Whistler Upgrades

One must be careful with Whistler titles as some are re-used. When early collectors were assembling logs they often assumed titles were used once for a distinct storyline. It was not until more and more recordings came out that they realized titles were subject to re-use.

Whistler 1946-04-15 203 Smart Boy (diff plot than 1950-10-15; orig title 'SmartGuy') UPGRADE-3.mp3
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The title was used a third time! There is a missing episode, 1952-12-14 "Smart Boy" script by Ross Murray (CBS sound effects artist who turned out to have a skill at scripting). The 1952-12-13 Los Angeles CA Evening Citizen News describes the storyline as "A bank employee with a large gambling debt"

Here's the summary:

1946-04-15 was by Adrian Gendot and was repeated as "Bright Boy" on 1955-02-24
RGI plotline: A nest of blackmailers plans multiple double-crosses and murder. Where to get an alibi for the expected homicide?
NOTE: also performed on the WBBM version of the series 1946-04-28; no recording exists

1950-10-15 was by Norman Kramer
RGI plotline: A henchman walks out on his gangster-boss with $60,000 of his money. Years later, he has to commit a murder to remain safe from his old boss.

1952-12-13 was by Ross Murray
Newspaper plotline: A bank employee with a large gambling debt
No recording exists

The bottom line: Three authors used the same title for three different stories!

This is a slightly better copy of this episode, but it has a clipped open. All that's missing is "The Signal Oil program (pause)..."

Whistler 1946-04-22 204 Waterford Case NETWORK (clipped open) UPGRADE.mp3
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And here's another episode for the day... just because...

Whistler 1946-06-03 210 The Judas Face UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Whistler 1946-06-10 211 Quiet Sunday UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Conyers OTR is having a The Whistler marathon!
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I checked in while I was typing this, it was in 1953.


1946 was a special year for the series. The CBS Pacific Network programs were very popular, the movies were doing well, and the rest of the country finally got to hear the radio program. WBBM in Chicago started its own productions of the series in front of a studio audience, starring Everett Clarke as The Whistler. The Jack Carson Show went on Summer hiatus, and CBS had 13 sustaining weeks of The Whistler fed to its non-Pacific stations from Hollywood. These were fresh performances of scripts that the Pacific listeners had usually heard days before. And... there was a The Whistler TV episode on CBS' experimental channel in NYC in late 1946!


The clip from Broadcasting implies a lockstep scheduling with the Pacific series scripts. That may have been the intent, but it did not work out that way. It looks like they selected scripts that they felt were good and perhaps matched the available cast members as Summer availability was always affected by vacations.

This series seemed to befuddle early collectors in properly dating the recordings they encountered. Completedayman untangled the whole thing back in 2011 when we posted the series in Cobalt about three server crashes ago. These Summer 1946 episodes are designated with show numbering of "SUM46-##". Some old collections have these designated as "east" which is only partially correct. This was a separate series, sustaining in hopes of landing a non-Pacific sponsor, which they eventually did. That Household Finance series was a big mistake for HFC, a story for another time, and has a very curious history because of separate casting, and a separate production staff that included William N. Robson, and separate scripts with milder endings! WBBM's arrangement with CBS was to run their version as long as there was no non-Pacific sponsor. Their productions ended when HFC began, and WBBM ran a Whistler-like series with new scripts called "The Echo." From what we have been able to research, we should be grateful that there are no surviving recordings. [And as I typed that, it made me even more curious to hear one... how strangely our minds work...]

The show is sometimes indicated as being sponsored by Campbell Soups because some early hobby researchers did not have recordings and assumed that Carson's sponsor continued on with The Whistler. We have recordings now, and much more accessible research resources. The Broadcasting magazine archive is at worldradiohistory.com which is one of the gems of the Internet for our purposes. The site keeps building out in marvelous ways. If you haven't been there for a while, it's worth the trip.

This is a list of the Summer 1946 episodes. Titles in bold are ones that have been found. It's not known if AFRS used any of these recordings.

