Variety (Jan 1949)

Vednc»day, Jmuuaey 12, 1949 ^ TSUBVISION - RADIO 31 hside Stuff-Ra£o Foilowing a rebuke from the Catholic Church for propagandizing for more liberal N. Y. State divorce laws in its special program, "Cause for Divorce", last week, WMCA, N. Y., agreed to grant the Church spe- cial air time for its point of view. Gottfrey T. Schmidt, Fordham Univ. Jaw professor^ will speak for the N. Y. Archdiocese tomorrow -night (Thurs,). Co;itroversy was stirred after Wilbur M. Wherry, prominent lawyer, delivered a report over the indie which indica:ted the need for reform in the divorce, laws. The station had originally invited Catholic ii»okesnien to appear on the forum but received no takers. - Before the War, Norman Twigger was on the staff of WCAE in'Pitts- burgh, a crack announcer and recognized at the time as an outstand- ing newscaster as well. He was then close to 40, at an age when careers are generally fixed and permanent. But Twigger had for years thought long and hard about a. career in medicine but a family prevented him from giving up the securitj^ of his radio work. After Pearl Harbor, however, and even as the netwoi-ks were tapping at his door, Twigger saw his opportunity to study to be an M.D. at Uncle Sam's expense, tie wsignod from WCAE, enlisted in the-army and. was sent to med- ical schboL Today he's Captain Norman Twigger, ear,, nose and throat surgeon at the Oliver General Hospital in-Augusta, Ga. Sometime this year his army stretch will be up and he'll settle down in Augusta for private practice. VALLEE'S 7iG TAG Godfrey Takes AM Cast FOR mE-COMICS' I Over to TV for New Show Hollywood, Jan. 11. | New Arthur Godfrey television Price tag of $7 ,500 a week has show, fir st on which the CBS star been placed on 'Teje-Coimcs," | ^^ijf 1,^ playing exclusively to a' series Of 15-mmute cartoon vidpix ; /. ■ * -s^u.. Sd out by Vallee Video as a,TV audience, preems tonight flve-a-week layout. Pix consist of | (Wed.) on 10 CBS-TV stations in a quartet of three-minute cartoons ( the east and midwest in the-8 to 9 with remaining time left open for giot under sponsorship of Chester- commercialSi | field, which also bankrolls the sec- Quartet of subjects consists of I ond half-hour of Godfrey's .i.in. "Brotlior Goose," drawn by Cal | cBS radio airer. Agency is Newell- Ho«ard: "Sa-Lih," an Arabian, Emmett. nights novelty drawn by A. J. Met-I p^^^gt jhe show, while not calfe: "Joey and Jug,'» clown.seiaes following that of Godfrey's b.v Arnold Gillespie: and "Rick " ■ Rack. Special Agent," by Miles Pike and Pete Burness. Jack Kirk- wood, Lillian Leigh and Bill Grey supply the voices for the cartoon figures. morning AM stanza, is to comprise most of the cast from the radio program and- will have a similar oflf-the-cult presentation. Featured with Godfrey will be vocalists Ja- nette Davis and Bill Lawrence, the Mariners quartet and Archie Bley- er's orch. Margaret Richardson will produce and Jack Carney and Paul Nickell will direct. Godfrey's "Talent Scouts" show Chesterfield cigarets, through the Newell-Emmett ad agency, bank- rolled the New York Daily News' WPIX's pickup of the finals in the Silver Skates tourney from Madi- son Sq. Garden, N. Y., Monday (101 night. Fifteen new series of spots started last week on WTMJ-TV, Milwaukee Journal station. New sponsors include the Plankinton Packing Co., through Cramer- Krasselt agency; Trubilt Trailers, through the MaoDonald - Cook agency; Milwaukee Co., through Gramer-Krasselt; .Tohn P. Hansor Soap, through Stonc-O'Halloran; Waukesha Roxo (sott drink.s) and W: P. Hammond & Sony through the same, agency; John Graf Co., through Al Herr agency; Indepen- dent Milwaukee Brewery,' via A1-; len Reiselbach agency; Pate Oil Co., through Herr; Wisconsin Tele- phone Co., no agency; Mrs. Drenk's Foods, Stone-O'Halloran; United Coal & Dock Co., no agency; Howard B. Stark Candy; Stone- O'Halloran; Mammy's Foods, Stone-O'Halloran, and York-Wag- ner (ice, cubes), no agency. Spear & Co., through the Wil- -liam- Warren- agencyr-lias-rcnewed, the Jimmy Jemail show,; and Krueger Brewery has renewed box- ing from Ridgewood Grove over WPIX. On the same station, Blackton'Fifth Avenue inked fori 13 weeks of one edition weekly of the five-minute"New.s on the Hour" show, and Lucky Strikes, | through Young & Rubicam. re- newed its thrice-weekly spotSi Spots were also bought b^ Celomat Corp., through Tracy Kent; Molle Shaving Cream through Y.