• • Ruth Efting YOUR RADIO THE LIFE FAVORITES REVEALE AND LOVE OF Is any Star Worth $5,000 a Week? BURNS AND ALLEN Ed Wynn Harry Richman Bing Crosby The Boswell Sisters • R A DI o AR s YOU R R A D I 0 FAVORllES REVEALED ALL IN THIS ISSUE NEXT MONTH , The Life and Love. of Burn. and Allen ...Walter Ram.ey The most misunderstood wo­ Gracie Allen was in 10". with Bon Ryan. But G_Ae Bun.. carne al0nA- man in radio. A fascinating story Woman-Hater? .. D. C. O'Raherty 7 revealing how a famous radio Harry Richman is .tiI11ook;n~lor his id_l Air} star'. honest sympathy for tho.e The In.ide Story of Radio Salarie. .. Jack Foster 8 in suffering has been misunder­ The exact amounts they 'ttl lor entert.in'n' yo... stood by the public and dubbed The Romantic Sto"ry of Julia and Frank ...Adele Whitely Retcher 10 a publicity gag. The eh_min, Jove aa,. 01 Julia s..nder.-on and Frank Crumil Back to the Farm ·.Curti. Mitchell 18 The continuation of Jack Fos· Ruth Ettin, has. secret Jon,in,. A surpruin, one, too ter's liThe Inside Story of Radio Could You Win Thi. Victory? · ..Mary Stewart 20 Salaries." Information you can't The story 01 Bin, Cro.sby·a re'ener.t.on afford to min. Let's Gossip About Your Favorite, 22 T1Ht latest ne,..a and chi'·chat about tho.H who ru/. the "."8.'- Faith Baldwin. Adele Whitely If You Met Ray Perkin. ... Faith Baldwin 26 A clOftt-up of this populv ether perlOl'me. Retcher. Curti. Mitchell, Walter Ram.ey - they'll all be in the Backstage at a Broadcast · ..Ogden Mayer 28 second issue. High-powered See what .. bf'O>lldcast i, really IiAr dories from each and every one. A Woman'. Right to Help Her Hu.band ...Curti. Mitchell 32 Tr.,edy 'live the Countess Alban; the chance to be independent Big Chief of the Jesters Mary Howell 35 And you musn't miss the ending The story of Ed Wynn'. am••in' rad.o succell!- of the Burns and Allen love story. The Woman Behind the Sound. ..Ogden Mayer 36 That, tao, will be in the second • The mysl.riN of cr••tin4 appropriate noiHs lor radio pl.y~ Issue. Have You a Hidden Talent? .. Hector Vaughn 38 Don Novi. had~.nd finally dereloped it. ClIft you do the 3an1e' There'll 01.0 be a number of The Katzenjammer Kid. of the Air .Peggy Well. 45 thrilling dories on radio person­ The Boswell SitJtera .1'....,.tJ h~e b&en imp_and atill a,.,. alities, dories which take you be­ hind the scene. of radioland­ bring you the radio players' love. and hopes, disappointments and RADIO STARS ALBUM heartbreaks. Among them will be features on Stoopnagle and Budd, Lowell Thoma. 13 Seth Parker. Myrt and Marge Little Jack Little 14 Irene Beasley 40 and Ford Rush. And that'. only 0 -Ann Leaf 15 Alexander Gray. 41 few of the many you'll find in Ben Bernie .. 16 Russ Colombo 42 that next issue. It'll be dated Vaughn de Leath I? Sylvia Froos 43 November. Don't forget. • Editors: Ernest V. Heyn and Curtis Mitchell Associate Editor: K. Rowell Batten Radio Stars published montbly :md copyrighted, 1932. b)' Ddl PubliS}lIng Co., Inc. Georlt' T. lklacorte. Jr., Pre5., H. Mey~r, Vic~l·res., M. Dclll corte Sect'y. 100 Filth Avenue, New YorK, N. Y., Octobel', 1932. Vol. I. No. I, printed in U. S, A. Single ropy prict' 10 cents. Subscription pn(', • in tht' Unit~ States $1.20 a )'t'3r, F6rt'ign and Canadian subscriptions $2.20 a year. Application for second class entry now pending. Tht' pulo lisht'1" ;lCCepts no responsibility for tht' rrlurn of unsolicitl'!l:l m3t~rial & RADIO STARS THE LIFE AND LOVE OF an • , By WALTE R RAMSEY A LONG ahout the beginning of the twentieth century. 1-\ a ~kinny kid named Georg-c Burns was just starting to waddle dO\\"11 Pitt Street-in the lower and very The famous team of Burns poor section of the East Side. New York. He was num­ and Allen. Above you see ber nine in a robust, excitable Jewish family that was them as they appear in the later to boast twelve members-seven girls and five boys. Paramount production, "The I fis father made pants but only very occasionally sold Big Broadcast." To the right, them. In fact. until George began earning his own money as they look during their • in vaudeville many years later, he never had a new pair broadcasting. III pants. Ifis \vere always inherited from an older, "neh" hrother out in Ohio. From his tirst to his eighth 'ear Ill' was a welcome hurden on an already chilcl- \ RADIO STARS What a charming