Breaking Walls

Despite the CBS sales team’s best efforts, national sponsorship for Luke Slaughter was non-existent. Only the May 4th episode managed to get sponsorship from O'brien Paints. All the components for an excellent series were there, except the timing. By Memorial Day, the writing was on the wall.

This is audio from the final episode of Luke Slaughter, which aired on June 15th, 1958. In it we learn that Slaughter was once a young lawyer, and his birth name was Lucien. With his commanding voice, Buffington could have been a radio leading man. His physical features — short, stocky, and balding — relegated him to character parts in film and TV.

On May 15, 1960 Less than two years after Luke Slaughter was cancelled, Sam Buffington committed suicide by asphyxiation. He was 28 years-old.

The front cover of the March 2nd, 1958 Sunday edition of The Los Angeles Times spoke of President Eisenhower’s recovery from a mild stroke. Two civilian airplanes crashed over Upland, killing four. Racehorse Round Table, won at Santa Anita. Meanwhile, at 12:05PM Pacific Time, Luke Slaughter signed on from KNX.

Lawrence Dobkin was featured in the cast. Years later, he and Lilian Buyeff, who played Carlotta in the previous episode, spoke with SPERDVAC.

After Luke Slaughter signed off, Frontier Gentleman signed on with its fourth episode. It was called “Kendall’s Last Stand,” and was one of the most gripping shows in the run. John Dehner starred.

Five minutes of a Road Show followed and then five more minutes of news.

After a New York Philharmonic Concert, Suspense signed on at 4:35, guest-starring Karl Swenson and Cathy Lewis. The story, “Five-Buck Tip.” is a thriller about a twin trying to escape the electric chair at the expense of his brother.

It aired at 4PM from KNX in Los Angeles. CBS had found multi-sponsorship for the series in late 1956. William N. Robson was also in charge of this production.

At 5:05PM, as a cold winter’s sunset overtook the east coast, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar signed on starring Bob Bailey in “The Durango Laramie Matter.” Bob Bailey’s daughter Roberta was a teenager at the time.

Yours Truly Johnny Dollar has been covered extensively in Episode 102 of Breaking Walls.

When Johnny Dollar signed off,The FBI In Peace and War signed on from New York. After which, dramatic programming shifted back to the west coast. Radio’s remaining Hollywood directors cast familiar character actors for union scale wages.

Throughout the 1950s, Norman Macdonnell’s Gunsmoke remained radio’s most popular show. It aired Sundays at 6:30 with a repeat the following Saturday at 12:30PM. On February 23rd, 1958 they presented “The Surgery.”

Although the last new episode of The Jack Benny Program aired on May 22nd, 1955, Between October of 1956 and June of 1958, CBS aired The Best of Benny in his familiar 7:05 time slot. With the Home Insurance Company paying for the time, even Benny repeats attracted a sponsor.

After Benny, Henry Morgan’s Comedy-Panel show Sez Who! Took to the air. Sez Who! debuted alongside The Stan Freberg Show on Sunday, July 14th, 1957 as part of a week in which CBS Radio added $765,000 in new billings. Sez Who! Would be sponsored every other week by Look Magazine.

When Luke Slaughter debuted on Sunday, February 23rd, 1958 over CBS, network radio had shifted focus. Car radios had become standard. That month, U.S. Radio Magazine reported fifty-five percent of all peak listening came from cars. Auto-rating measurements were underway, but ineffective.

If you’d have turned on your radio to WCBS in New York that Sunday, you’d have heard news reports at the tops of most hours. Concerts and other music programs filled the dial between 11:30AM and 2:00PM.

Slaughter signed on at 2:05 with CBS’s first fiction show of the day. Chairman William Paley still believed in radio drama. Americans were on the move and there was still an audience to reach. Opposite Slaughter, NBC broadcast a talk show The Sound of Science. ABC was in the midst of Dr. Oral Roberts. Mutual—WOR aired Studio X Matinee.

Junius Matthews played Wichita. Vic Perrin guest-starred. Sam Edwards appeared as well.

William Robson attracted talented people into Slaughter’s creative process. The going rate in 1958 for a radio script was four-hundred fifty dollars. Lucian Davis would produce script writers like Allen Botzer, Don Clark, Robert Stanley, and Tom Hanley, who also provided editorial supervision. Hanley shared sound duties with Bill James. Gunsmoke director Norman MacDonnell remembered their work.

Luke Slaughter would be set in the 1880s around Southwest Tombstone, Arizona. The title character was based on John Horton Slaughter, a Civil War cavalryman and Texas Ranger, noted as a trail-driver, gambler and cattleman. Slaughter also served as the sheriff of Cochise County in Arizona, and inspired a series on ABC TV the same year.

The supporting cast would be filled out by Hollywood radio’s most famous character actors, like Harry Bartell, Lilian Buyeff, Lawrence Dobkin, Jack Kruschen, Junius Matthews, Shirley Mitchell, Jeanette Nolan, Virginia Gregg, Vic Perrin, Parley Baer, Howard McNear, and Sam Edwards. They were like a family. They looked out for each other, including those less fortunate, as Jack Kruschen and Shirley Mitchell remembered.