&R,, and .Long Island Railroad, through the Al Paul Lefton Co. FMA Confident It Will Push AM. Out of Radio Picture in Five Years Shades of Franklin! Philadelpia, Jan. 11. Ben Franklin, who was a forward looking gent in his day, would have gotten a big boot out of the present use his carriage house is being put to,. The former Franklin stable, at 321 S. Fourth st. here, has been remodeled and is now the- home of the Theatre Arts In- stitute. The school will con- centrate on television produc-' tion and is the only one of its kind in Pennsylvania. Robert Wahl, rehearsal and script head at WPIL-TV, is in charge. ENDS 19-tEAR AIR SERIES Dallas, Jan. 11. The 'oldest program on WFAA ended la.st Sunday with the final broadcast made by Dr. David Lef-. on Monday nights, meanwhile, will kowitz. ' continue as a simultaneous AM-TV ■ For the past 19 years he has . presentation under sponsorship of aired a 30-minute program spon-i Lipton's Tea. but the video version sored bv the Brotherhood of | will be can ied only on CBS-TV's Temple iMuanu-El. ' eiist coast web. 'H'WOOD SCREEN TEST' WINS ROVND IN COURT "Hollywood Screen Test." Les- ter Lewis Associate's package on ABC^V._-won--the—first—round . in the $500i000 plagiarism suit launched against it by Screen Test, Inc., in New York State supreme court this week as Judge Aron Steuer denied the latter company's motion for a temporary iniunction. Robert A. Monroei Mutual net- work producer,, and Latham Ovens, owners of the program, "Screen Test," which was on the AM air- lanes several years ago under Metro's sponsorship, are charging So Sorry Hollywood, Jan. 11; It was bound to happen with, all the confusion attending a mass telecast of one event. With every going-station's cameras-picking up the Tourna- ment of Roses parade in Pasa- dena New Year's day, links to the Mt. Wilson transmitters be- came mixed and KTTV carried 10 minutes of KLAC's iiickup. "Hollywood Screen Test'- with lift ing their original idea. A jury trial | comprehensive since the Associa Washington, Jan. 11. FM Assn., with a change in com* mand to direct its promotional activities^ was all set last week to embark on its tliird year of opera- tion, confident the new service has won its toughest battles^ and that , it would push AM broadcasting out of the cities within five years. At a press conference Thursday f6) to introd uce its new executive director,. Edward L. Sellers, who succeeds J. N. iBill) Bailey, FMA, announced that it is gearing ilS; operation along the .lines of a .pub- , lie relations setup and has retained the Faught Co., of New York, a«; counsel "in establishing and ex- ecuting an expanded program of operations.for 1949." FMA said its' board will hold a special.meeting in the near future "to consider de- tails of the new program and to make budgetary provisions for it." FMA stated it will extend its bulletin—jse^rvJee—ta-membecs will place greater stress in pro- viding "how-to-do-it case material" in meeting problems most common to FM stations. In this connection, it is planning a "clinic" on tim« sales to be held in New York in the spring, in cooperation . with station reps, time, buyers, and other ad- vertising agency people. FMA announced it also has plans under way to make its 1949 annual convention, which will be' held in Chicago, "the largest and mo.st is slated to open Monday (17). Suit is the first court ease in- volving alleged infringement by a video program on an Idea from aur other medium. Defendants in the case are Lester Lewis Associates, Neil Hamilton, director and emcee of "Hollywood Screen Test," and the ABC network. . . Tacoma -^ Charlie Bryant,, an- nouncer at l^VI, . Mutual outlet here, left the Citation .Tan, 9 to be- come director of publicity for Gov- ernor-elect Arthur Langlic tion viras founded in Washington on Jan. 10, '47." Millard Faught, head of the Faught Co., which has worked with: other clients in the field of radio and trade associations, participated at the conference in acquainting reporters with FMA's new plans in selling the service to the public; He predicted that FM will largely displace AM in the next five year* and that just as soon as broad- casters see their AM audience be- coming unprofitable "they will get out ol AM nuick." to quote... ^ in which WOK repeats some things it said in 1948 as an underlined assiirance of what it will continue to be in 1949. *'... what we've said attempts to mirror the wai-mth and human- ness of WOR's programming from day to day. It is these qualities, based on a skilled knowledge of what the public wants, that have made WOR one of America's gieatstations^andgreatsellingJorces —for moie than a quarter of a century." "... WOR is a powerful force in the lives of the majoiiL}- of 36,000,- 000 people in 430 counties in 18 states on the eastern seaboard. T rom the windy reaches of Prince Edward Island, in the Dominion of Canada, to the pine-scented border of Southern Georgia, WOR's voice is a welcome and forceful one." "... WOR's personality has always been a warm one; a method and technique of programming based on people, not just shows. But in evolving this form of radio broadcasting, ^VOR has not ignored ideas, nor the need for showmanship and day to day awareness of what the public wants..." It is qualities such as those described above that ma fie WOR the amazing selling force that it is, and — mind you — at a price that'll leave you gasping. hearil iby the most people where the tnost people are WOR mutual