46-07-03 SUM46-1 The Affair at Stoney Ridge
46-07-10 SUM46-2 Quiet Sunday
46-07-17 SUM46-3 Triggerman
46-07-24 SUM46-4 My Love Comes Home
46-07-31 SUM46-5 Panic
46-08-07 SUM46-6 Lucky Night
46-08-14 SUM46-7 Death Wears A White Robe
46-08-21 SUM46-8 The Broken Chain
46-08-28 SUM46-9 TITLE UNKNOWN
46-09-04 SUM46-10 Where The Lines Cross
46-09-11 SUM46-11 Brief Pause For Murder
46-09-18 SUM46-12 Three Times a Sinner
46-09-25 SUM46-13 The Stranger in the House

Completedayman doesn't post here any more but he's doing well and is pleased to hear that the work he did is the foundation for much enjoyment of the series. I've been keeping him updated with upgrades and news as we are on other projects together, especially the Hehn one.

Remember: You can see all of The Whistler network gyrations at the online log [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]


Today's recording is a usual Pacific Network broadcast.

Whistler 1946-07-15 216 Custom Built Blond UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Whistler 1946-07-29 218 Sell-Out UPGRADE-2.mp3
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IMPORTANT NOTE:
This is a PDF draft log of the series drawn from the online Whistler spreadsheet log that is under regular update. It was a good time to take a snapshot of the log information. It has improved considerably over the last couple of years.
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PLEASE DO NOT SPREAD AROUND THE HOBBY... yet...
We're still updating -- and in the process -- we could use your help with edits, suggestions, corrections, etc. There's a lot of new information here and corrections to prior logs. Comments are greatly appreciated.

If you want to access the online spreadsheet go to
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And now, today's strange story...

Whistler 1946-08-05 219 Bullet Proof UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Thanks greybelt

Best regards
Art

Whistler 1946-08-12 220 Stolen Murder UPGRADE.mp3
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Whistler 1946-08-19 221 Delivery Guaranteed UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Thanks greybelt

Best regards

Art

Here's one from the Summer 1946 series when the non-Pacific Network got to hear Hollywood-produced The Whistler for the first time. The WBBM Whistler was in the upper Midwest beginning a few months earlier... so some listeners got to hear BOTH productions depending on which stations they were able to receive!

This particular episode was produced on the Columbia Pacific Network in May 1946, and is missing. That's the same situation for the WBBM series, where this script was done in May or June 1946 -- the date is not clear at this point. Only three of the thirteen Summer 1946 productions are available, and is a new production of that May 1946 script. The script was not used in the later HFC series.
Whistler 1946-08-21 SUM46-8 The Broken Chain UPGRADE.mp3
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1946 was an incredible year for The Whistler franchise. The Pacific Network show was going strong. The WBBM and Jack Carson Show Summer replacement broadcasts were doing well, TWO more Whistler movies were released, AND a television episode was produced on the NYC experimental station that CBS was operating! The character and the concept had great momentum.

The two movies were Mysterious Intruder (considered to be the best of the eight by many) and The Secret of the Whistler.

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1942 makes this year the 80th anniversary of Suspense, but The Whistler started a month before Suspense came to the airwaves. Sorry I missed that anniversary date in May. I'm trying to figure out some 80th anniversary "hook" to celebrate the series history in these last months of 2022. Any ideas?


HELP!

We could use some assistance from a Cobaltian with library access to newspaper archives that are not newspapers.com. There are many missing episode titles and plotlines that we are trying to fill in for missing episodes that will make the series log more complete and more valuable (see the post of a few days ago where the draft log can be downloaded [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Found this plotline in Billboard... it sounds like a good one... hope it is found one day... nice cast
1942-07-18, episode 10, Cold Fury

Whistler 1946-08-26 222 Brief Pause for Murder (Kearns, Croft) Signal Oil UPGRADE-2.mp3
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The documentation for this episode has often been mangled through the history of our hobby. This has been verified by Karl Schadow as definitely of this date.

