Instead of watching Miracle on 34th Street two more times this season, try a new Christmas Favorite from the golden age of films.
The little known, heart-warming “Streets of New York – also known as the Abe Lincoln of 9th Avenue” will cheer you up and renew your spirit.
Jackie Cooper stars as a struggling newspaper stand owner, who adopts a little crippled boy, single-handedly takes on a gang of thugs, and goes to night school in hopes of becoming a Lincoln Lawyer, not the rich guy written about in books and a movie, but a true honest man who is trying to make the world a better place.
The Old American
Barn Dance was a summer series that ran from July to September of 1953 on the
old DuMont TV Network. Dumont was the ‘fourth’
network, trailing by far the established operations of NBC, CBS, and ABC.
The network began
broadcasting in 1942 and existed primarily as a vehicle to sell DuMont televisions. In 1942 almost 100 per cent of Americans had
radios but there were only about 5,000 tv sets in use at the time.
DuMont was a
pioneer in television but never really succeeded as a Network. It closed the television network in 1956 and
sold its TV manufacturing division to Emerson Radio company two years later.
The Barn
Dance is one of the few DuMont shows preserved in excellent condition. It portrays western and country music in a
very unsophisticated and ‘corny’ fashion, displaying the talent as ‘Hillbilly’
caricatures.
Despite that, there are some good musical moments, especially in the performances by Patsy Montana, who in 1936 made musical history with her massive hit, “I Want to be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart.” She was the first female country singer to have a recording sell over one million copies.
. Host Bill Bailey sings the western swing number
"No Supper Tonight".
Other performers on the first show include Kenny Roberts
("Cry Baby Blues"),
also..............
Kay Brewer ("Boogie Woogie Yodel"),
The house band The Saddle Pals ("Stomp"),
Nancy Lee ("I''m Dyin' For Someone To Love Me"),
Homer & Jethro ("A Screwball's Love Song"),
The Candy Mountain Girls ("Night Train To Memphis")
and Doc Hopkins ("Honey In The Rock").
The cartoon
series Calvin and the Colonel is actually the Amos and Andy show with the
original voices of the A and A characters who were changed into a cartoon Fox
and a Bear. The radio series ran from
1928 to 1960 and was for many years the top rated program in radio.
The first
Amos and Andy TV series in 1950 was a huge hit and was loved by millions who
can never forget Tim Moore’s brilliant performance of “The Kingfish”.
After the
show was forced off television in 1952, the creators tried to find a way to get
the show back on the tube. When they
finally ended the radio version of the program in 1960 after 32 years , they made
it into a cartoon series - changing the names of the two lead characters to
Calvin and the Colonel.
If you liked
the radio series and the first TV series, you will love Calvin and the Colonel –
just close your eyes so you don’t have to watch the cartoon and you’ll be fine,
it is vintage Amos and Andy!
My annotated and updated version of the classic holiday tale Christmas Under the Snow, available in this blog, in my podcast - Short Story Theater, and on YouTube, has been listened to, watched, and read more than 25,000 times since I published it a few years ago.
The original version from 1905 by Olive Thorne Miller may have been read a million times or more and I'm pretty sure than not one single child has been harmed by hearing this ancient narrative.
OH YOUTUBE - WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?
In an age where seemingly anything goes in television, politics, radio, and film, YouTube has "Age Restricted" my annotated and updated retelling of "Christmas Under the Snow" which, as previously stated appears in this blog as well as in my podcast, Short Story Theater, and in my Book "Christmas Classics Refreshed".
Attention parents:
DO NOT ALLOW YOUR CHILD TO READ THIS HUNDRED YEAR OLD CHRISTMAS TALE,
they perhaps will be damaged forever because in the story, a rural family whose house is literally buried under the winter snow, captures and eats two rabbits to avoid starvation. YouTube doesn't want your children to know that in hard times people have had to resort to hunting and trapping animals for food.
Good Grief!
Don't tell them that their fish filet once swam in the ocean! Never let on that their Big Mac was slaughtered in Chicago before it got to swim in Special Sauce.