Jerry Goldsmith, then a CBS staff musician, was tasked with creating the musical score. Picked to star was a twenty-six year old named Sam Buffington. Buffington appeared in at least thirty-nine TV shows and nine movies in less than four years. Luke Slaughter would be his only radio credit.

In February of 1958, CBS’ Gunsmoke, considered by many to be the greatest western of all-time, was in its sixth radio year. The TV version was the medium’s most-watched show, with a rating of 39.6. Although the 1950s proved to be a great time for radio westerns, in 1958 Gunsmoke was the only one of note on the air. Gunsmoke’s cast and crew had little overlap with its TV counterpart.

CBS was contractually obligated to provide their radio affiliates with a promised slate of shows, and because advertisers were now investing most of their dollars into TV, CBS officials left radio to the radio people.

Producers and directors, like Elliot Lewis, Jack Johnstone, Norman MacDonnell, and William N. Robson enjoyed less second-guessing and more creative freedom. However, these men and women also faced with shrinking budgets.

This is William N. Robson. By 1958 he had more than twenty years of experience writing, producing, and directing radio shows. He was also no stranger to westerns, having been in charge of Hawk Larabee a decade before. Robson had also been in control of Suspense since 1956.

In 1957 CBS Radio saw a rise in revenue for the first time since 1950. At the company convention that November, upper management predicted that radio was becoming fashionable again.

In early 1958, the network ordered two new western programs to air on Sunday afternoons, replacing an hour of concert broadcasts. The goal was to interest national advertisers. In the meantime, unsold commercial spots would be filled with PSAs. The first was created by Antony Ellis and called Frontier Gentleman. It came to the air on February 2nd, 1958. Breaking Walls covered Frontier Gentleman in episode 101.

The second one’s assignment fell to Robson. It would be called Luke Slaughter, of Tombstone.

When Jack Benny passed away on December 26th, 1974 after a short battle with cancer at the age of 80, it was Jack's best friend George Burns who was supposed to eulogize him at Benny's funeral. Burns attempted to, but was overcome with emotion and unable to continue.

Bob Hope, another close friend and long-time comedy peer, delivered one of the most poignant speeches of his lifetime. This is a portion of it, recorded live at Jack Benny's funeral.

This is the preamble from Andy Williams before his Radio Spirits selection of 60 greatest old-time radio Christmas shows. This collection is ©2000. The recording is from ca. 1999-2000.

Origin - radiospirits.com

In Breaking Walls episode 134 we spend our holidays with one of the most-beloved figures of the twentieth century: Jack Benny.

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Highlights:

• Picking Up with Benny Leaving NBC for CBS

• A World in Turmoil

• Benny Launches his Fall 1949 Season

• The Texas Benefit

• What About 1950?

• Jack Goes Christmas Shopping

• Christmas Week 1949 in World News

• Christmas Day with Jack and the Gang

• Bringing 1949 To a Close — Looking Ahead to January

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The WallBreakers:

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Subscribe to Breaking Walls everywhere you get your podcasts.

To support the show:

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The reading material used in today’s episode was:

• Sunday Nights at Seven — By Jack and Joan Benny

• On the Air — By John Dunning

• Network Radio Ratings — By Jim Ramsburg

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On the interview front:

• Jack Benny, Dennis Day, Phil Harris, Frank Nelson, and Don Wilson, were with Chuck Schaden. Hear their full chats at SpeakingOfRadio.com.

• Mel Allen, Mel Blanc, and Vincent Price were with Dick Bertel and Ed Corcoran for WTIC’s The Golden Age of Radio. Hear these at Goldenage-WTIC.org.

• Jack Benny, George Burns, Phil Harris, Frank Nelson, and Don Wilson were also interviewed by Jack Carney.

• Dennis Day and Dick Joy spoke with John Dunning for his 1980s 71KNUS Radio program from Denver.

• Don Quinn was interviewed by Owen Cunningham in 1951

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Selected music featured in today’s episode was:

• Somewhere In My Memory — By John Williams

• What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve — By Nancy Wilson

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A special thank you to Ted Davenport, Jerry Haendiges, and Gordon Skene.

For Ted go to RadioMemories.com, for Jerry, visit OTRSite.com, and for Gordon, please go to PastDaily.com.

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Thank you to:

Tony Adams

Steven Allmon

Orson Orsen Chandler

Phil Erickson

Jessica Hanna

Perri Harper

Briana Isaac

Thomas M. Joyce

Ryan Kramer

Earl Millard

Gary Mollica

Barry Nadler

Christian Neuhaus

Aimee Pavy

Ray Shaw

Filipe A Silva

John Williams

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WallBreakers Links:

Patreon - patreon.com/thewallbreakers

Social Media - @TheWallBreakers

As the curtain closed on 1949, Jack Benny had his most lucrative year to date. CBS was now the number one network in the country, and both were poised for big things in the oncoming TV era. Benny’s January 1950 rating would rise again, to 25.6.

This brings our look at December of 1949 with Jack Benny to a close. Although we’ll be moving on you shouldn’t worry, Jack will still be around the periphery in January.