The problem has been that the script was presented a few times. It was done on the Summer 1946 series for Carson on 1946-09-11, a sustaining broadcast. It was also done on 1949-09-11 as a re-performance in the Pacific series. Since there were two dates of 194x-09-11 and the year could end in a 6 or a 9, that added to the confusion. Many collectors were not aware of the Carson replacement series but they might have seen a newspaper listing or some other log and never had enough background information to put it in context.

The other day, I was sent a recording of this August 1946 broadcast labeled as "1946-09-11 eastern broadcast" -- and it had Signal commercials, a tipoff that the labeling was wrong. It had floated around in the hobby that way for decades, at least with anyone who traded with that person.

Thankfully there are folks like CompleteDayMan and Karl to undo all these knots that haunted ... and continue to haunt ... many collections of this series.

Today we have a Signal/Carson Summer Replacement pair. I hate when this happens. Okay, as a completist, I like when this happens, but in terms of finding a missing script performances I hate when this happens. Mixed feelings. OTR can be so confusing

Whistler 1946-09-02 223 Stranger in the House UPGRADE-2.mp3
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This is the last of the Jack Carson Summer replacement series. Only 3 have been found. We don't know if any of them ended up as AFRS recordings... and how would we be able to tell unless we had some documentation of a different cast? The original stated intention was to have the same script done on Pacific Network and on this series in the same week. This episode is more than 3 weeks out of sync. Good intentions going awry... sounds like the makings of a Whistler script...
Whistler 1946-09-25 SUM46-13 Stranger in the House UPGRADE.mp3
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Whistler 1946-09-09 224 Witness at the Fountain UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Thanks greybelt
Best regards

Art

greybelt wrote:

This is a list of the Summer 1946 episodes. Titles in bold are ones that have been found. It's not known if AFRS used any of these recordings.

46-07-24 SUM46-4 My Love Comes Home

Does anyone have this show?

Whistler 1946-09-16 225 The Brass Ring UPGRADE.mp3
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It is with great sadness that I must report yesterday's passing of a classic radio hobby giant, Jay Hickerson. (August 3, 2022)
If you have been on some of the hobby Facebook pages, you have learned of it there. This is the first chance that I have had to post it or comment on it here.

There may be Cobaltians who may never have heard of Jay, or the FOTR conventions, or his newsletter "Hello Again." There are us old timers who have warm memories and great gratitude about such things. The final FOTR convention was in 2011, and in December 2022, YesterdayUSA marked the 10th anniversary with a lively discussion that included yours truly, Stu Weiss (involved in the convention committee from the first in 1976 to the last in 2011), and Sean Dougherty. Jay was not well enough to join us online that day, but mention of his role in our hobby was delightfully constant. That YUSA broadcast is now available at [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] and can be streamed there or downloaded. That page also has background perspective about Jay's influence in our beloved hobby and the significance of those conventions. Thank you to YUSA for their enthusiastic permission to post this recording to mark Jay's passing.

Thank you, greybelt. I'm very sorry to hear of Jay's passing.

BobbyP wrote:

greybelt wrote:

This is a list of the Summer 1946 episodes. Titles in bold are ones that have been found. It's not known if AFRS used any of these recordings.

46-07-24 SUM46-4 My Love Comes Home

Does anyone have this show?

Here you go BobbyP - I have the Summer Series in its own folder, so I just have the episode number as 4.

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Whistler 1946-10-07 228 A Present for Ricky (scratchy open) UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Thanks greybelt

Best regards

Art

Whistler 1946-10-14 229 Weak Sister UPGRADE.mp3
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I'll need to miss a few days of posts soon, happy reasons, so I will double up on some of the Whistler episode posts now so you don't have to go through "Whistler withdrawal" on those days! Be good... don't listen to all of them now...

Whistler 1946-10-21 230 Masquerade UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Whistler 1946-10-28 231 Backfire UPGRADE.mp3
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Whistler 1946-11-11 233 The Deadly Penny UPGRADE.mp3
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Whistler 1946-11-25 235 Two Year Plan UPGRADE-2.mp3
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Thanks greybelt

Best regards
Art