Wake up YouTube!
If you'd care to read or listen to this salacious tale, it is here on this blog. It is free to listen on my podcast, Short Story Theater, or on YouTube - but only if you are 18 or perhaps 21. Maybe you should be over 55 to hear about rabbits being used as food. Click the link if you dare! And if you do please tell YouTube you are a grown up and you know how hamburger is made and where the real Santa Claus lives! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKC6RhcLl8c
News from Bill Russo's Short Story Theater
"The Book of Gord" was our most popular episode last week (week ending 11-07-2020) on Short Story Theater, followed closely by "From the Halls of Carrabba's Italian Grill", and then by our all time most listened to episode, "The Cold Touch of Death".
We wish to thank our 2500 regular listeners. Season two is about half-way over, there's lots more to come. If you like our work, please do so on social media. Likes and shares will help us get a higher ranking on podcast listings, allowing us to reach more listeners.
Here's a message from our author and publisher, Bill Russo, who celebrated his 77th birthday on November 7. The number seven crops up again in Bill's birth year it was 1943 - 4 plus 3 = 7.
"Hello folks. Our goal this second season is to get to 5000 listeners. Our podcasts are experimental audio plays using actual people as well as computer voices. My budget is very limited and I bear all of the expenses myself. I hope in future we will get big enough so that we can have full cast productions with live actors and actresses."
"One day, when the virus finally goes away, I hope we can go from a virtual theater, to staging an actual broadcast in the great and historic Cape Playhouse in Dennis on Cape Cod, where stars such as Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart, Shirley Booth and Robert Montgomery made appearances early in their career."
Our listeners will be invited to play the roles in our live performances! Stay tuned, and please like and share our stories, most of which I have written especially for Short Story Theater."
Here's our newest play, which had the most unusual ending ever! Bill said .....
"When I was tapping away at my laptop, reaching the end of the story "Jilted", where a Yellow-Hammer Woodpecker is tapping away at a tree, I heard a loud tapping at my window - it was a Yellow-Hammer wood pecker who would not go away!' Hear the details on the podcast of "The Jilted Arbor of Bell's Neck" https://www.spreaker.com/.../the-jilted-arbor-of-bells-neck
Here are a few of the photos Bill took of the Yellow-Hammer with a two foot wingspan, which was tapping on the window of his writing room on Cape Cod, three stories up from the ground.
“Dusty’s Trail”, which you could call
“Gilligan’s Wagons”, is a 1973 series meant to capitalize on Bob Denver’s fame,
first as Maynard G. Krebs in Dobie Gillis and later as Gilligan in Gilligan’s
Island. The series just scraped the bottom of the top fifty during its run of
26 episodes and was not renewed for a second season.
by Bill Russo
So because of not being used to the clocks being turned back, I woke up at 3:55 a.m. this morning, the day after daylight savings time ended (November 2, 2020) and could not go back to sleep.
I began writing a story called 'The Jilted Arbor of Bell's Neck" which ends in a tree where the enigmatic word 'Jilted' had been carved in huge letters.
As I ended the story with a bird pecking away at those letters, I was distracted by a rhythmic tapping on my window. The window by the way is on the third floor, some 30 feet above the ground!
I was wrapped up in finishing my story with a bird tapping away at the carving on the tree....
but the tapping persisted at my window...and when I looked i was shocked to see............
a large white bird with black speckles, and a big red dot on the back of its head, tapping on my window.
I grabbed my camera and took several pictures of it. Then I tapped back at it and joined it in a duet of tapping, me on the inside and the bird tapping and walking across the window as if it had magnetic feet!
This continued for two full minutes, until finally the strange bird had its say and left.
It left behind however the photographic evidence that you see below!
This is not the first encounter I have had with the weird (Think ee-wahn chu, puckwudgies and the Bridgewater Triangle) and I guess it will not be the last!
-0-
Daylight Savings Time Was Invented by the Devil
by Bill Russo
