Radio doings (Dec 1930-Jun1932)

Arc You Listemri'? Tony Wons Hobby of Collecting Literary Odds and Ends Has Brought Him National Fame A BUTCHER, a baker, a chairslat maker, now the world's champion wielder of scissors and pastebrush, Anthony Wons has a picturesque and varied experience from which to draw the threads for the weaving of his home-spun philosophy. Tony's Scrap Book, as he calls his twice-daily program over Columbia, is a pot-pourri of the best that he reads, plus the best that his listeners read and send in to him, plus a generous measure of his own thoughtful personality. There are many reasons why Tony should be the quiet, thoughtful, human sort of human that he is. For one thing, he comes from the lakes and the woods, from Northern Wisconsin, and as a child he was able, between chores, to get his fill of the beauties of nature. Besides, he is a fisherman, and fishermen ever since Izaak Walton have been notoriously addicted to thought, for lack of anything better to do. The serenity of life on the familv homestead was interrupted when Tony was only twelve by the death of his father, and the youngster had to consider seriously the questions of ways and means. Soon he was tendimr a furnace in Milwaukee for a stipend of three dollars a week, and he regarded it as a promotion when he was set to the task of operatins a circular saw. slicing off slats for chairs. By the time he was fifteen Tony had moved into a butcher shop, and not long after this he moved out to Arizona and went in for cow-punching on a ranch near Phoenix. The next move to be recorded in this miniature Odyssey carries the hero to Valparaiso, Ind., where he spent his daytime hours clerking in a grocery store, his evenings studying at business college, and his nights playing drums in an amateur dance band. When he slept is not recorded. Neither is it known just how or when he learned to play the drums. Tony has a lot of qualifications for a variety of different jobs which do not figure in the story of his life. by Phil Holt Playing at old fashioned masquerades from eight at night until six in the morning was too much for the youth, however, and he soon had to give it up. But he saved enough money to complete his business course, and as in all Tony and part of his Scrap-Book good romances, industry was rewarded. He got a position as correspondent in a sales office, and describes his sensations at this time as approximating to what he expects of Paradise. The thing that appealed to Tony was that he had time for reading. He used it to such good advantage that before long he had been all through Shakespeare's works, and had taken such a passionate liking to some of the plavs that he learned them bv heart. He knows twelve of them and can stage a one-man Shakespeare production with ease. And he has. Out in France, Private Won s career was interrupted by a piece of shrapnel, and he spent about a year and a half in a hospital with nothing to do but read. First he got the habit of marking passages which he particularly liked. Then he got around to using scissors and paste, which he has been doing ever since. He pasted poems in his scrap book, for he had read hundreds, if not thousands of them. Then there was a sprinkling of jokes and a collection of more serious matter, including religious comments. For a while after leaving the hospital Tony was not strong enough to do heavy work, and filled in with odd clerical jobs. In his spare time he kept up his scrap book, until several thousand authors were represented between its covers. Shakespeare was still his favorite, and when radio broadcasting in Chicago got under way Tony was convinced that there ought to be a place on the air for him. But it was obvious that a full cast production of a Shakespearean drama was too ambitious a project for the infant radio, and Tony got the idea of taking all the parts himself. He had always wanted to be an actor. Most of us have. He made the suggestion to station WLS. "How long would you want?" asked the program director. "About an hour." replied Tony. "Gee, you must be good. The President never wants more than half an hour." The question of presidents, precedents and precedence having been settled, it was decided that Tony should have a [Turn to Page 45] RADIO DOINGS Page Twenty-seven