shorter tapes (or perhaps his favorite parts of some other tapes) onto one reel. But then, he more or less ruins the majority of the recordings by plugging in his microphone and erasing part of the song being heard, in order to comment on the song being heard, or to make mention of what song it is. At one point, during a re-recording of a Lawrence Welk segment, he comes back in to comment that the performer being heard later died in a car crash. And every now and then, when some backwards material (from what he is erasing) pops through, he comments on that, too.

Again, these seem to have been for his own purposes/enjoyment. Did he want to hear interrupted songs, with his own comments (which he presumably would also be familiar with at a later hearing. Also, songs start and stop in the middle of the recording a lot of the time. The recording is amazingly choppy, even without taking into account his interruptions. 

This is a long tape, and surely won't be for everyone, but the sheer peculiarity of it caused me to choose to share it. 

Download: Pete Records His Old Tapes and Comments On Them

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Here are portions of the front and back of the tape box, for anyone who would like to play "Peteologist" and try to make more sense of this: 

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I recently found in my possession a tape which contained, back to back, a series of episodes of a short radio show which aired on the Mutual Radio Network for nearly three decades, a program of commentary by Fulton Lewis, Jr. I read up on him, and it sounds like he was somewhat akin to Rush Limbaugh, if Limbaugh had presented his program as news and had limited it to a few short minutes a day. I strongly suspect that Mr. Lewis' show would not be something I would dial into, were he still in business. Be that as it may, it's an interesting tape and worth a listen for its historical value, if nothing else. 

Download: Several Episodes of Fulton Lewis, Jr's Radio Commentary Program

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And now for an "Acetate of the Month". And this is an interesting little relic, which looks like this: 

The label is the same on both sides, and the recording is the same on both sides, too. The presence of a zone, rather than a zip code, means this recording is from no later than 1963. The song being parodied, "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" was written by my musical, social and political hero, Pete Seeger, in 1955, but didn't enter the national consciousness until 1961, which helps date this little record to somewhere within an 18-20 month period. 

The performers are The Moritz Family, or at least two of them, singing to friends (I'm guessing) prior to their departure from the neighborhood to parts not named. There are two references Kenilworth, IL, a tiny burg (never more than 3000 residents, covering just over a half-mile square) which is very near the town I grew up in, and which was, in the 1960's, sometimes ranked as the richest town in America. 

Presumably this recording was given to The Moritz' friends upon their departure. I no doubt found it in a sale in the same North Shore area where it was recorded, many years later. 

Download: Sound Studios, Inc - The Moritzs - Where Have All the Moritzs Gone?

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And finally, this 250th post's "Very Short Reel". This is a bit of a cheat, but in another way, not. I have very little doubt that this tiny piece of tape, which I found on its own on a reel, was chopped off of another, no doubt longer reel. Why that would be, I couldn't tell you, but the resulting sound of the material that I somehow acquired made me laugh. 

What it contains is a couple of people setting up an interview, testing the microphones, messing with volume, etc., and then making sure everyone's on the same page, and beginning an interview. 150 seconds into the tape, the actual interview begins, but after 20 seconds, containing one question and an "uh" (presumably leading to the next question), the tape ends. 

Maybe they started again for some reason and chopped off the unwanted stuff. I don't know. But the contents heard as this length of tape plays did make me laugh, as if, as I titled it, they set everything up, then didn't actually record the interview. Maybe you'll find it funny, too. 

Download: Setting Up an Interview, Then Not Recording It

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A Year End (and Decade End) Countdown, Some Great Old Ads, More From the Muir Family, An Audio Letter, A Brief Recital, and Touch Tones!

Happy almost New Year's Eve! 2026 can't get here quickly enough. Let's hope it's a damn sight better than 2025. As John Lennon once sang, "Can't Get No Worse".

As I like to do, when I have one available at the end of a year, I am leading off with a countdown the major offering for this week's post. More than four hours of a show called "The Dynamite Decade", hosted by the small man with the large pipes, Charlie Van Dyke, as heard on the last day of the '70's, on WRBR, South Bend, IN. 

This is a unique end-of-the-year countdown, in that, as its title indicates, it's also a summary of the decade of the 1970's,. with various comments from, and songs by, the hitmakers from throughout those years, in the midst of also counting down the 100 biggest hits of 1979. 

