Ask anyone who was around
during the
Golden Age of Radio what he or she remembers most, and chances are the
reply will be "The Shadow." Who can forget sitting around the radio
when the ominous strains of Saint Seans' Omphale's
Spinning Wheel"
signaled
the nation's favorite Sunday evening program?
It is
Thursday night, July 31,1930. The time is 9:40 PM. Radio
listeners tuned to CBS hear the first appearance of "The Shadow" as
James La Curto portrays the part in the Detective Story Hour. Street
and Smith publishers sponsored this show (which lasted about a year),
along with their magazine series The Shadow, A Detective Monthly.
In
September 1931, The Blue Coal Radio Revue, starring Frank Readick,
Jr. (who was the star in the later Detective Story Hour shows),
continued the adventures of "The Shadow". The show remained an hour
long, but was heard on Sundays at 5:30 PM. For a short time, lucky CBS
listeners were able to hear The Shadow on both Thursdays and Sundays.
In October, 1931, the 9:30 Thursday slots were taken by Love Story
Drama or Love Story Hour (sponsored by Street and Smith), which also
had portrayals of The Shadow!
A year
later (October, 1932), the series moved to NBC, and continued
what was to be a long relationship with the sponsor: Blue Coal. Frank
Readick Jr. remained the star for the weekly Wednesday presentations.
In October 1934, NBC aired the program on both Mondays and Wednesdays
at 6:30PM. Mr Readick starred in most of the shows, with Mr LaCurto
appearing in a few. The program shifted to Mutual on September 26,
1937, and was heard on Sundays at 5:30 PM. It maintained the same
sponsor (Blue Coal), but had a new voice for Lamont Cranston, the young
and relatively new theater and radio personality: Orson Welles. The
1937 programs also began to feature "The Shadow" as a character in the
stories, rather than merely as a narrator.
Blue Coal
again became the sponsor in late 1938, and Bill Johnstone
became the new voice. Bret Morrison was the voice of The Shadow for
most of 1943, and John Archer took over near the end of 1944. Bret
Morrison returned in September, 1945, and remained the voice through
1954, when the program ended.
Blue Coal
remained the sponsor until September, 1949, when Grove Labs
sponsored the show for a year (The show remained on Mutual, but shifted
a half hour earlier, to 5:00 PM, Sundays). In January 1951, the US
Army/Air Force became The Shadow's sponsor, after it was "sustained"
for a few months by Mutual. Wildroot was the sponsor from about
September '51 to Sept. '53, when various sponsors began to appear. The
program was again "sustained" by Mutual until the last show on the day
after Christmas, 1954.
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