PHILADELPHIA, JULY 4th 1776....THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE...Y0U ARE THERE.
YOU ARE THERE
Some of Network Radio’s most creative minds were also the most versatile. For example, Carlton E. Morse, who gave us years of the warmhearted One Man’s Family, chuckled over his typewriter turning out the blood curdling series I Love A Mystery. Philips H. Lord who was responsible for the weekly shoot ‘em up Gangbusters, also portrayed the hymn singing Seth Parker and created the human interest series, We The People. So it was with Goodman Ace, renowned as radio and television’s top comedy writer and co-star of his own long running series with his wife, Jane. (See Easy Aces on this site.)
The former Kansas City newspaperman was impressed, as many were, by Orson Welles’ infamous 1938 War of The Worlds drama on CBS that supposedly touched off a national panic. The events of that broadcast, of course, were fiction described by fictitious reporters made to sound real. (See War of The Worlds on this site.) Then came D-Day in 1944, when radio went to real war on the shores of France and real reporters described the largest invasion ever known as it happened. (See D-Day On Radio on this site.)
What if, he reasoned, real historic events could be given Welles’ War of The Worlds treat-ment and be “reported” by real network newsmen as if they were happening now? The idea had merit but he was too busy with Easy Aces and lucrative outside writing assignments to develop it any further. Then Ace was hired in early 1947 to oversee The CBS School of Comedy Writers, the brainchild of network executives searching for a creative answer to NBC’s comedy dominance before Bill Paley discovered the monetary solution in 1948. (See The 1948-49 Season on this site.)
So while his six-month “class” turned out the forgettable Robert Q. Lewis Little Show, Goodman Ace hit the history books and developed You Are There which debuted as CBS Is There and remained for almost three years. (1)
Although Ace created the concept he had no desire to be tied down to its weekly production and approved CBS turning it over to future media critic and educator Robert Lewis Shayon who acted as You Are There’s painstaking producer/director for its entire run. The writing staff of You Are There consisted of Irve Tunick, a frequent contributor to NBC‘s Cavalcade of America, Joseph Liss from the Library of Congress and Michael Sklar.
CBS opened its checkbook for the sustaining program assuring Shayon and his writers access to the top radio acting talents in New York City and CBS News made Ned Calmer, John Daly, Morton Dean,, Douglas Edwards, George Fielding Elliott, Art Hannes, Don Hollenbeck, Richard C. Hottellet, Quincy Howe, Larry LeSueur, Harry Marble, Edward P. Morgan, Bill Reynolds, Ken Roberts, Hughes Rudd and Daniel Schorr available to the show. Some of the journalists welcomed the chance to spread their wings and enjoyed their trips into history, others considered it beneath their professional standards, but all cooperated. (2)
CBS Is There was first broadcast as the month long summer replacement for the first half of Lux Radio Theater on July 7, 1947, and dealt with the 1865 assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A rebroadcast of the original on September 5, 1948, as “reported” by CBS newsmen Daly, Hollenbeck, Howe and Calmer is posted. Most reviews of the unique new program were complimentary for its modern approach to historical subjects. Variety’s review on July 9, 1947, however, was mixed:
CBS has come up with a dramatic program that opens up sources for a wealth of material for future presentation. Titled CBS Is There this 30 minute program utilizes the on-the-spot technique of modern radio journalism for the reenactment of major historic events. On Monday’s inital program, for example, CBS newsman John Daly, equipped with a portable microphone, was on hand at Ford’s Theater in Washington the night that Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. Further utilizing the facilities of present-day coverage, there were pickups from different parts of the world with CBS treating history as if the network had assigned to staffers to the event. … Superimposing the mike and the newsman on a bygone day, by hindsight, served to point up present day brashness with startling clarity. CBS gave it all the hoopla of a wire-recorder era. The idea of CBS Is There is good; it’s exciting radio. But CBS should be there in spirit only. Let the newsman be there, let him describe what happened and how it happened. But from the sidelines - his mike should only be figurative.
Harry Marble took the lead of the August 11, 1947, episode, The Defeat of The Spanish Armada, joined by Jackson Beck, Michael Fitzmaurice, Ernest Chappell, Bud Collyer, John Daly and Ken Roberts. The event from 1588 reaches an exciting climax as Sir Francis Drake’s ships turn away the invading Spanish fleet.
