Radio varieties (Sept 1940-June 1941)

Fifty Years With Henry Burr G^ — ? Featured Singer on National Barn Dance Has Colorful History " Jl RE YOU the same Henry Burr we used to hear on our phonograph?" This is the constant query put to Henry Burr, dean of ballad singers on the Alka Seltzer National Barn Dance. The question is understandable because Henry Burr, bom Harry McClaskey, is a living tale of the history of the mechanical amusement industry and a pioneer in radio broadcasting — his silvery voice has been heard from coast to coast for a half-century. Despite the years, Henry Burr has kept his popularity, as evidenced by the heavy fan mail received each week. Each week also he receives innumerable requests to sing songs he made famous from the Gay Nineties on. Henry Burr was bom in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada, in 1885. When he was five years old he became a boy soprano, singing in theaters, churches and community centers — and he's been singing ever since. For many years he toured the country with such artists as Herbert Witherspoon, baritone and late director of the Metropolitan Opera Company. Then he became interested in the queer contraption invented by Edison in which the voice could be played back. So, in 1903, he was one of the first to make records for Edison and Columbia. "These were disc records," he explains. "I would sing into a number of horns each one of which was attached to a separate recording. And for each one I received the magnificent sum of fifty cents." Despite the frugal monetary returns, Henry Burr kept on. He has made more than nine million records. One, "Goodnight, Little Girl, Goodnight" sold more than three million copies. At the time of his initial record ventures. Burr was a soloist at a Madison Avenue chiirch in New York. Since record making was considered in the light of a toy, he was strongly advised to discontinue such nonsense. So he dropped his real name, Harry McClaskey, in order to continue the "nonsense". In 1912, he organized his own concert company, Eight Popular Victor Artists, touring the United States from Maine to California, with such men as Billy Murray, Frank Banta, pianist, and Rudy Wiedeoft, saxophone player. Then came radio, and Burr who had shown he was not afraid to fry new things, bravely approached a crude microphone in 1920 for his ffrst broadcast. The studio was in a doctor's laboratory in Denver. The microphone was a crude wooden bowl with an inverted telephone fransmitter. RADIO VARIETIES NOVEMBER Henry Burr Immediately after the broadcast, Burr left for California, finding upon his arrival that the fact that his voice had been heard from Denver to San Francisco via the ether waves had made frontpage headlines up and down the West Coast. In the years following he performed on such programs as the City Service Show from New York, the Maxwell House program, and Goodrich Zippers. Six years ago he joined the Alka Seltzer National Barn Dance where his silvery voice still carries on. Burr is five feet, nine and onehalf inches tall, weighs 205 pounds, has a fair complexion, gray hafr and blue eyes. He has been married to concert singer Cecelia Niles since 1910. Of his listeners he says: "I have fans who've been following my records and listening to my broadcasts since the beginning. They're my friends, and each time I approach the microphone I sing to them." But each time he approaches the microphone, Henry Burr has an attack of "mike fright" — despite the fact that he's been doing the same thing for twenty years. Henry Burr is heard on the National Barn Dance each Saturday evening at eight o'clock (CST) over the red network of the National Broadcasting Company. .Page $