This is a snippet from Breaking Walls Episode 120: Radio and The Harvest (1936 - 1954)

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Jim Jordan was born on a farm near Peoria, Illinois on November 16th, 1896. He met Marian Driscoll, a coal miner’s daughter, at choir practice. She was born on April 15th, 1898. Both wanted a life in the theater. He studied voice and she played the piano.

They were married on August 31st, 1918.

By the 1920s Jim and Marion were performing together on stage, playing in small-town movie houses and lodge halls throughout the midwest. Their two children, Kathryn, and Jim Jr. were born at the end of Vaudeville tours.

Vaudeville wasn’t paying off. They went broke in 1923 and Jim went to work in a department store, but the Jordans couldn’t stay away from the stage. Jim soon went to Chicago for a traveling musical show.

In 1924 the couple debuted on the radio. Under that first contract, they were heard on WIBO as The O’Henry Twins for twenty-six weeks.

From 1925 until 1927, they played over Chicago’s WENR, gradually making the transition to comedy. They were heard in a children’s show, The Air Scouts until December 31st, 1929 and both Jim’s Grab Bag and Luke and Mirandy until 1931. Over this early period they developed dozens of on-air voices.

In 1929 the Jordans met Don Quinn on The Farmer Rusk Hour. They became friends, with Quinn penning occasional gags for the couple. Their loose partnership led to success.

On Luke and Mirandy, Jordan played a character named Uncle Luke, a fibber of sorts, and Marian was Aunt Mirandy, his wife. They starred in skits on The National Farm and Home Hour over NBC’s WMAQ. This would last until 1935. They simultaneously were featured players in a soap opera, The Smith Family.

It was this partnership that eventually led to Smackout.