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When I was young, we lived in a three-bedroom home on Madison Avenue. Life was great and extremely simple. Our main and probably only source of entertainment was a very large radio that stood on its own in our living room. This was well before we had our first television.
There were four or five local AM stations, and their newsmen and disc jockeys were very well known. The stations were connected to networks like local TV stations are today. Local news and music aired during the daytime, network shows during the evening and weekends along with sporting events.
I listened to shows like, “The Lone Ranger,” “Superman,” and “Roy Rogers.” I sat on the couch near the radio, closed my eyes and listened to my heroes save the day. Their voices were locked into my brain. I remember my folks telling stories about me altering my voice to sound like Roy Rogers, my hero.
Soap operas also got their start on radio and were aired during the early afternoon before children were home from school. I remember my grandmother having an afternoon break to listen to her shows.
Comedy, drama, detective, music, quiz, and adventure shows dominated the evening schedules. One of my parent’s favorites was “The Jack Benny Show.” The show also featured Rochester, Don Wilson, Phil Harris, Mary Livingstone, and Dennis Day.
I fondly remember sitting on the floor in front of that big radio on Sunday evenings listening to The Jack Benny Show with my parents. That was just another part of Sunday for us.
Many of these wonderful shows were transformed into television programs a few years later. It was so cool to see Clark Kent dash into a public telephone booth and in a few seconds emerge and fly away as Superman. I often wondered about the business suit he left behind in his rush to save Lois Lane.
I think we had a 16-inch black and white console television with some interesting rabbit ears sitting on top of the set. Things went along smoothly until the invention of color television. Then it seemed to start all over again. We were lucky to get a color television exceedingly early. Lots of my parents’ family would stop by to watch a popular show in the evenings.
There are a few cable channels that now provide some of those early television shows. I have enjoyed watching “The Jack Benny Show” again. So many memories, especially when the show has a famous guest star. Recently, I saw Nat King Cole guesting on one of The Jack Benny Shows.
I wish I still had that old stand alone radio.
Shonk is a 1960 graduate of Southport High School, a ’63 grad of Indiana Central College (now the University of Indianapolis) and a retired bus driver from Beech Grove Schools. He can be reached through email at [email protected].