The Battle of Gettysburg of 1863 was the subject for the broadcast of February 22, 1948. Don Hollenbeck took the lead in describing the Union army’s stand to halt the Confederacy, supported by George Fielding Eliot, John Daly, Jackson Beck, and Ken Roberts.
The program had been known as You Are There for several months on July 4, 1948, when it celebrated the event of 172 years earlier with its recounting of The Declaration of Independence. John Daly anchored the episode with contributions by George Fielding Eliot, Ken Roberts, Ned Calmer and Bud Collyer. Daly then anchored the September 19, 1948 recreation of The Ratification of The U.S. Constitution from 1788 with reports from Ned Calmer, Don Hollenbeck and Ken Roberts.
Columbus Day was commemorated on the broadcast of October 10, 1948, when Don Hollenbeck teamed with John Daly, Ned Calmer, Ken Roberts and Art Hannes to chronicle Christopher Columbus arriving in San Salvador in 1492.
Representative of the final broadcasts of You Are There is Bill Leonard leading its January 21, 1950, recreation of The British Taking New Amsterdam Island from the Dutch in 1664. Don Hollenbeck, Douglas Edwards, Ned Calmer participated in this episode, which like most of Bob Shayon’s 90 productions of the program, was filled with facts and built to an exciting climax.
It’s like Goodman Ace first envisioned the program, “All things are as they were then, except You Are There!”
Or as Walter Cronkite, who hosted the Peabody Award winning television version of the program on CBS-TV from 1953 to 1957 asked - then answered his own question every week, “What kind of day was it? It was a day filled with the events that alter and illuminate our times - and You Were There!”
Or as Jane Ace might have added about her husband's creation, "It wasn't just good radio, it was hysterically accurate, too!"
(1) Goodman Ace’s original name for the show was You Are There but he was overruled by the network which insisted on CBS Is There. Wide criticism for this overindulgence of self-promotion caused CBS to revert back to You Are There on April 25, 1948
(2) South African born CBS newsman John Daly with his clipped accent and surprising dramatic talents
appeared in the most You Are There episodes.
Some of Network Radio’s most creative minds were also the most versatile. For example, Carlton E. Morse, who gave us years of the warmhearted One Man’s Family, chuckled over his typewriter turning out the blood curdling series I Love A Mystery. Philips H. Lord who was responsible for the weekly shoot ‘em up Gangbusters, also portrayed the hymn singing Seth Parker and created the human interest series, We The People. So it was with Goodman Ace, renowned as radio and television’s top comedy writer and co-star of his own long running series with his wife, Jane. (See Easy Aces on this site.)
The former Kansas City newspaperman was impressed, as many were, by Orson Welles’ infamous 1938 War of The Worlds drama on CBS that supposedly touched off a national panic. The events of that broadcast, of course, were fiction described by fictitious reporters made to sound real. (See War of The Worlds on this site.) Then came D-Day in 1944, when radio went to real war on the shores of France and real reporters described the largest invasion ever known as it happened. (See D-Day On Radio on this site.)
What if, he reasoned, real historic events could be given Welles’ War of The Worlds treat-ment and be “reported” by real network newsmen as if they were happening now? The idea had merit but he was too busy with Easy Aces and lucrative outside writing assignments to develop it any further. Then Ace was hired in early 1947 to oversee The CBS School of Comedy Writers, the brainchild of network executives searching for a creative answer to NBC’s comedy dominance before Bill Paley discovered the monetary solution in 1948. (See The 1948-49 Season on this site.)
So while his six-month “class” turned out the forgettable Robert Q. Lewis Little Show, Goodman Ace hit the history books and developed You Are There which debuted as CBS Is There and remained for almost three years. (1)
Although Ace created the concept he had no desire to be tied down to its weekly production and approved CBS turning it over to future media critic and educator Robert Lewis Shayon who acted as You Are There’s painstaking producer/director for its entire run. The writing staff of You Are There consisted of Irve Tunick, a frequent contributor to NBC‘s Cavalcade of America, Joseph Liss from the Library of Congress and Michael Sklar.
