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BROADCAST ON WNYC TODAY IN…
1924: The Club Alabam Orchestra performs.
1942: Connie Boswell sings and labor leader Sidney Hillman speaks along with Mayor La Guardia at Labor Day ceremonies in Central Park. The Mayor says: "Any interruption of work in a war production factory is not only detrimental to the safety of our country, its a sin against humanity itself."
1954: Host Merle Evans presents "Benjamin Franklin: America's First Universal Man," from the drama series The American Story, sponsored by the Society of American Historians.
1960: Governor Nelson Rockefeller speaks at the 50th anniversary ceremonies of the National Urban League.
1993: Sportscaster Curt Gowdy, who wrote Seasons to Remember: The Way it Was in American Sports From 1945 to 1960, talks to Leonard Lopate on this edition of New York and Company.
2002: The Fishko Files features mezzo-soprano Frederica Von Stade and composer Ned Rorem; both have participated in the creation of pieces of music meant to evoke and memorialize lost loved ones. Also featured is Clifford Chanin, whose group, 'The Legacy Project,' looks at memory and loss in the face of violence. An extended version of the piece appears in Studio 360, as part of its program on the subject of 'Memorials."
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Ace Brigode and His 14 Virginians 'Sign' With WNYC in 1924
In the July 30 edition of Variety, Abel Green writes that the popular dance band playing at the Roosevelt Hotel had signed on as a regular WNYC feature every Thursday night. "The studio officials, because of the band's limited time, send municipal omnibuses uptown to transport the musicians to and from the radio station. The bus is also escorted by a squadron of motorcycle cops to pave the way for speedy traffic. It is quite a thrill to the musicians to be made so important as to override the strict city traffic regulations and it compensates them for their weekly trip down to ... the Municipal Building." The band played in the jazz-influenced peppy dance band style called "Collegiate Hot" a jazz style that has come to exemplify the music of the "Roaring Twenties". (Photo: WNYC Archive Collections)
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LITTLE-KNOWN FACTS
Early On Amateurs Given Tryout At WNYC
"Amateurs performed recently for Herman Neuman, Music Director at WNYC, municipal Radiocasting station in the Municipal Building. The real find of the afternoon was Helen Bourne, a young Baltimore girl who has come to this city in the hope of getting an engagement in light opera. Mr. Neuman declared it was a treat to have a voice of quality and splendid diction, poise and musicianship appear out of the blue.
"The youngest novice was a three-foot 11-year-old urchin who wanted to be "Carried 'Way Down South." He had a voice six times as strong as himself. Then came Helen Fitzgerald, 13, who sang about Mother Machree.
"You can never tell from their looks what the artists will turn out to be. A man came in who gave the effect of a bookkeeper in need of a haircut, but he sang sea songs like a Viking. Then there was the stubby Italian with two-toned shoes who worked in a boiler room but desired to sing opera arias."
(Source: Radio Digest Illustrated, August 23, 1924, pg. 5)
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