MOST COMPLETE PROGRAM LISTINGS PUBLISHED! WEEK ENDING JULY 3, 1937 VIRGINIA, VERRILL -.4 IN 1 IS ISSUE-WINNERS IN.1111--IE RADIO GUIDE STAR OF STARS POLL! "STARS RE-BORN"-WHAT SURGERY'S MAGIC HAS DONE FOR RADIO'S GREAT! "RAINBOW'S END"-SEAN DICKENSON'S STRANGER-THAN-FICTION LIFE STORY! witcositiowstwitoof 101.,0111*************** IN THIS ISSUE Week Ending July 3. 1937 M. L ANNENBERG Publisher CURTIS MITCHELL, Editorial Director Smash Features I Stars Reborn ® Plastic surgery -in radio! 3 Rainbow's End Jean Dickenson's unusual story by MARY JACOBS 4 "Blue Heaven" How Gene Austin found it! Radio's STAR of STARS by JACK SMALLEY. 10 Flying the Pacific -with the first passenger on FIFTY years ago, the title of this little issue of Radio Guide you'll find a story the first Clipper flight essay might have been, "Buck Benny about the 1937 Star of Stars. by CARLTON E. MORSE 16 Rides Again," or, "You Can't Keep a Radio Guide has a special pride in the Personalities Good Man Down." Star of Stars Election. We're proud of 1 For that's the story. Radio Guide has our annual contest, proud that we are able Bert Lahr Millionaire Clown just completed its annual Star of Stars to conduct it, proud of its rating as a re- by LORRAINE THOMAS 6 Election, and once more Jack Benny liable barometer of radio popularity. But Jack Benny This Is the Life -Part III stands at the top of the heap, head and most of all we're proud of the enthusias- by JACK JAMISON 8 shoulders over the crowd, the Star of tic response of radio fans everywhere. Lily Pons Her photo -life story! 21 Stars of the greatest show on earth! Characteristic of us as Americans, of That's a story in itself. But there's course, is an inborn delight in contests. News and Comment a bigger story behind it. Because Jack That philosophy, that idea, is an evi- Plums and Prunes Benny ranked No. 1 in 1936, too. And dent characteristic of Radio Guide's Star by EVANS PLUMMER 12 it was the same Jack Benny who was of Stars Election. Everybody gets in! Inside Stuff voted America's in by MARTIN LEWIS 13 best the year 1935! Ballots come to this office from the windy The Radio Week plains of the Far West with the name The Latest Radio News 15 of the writer's Music of the Masters favorite star painfully by CARLETON SMITH 17 scrawled with the stub of a pencil -and Short Waves they come beautifully and precisely writ- by CHARLES A. MORRISON 20 ten, enclosed in a starchy English en- velope with a Park Avenue address! Pictorial Features Today, in June of this year 1937, this Dancing in the Clouds Al Donohue's opening at the is your Star of Stars rating: Rainbow Room in Radio City! 14 You Asked for Them -and Here 1. Jack Benny They Are - 2. Nelson Eddy Eight of Radio's 400! 24 3. Lanny Ross No Visitors Allowed 4. Frances Langford Behind radio footlights with Joe Cook! 26 5. Lulu Belle 6. Bing Crosby 7. Rudy Vallee ' Departments ' 8. Eddie Cantor RADIO GUIDE'S X -Word Puzzle 18 9. Joan Blaine Stories of Near -by Stations 19 10. Jessica Dragonette Voice of the Listener 19 11. Fred Allen Short -Wave Programs 20 Contests on the Air 46 12. Don Ameche Log of American Stations 47 There are lots of surprises in that list- ing. Eddie Cantor furnishes one of them. Programs Third in 1935, he rose to second place in Sunday, June 27 29 1936 -to drop to eighth in this year's Monday, June 28 31 Tuesday, June 29 34 ranking. Nelson Eddy, not even in the Wednesday, June 30 36 running two years ago, shot into third Thursday, July 1 39 Friday, July 2 41 place in '36, and is now crowding Jack Saturday, July 3 44 Benny for top honors! Cover Portrait by Charles E. Rubino You'll notice that Frances Langford, in fourth place, tops all the rest of her sex. Editorial Offices, That's a quick climb. She went from 551 Fifth Avenue, nowhere to the top in one year! Speaking of Benny again -and we New York, N. Y. were, you know -down there in eleventh RADIO GUIDE (Trade Mark Registered U. S. Pat. Office). Vo.nme VI. Number :17. Week ending .1 u : place you'll find his late hated rival, 1937. Published by Regal Press, Inc. Issued weekly. Fred RADIO GUIDE, 731 Plymouth Court, Chicago, Illinois. Entered as second class matter at the Post Office. Chicago, Allen. Allen will probably say that he Illinois, February 24, 1932, under Act of March 3, 1879. Copyright, 19:17, by Press, Inc: All reserved. Radio -and - Screen Top - Notcher, Jack Benny: Winner Radio Regal rights of was driven into the cellar when Benny Circulation