story, this tale of the beginnings­ yes, the very earliest beginnings-of the famous team of George Burns and Gracie Allen. George was born in lower Manhattan. Gracie in San Francisco. Yet their paths crossed, with dramatic consequences (Below) Gracie AUen in what was then considered ·0 pretty snappy pose. She was five at the time. (Left) Little Gracie a nine-year­ old Gracie. (Above) In costume for a Colonial play she did at school. She was fifteen at the . time this was taken. ever hated the family talent! Once, at the age of four, when she was performing an HInterpretive Irish Dance," she grew so weary of the whole idea that she pulled off the chin-whiskers she was wearing and carried them on burdened family. At eight he acquired a career! He and her arm while she finished. No one in the family under­ three other kids formed the "Pee Wee Quartet" and be­ stood Gracie. She was rebel in the clan. Yet she sang gan singing in every available saloon. They took turns and danced as a child performer in San Francisco almost passing the hat. from the moment she could totter onto the stage. It would have surprised him very much to have learned that the dark, little girl with the "funny little voice" who TO the Burns group, three thousand miles away in was later to become his. wife, had just received a tiny New York, George, "the go-getter" was no mystery. diamond ring for her third birthday ... which she The kid was out to make money and as much of it as promptly planted in the back yard in the fond hope that possible! it would grow into a diamond-ring tree. But George The highlight of George's young career, however, was didn't bother his head about far-away places like San the night that the Pee Wee Quartet made eighteen dollars I Francisco, and that was where Gracie Allen lived. Gracie Each kid in the group would get almost five dollars. Bnt was an optimist! At the age of ten, she met Charlie they lost the money on the way home I Chaplin who was on location near the Golden Gate. From When George was seventeen years old, he decided that that moment she planned to grow up and marry Chaplin. the professional opportunities of Pitt Street were too C011­ "A fortune teller had told me that I was going to marry lining-so he attempted to move up to Broadway. The a rich man:' relates Gracie, "and Charlie was the only best he got was the outskirts! Under the assumed name of rich man I had ever met!" \Vhen Charlie married Mil­ Williams he teamed up with a fellow under the assumed dred Harris, Gracie was that humiliated! name of Brown and somehow they managed to get the Instead of becoming the "child bride" of Chaplin, she act booked as SINGING-DANCING-SKATING' • consented, after many stormy sessions, to become a pupil The fact that neither of them could sing, dance nor skate in dancing school. The Aliens (there were five little may have had something to do with the early failure of Aliens ... four girls and a boy), were a family of "Brown and Williams"! Georg-e immediately switched dancers, and Gracie, the youngest, was the only one who to a comedy act called MacFry & Co. Just as bad! "Twu 5 RADIO STARS Another picture of them doing their radio stuff. The gentleman picking the card is Guy Lombardo. • people can be twice as lousy as one!" said George as he Union City where she was playing. She wanted Gracie started out as a "single." But it seemed that even one to see the act called U Burns & Lorraine." person can be pretty bad. and it wasn't long before the "They're planning to bust-up as a team," explained single folded as well. Rene. "Maybe you could team lip with Lorraine ... he's He finally came to the conclusion that assumed names awfully funny." were at fault. He was right! uBufns & Lorraine" was Gracie reillctantly trekked over to Union City. She really a funny act ... and it was George's first real step wasn't keen on teaming up with anybody, "... except towards recognition. Lorraine stuttered when he talked Ryan for life." But he had insisted that the weddin~ be ... but never when he sang. This oddity led to a very postponed until he had finished his twenty weeks' engage­ flln'ny gag that was later put in the act. It seems that ment. Grace saw ';Burns & Lorraine" at the matinee Burns was dining at a swanky cafe one night when Lor­ performance and returned again in the evening.