This is not the entire show, which I'm guessing was at least six hours long, but it does capture from the 80s into the high teens of the countdown. Unfortunately, whoever taped this edited out most of the commercials. 

Enjoy this flashback to another, more enjoyable end-of-the-year. 

Download: OPUS 1979 - The Dynamite Decade - with Charlie Van Dyke - WRBR, South Bend, 12-31-79

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Ads are always popular around here, and the older, the better (well, that's what I think, anyway). Here are eleven ads for a store called "Oliver Wright's Appliance Company" in Knoxville, Tennessee, from May of 1966. 

If you look up the address, you'll see that this is now an industrial area, and that this particular address is virtually underneath a short highway - "Hall of Fame Drive" - one that was built pretty recently, according to a bit of research I did. But if you look at page three of this little high school newspaper, you'll find that Ol' Oliver was doing right by the high school, and advertising in their paper. 

Download: Eleven Ads for Oliver Wright's Appliance Company, Knoxville, TN, May, 1966

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Apparently this tape was originally used for a broadcast by someone named Dr. Howard Kershner, and then later was an audition tape. A shame we'll never hear either of those. 

Then again, Dr. Kershner seems to have been affiliated with Liberty University. So.... maybe not. 

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And now, something I alluded to in my last post, when I shared some not terribly good family singing, and said I had something much better, in the same vein, in the pipeling. 

This is a return to the Muir family. Back when this blog was new, just over ten years ago, I shared a set of recordings by the Muir family which I just loved. This is a family in which clearly, all of the members knew how to play instruments, and knew how sing in good old-timey, ragged-but-gorgeous harmony. That post came when I was typically just sharing one tape per post, and I separated out all of the individual songs, something I've not done in quite some time. You can find it here. That wholly amateur guitar/piano/trumpet version of "You Tell Me Your Dreams", in that offering, complete with lots of bum notes, still just hits me straight in the heart, and makes me wish I'd known these people. 

Anyway, I have just recently discovered that I have another tape by the Muir family (along with at least one non-Muir family member or friend). In this case, there aren't a lot of different instruments heard. Instrumentally, it's all piano, including a couple of piano solos and a bunch of songs sung by the family choir, the vast majority of them Christian in nature. A man sings baritone alone on a few of the tracks, and a soprano sings another. Those don't really resonate with me, but when the children sing - I'm a sucker for children singing naturally (i.e. not stage-trained), it's pretty wonderful. And when everyone sings together, it's magical. 

At times, it's clear that everyone knows their parts and that they have no doubt sung these songs countless times. The harmonies in the first song sung together, particularly from the five minute to six minute mark are sweetly gorgeous. And the song at about 15:30, "Years I Spent" (which I know from a thoroughly magical recording by someone named Joan Creary), is sung in a thick, and complicated harmony that gives me chills. It's identified here as being called "At Calvary".

I recognize that this isn't for everyone, and plenty of people love stuff that I just can't stand, but this is the sort of thing I listen to when I want to get all those technically perfect but utterly soulless Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston records out of my brain. 

Download: A Selection of (Mostly) Christian Songs, Sung and Played by the Muir Family

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Here's the back of the tape box: 

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Not a lot to say about this next one. I've labeled it "Audio Letter to Larry" and although the speaker does identify himself, I'm not sure I've made out his name correctly, so I'm not even going to try. The sound quality isn't awful, but it's not very good either. I tried to improve it a couple of different ways, without success. 

Download: Audio Letter to Larry

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Here's a tape which features a piano player and violin player in recital. For some of this short performance, there seems to be two violists and at other points, only one. I mostly included this because of the final piece, a rendition of "Jamaican Rhumba", a tune I've known since infancy, as my family had two, very different renditions of it that we would listen to a lot - a story which is far longer than I'm going to share here. I know nothing else about this recording. 

Download: A Short Piano and Violins Recital

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And finally, a "Very Short Reel". Here's an itty-bitty bit of tape explaining in detail - with auditory examples - exactly which tones - at what two combined hertz - make up the ten numbered spots on a touch tone phone. This tape is missing its beginning and runs out as the "Zero" tone is being heard. It is labeled "Touch Tones by J.I.S.", as seen below. 

Download: A Telephone Company Tape - Touch Tones By J. I. S.

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