and Business Offices, 731 Plymouth Court, Guide's coveted Star of Stars award -three years in a row! Chicago, Illinois. Editorial Offices, 551 Fifth .Avenue, played "The Bee!" New York, N. Y. M. L. Annenberg, Chairman of the Board; Herbert Krancsr, Executive Vice- President and General Manager; Curtis Mitchell, Vice- President and And so another Star of Stars Election Editorial Director; Ed Zoty, Circulation Manager. Ad- vertising Offices: 551 Fifth Avenue, New York. N. Y.; From amateur entertainer in Wauke- passes into history. And from the bottom Mills Building, San Francisco, ('alifornia; Western Pacific Building, Los Angeles, California, and 731 Plymouth gan, Illinois, to a three -time title as the of our hearts, we of Radio Guide thank Court. Chicago, Illinois. Unsolicited manuscripts should be accompanied by stamped, self- addressed envelope for biggest name in radio the saga of return. Ten cents per copy in the United States. Subscrip- -that's you, readers and radio fans everywhere, tion rates in the U. S. and possessions and countries of the Pan -American Postai Union: six months, $2.50; one the pride of the Benny family. And while for your whole- hearted participation. year, $4.00. Subscription rates ln foreign countries: nix months, $5.00; one year, $8.00. Remit by postal money we're on the subject -on page 8 of this -THE EDITORS. order, express money order, or check drawn to order of RADIO GUIDE. Currency sent at subscriber's risk. Radio Guide Week Ending July 3. 1937 N M7 ';734. !in STARS REBORN CAREERS - IN -RADIO DEMAND GOOD LOOKS AS WELL AS TAL- ENT - AND SURGEONS SEE THAT STARS FILL THE BILL! AFEW years ago, a radio star There is no danger, no pain, little was a voice. Sheltered by the bleeding and you will be discharged protective shadow of the mi- in about two weeks." crophone, she could be fat, thin, pretty After her operation, the girl's pro- or ugly. It didn't matter. Today, news- fessional success was merely a matter papers, magazines and million -dollar of wise management. She appeared publicity campaigns bring the stars' in a New York musical show, then in faces to the attention of the public various New York night clubs. Step daily. And because we, the public, are by step she was building up a glamor- human beings and react to beauty and ous reputation and background for ugliness in normal ways, we want our herself. Then came a screen test, idols to be beautiful. which she passed. Today she is in Besides, a radio star today cannot Hollywood featured in pictures, and I- confined to radio activities alone her radio appearances net her about and expect to stay on top. Broadway five times the salary she used to re- shows, personal appearances, night- ceive. She is described in the newspa- club engagements, Hollywood films - pers as "the beautiful Miss Y," and all these are now considered necessary she is about to marry a highly eligible to the build -up of a successful radio and sought -after young movie actor. star. Other examples, similar to hers, may Look over your radio stars today- be found in radio. Not only because it's the Frances Langfords, the Gladys it generally leads to Hollywood and Swarthouts, the Lily Ponses, the Bing from there on to unlimited possibilities Crosbys and the Nelson Eddys who in film and radio work, but because get the best programs, command the of the imminent arrival of television. biggest money. There's no question but Many radio people don't want this that their stage and film appearances new and fast -approaching medium to contributed largely to making them find them unprepared. the great stars they are in radio. The experience of Miss Y is a com- Radio stars have seen the warning mon one, and plastic surgeons can du- signal and are taking plicate her story with heed. Miss Y, for ex- countless other exam- ample, who had a ples of radio artists misshapen nose, faced who have come to facts. She saw two B Y them for new faces. paths open to her: But not only wo- brief popularity and HEL EN men take advantage then oblivion-or a of plastic surgery's new face and a re- benefits. One of the newed life on her HO VER most dramatic stories, career. Her decision in which plastic sur- led her to the plastic gery saved not only surgeon's office. a career but helped The physician examined her nose to solve a marital problem, concerns and found it to have a slight hump a well -known orchestra leader whom and a downward bony curve at the we shall call John Q.