CBS opened its checkbook for the sustaining program assuring Shayon and his writers access to the top radio acting talents in New York City and CBS News made Ned Calmer, John Daly, Morton Dean,, Douglas Edwards, George Fielding Elliott, Art Hannes, Don Hollenbeck, Richard C. Hottellet, Quincy Howe, Larry LeSueur, Harry Marble, Edward P. Morgan, Bill Reynolds, Ken Roberts, Hughes Rudd and Daniel Schorr available to the show. Some of the journalists welcomed the chance to spread their wings and enjoyed their trips into history, others considered it beneath their professional standards, but all cooperated. (2)
CBS Is There was first broadcast as the month long summer replacement for the first half of Lux Radio Theater on July 7, 1947, and dealt with the 1865 assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A rebroadcast of the original on September 5, 1948, as “reported” by CBS newsmen Daly, Hollenbeck, Howe and Calmer is posted. Most reviews of the unique new program were complimentary for its modern approach to historical subjects. Variety’s review on July 9, 1947, however, was mixed:
CBS has come up with a dramatic program that opens up sources for a wealth of material for future presentation. Titled CBS Is There this 30 minute program utilizes the on-the-spot technique of modern radio journalism for the reenactment of major historic events. On Monday’s inital program, for example, CBS newsman John Daly, equipped with a portable microphone, was on hand at Ford’s Theater in Washington the night that Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. Further utilizing the facilities of present-day coverage, there were pickups from different parts of the world with CBS treating history as if the network had assigned to staffers to the event. … Superimposing the mike and the newsman on a bygone day, by hindsight, served to point up present day brashness with startling clarity. CBS gave it all the hoopla of a wire-recorder era. The idea of CBS Is There is good; it’s exciting radio. But CBS should be there in spirit only. Let the newsman be there, let him describe what happened and how it happened. But from the sidelines - his mike should only be figurative.
Harry Marble took the lead of the August 11, 1947, episode, The Defeat of The Spanish Armada, joined by Jackson Beck, Michael Fitzmaurice, Ernest Chappell, Bud Collyer, John Daly and Ken Roberts. The event from 1588 reaches an exciting climax as Sir Francis Drake’s ships turn away the invading Spanish fleet.
The Battle of Gettysburg of 1863 was the subject for the broadcast of February 22, 1948. Don Hollenbeck took the lead in describing the Union army’s stand to halt the Confederacy, supported by George Fielding Eliot, John Daly, Jackson Beck, and Ken Roberts.
The program had been known as You Are There for several months on July 4, 1948, when it celebrated the event of 172 years earlier with its recounting of The Declaration of Independence. John Daly anchored the episode with contributions by George Fielding Eliot, Ken Roberts, Ned Calmer and Bud Collyer. Daly then anchored the September 19, 1948 recreation of The Ratification of The U.S. Constitution from 1788 with reports from Ned Calmer, Don Hollenbeck and Ken Roberts.
Columbus Day was commemorated on the broadcast of October 10, 1948, when Don Hollenbeck teamed with John Daly, Ned Calmer, Ken Roberts and Art Hannes to chronicle Christopher Columbus arriving in San Salvador in 1492.
Representative of the final broadcasts of You Are There is Bill Leonard leading its January 21, 1950, recreation of The British Taking New Amsterdam Island from the Dutch in 1664. Don Hollenbeck, Douglas Edwards, Ned Calmer participated in this episode, which like most of Bob Shayon’s 90 productions of the program, was filled with facts and built to an exciting climax.
It’s like Goodman Ace first envisioned the program, “All things are as they were then, except You Are There!”
Or as Walter Cronkite, who hosted the Peabody Award winning television version of the program on CBS-TV from 1953 to 1957 asked - then answered his own question every week, “What kind of day was it? It was a day filled with the events that alter and illuminate our times - and You Were There!”
Or as Jane Ace might have added about her husband's creation, "It wasn't just good radio, it was hysterically accurate, too!"
(1) Goodman Ace’s original name for the show was You Are There but he was overruled by the network which insisted on CBS Is There. Wide criticism for this overindulgence of self-promotion caused CBS to revert back to You Are There on April 25, 1948
(2) South African born CBS newsman John Daly with his clipped accent and surprising dramatic talents
appeared in the most You Are There episodes.
| you_are_there___9-05-48.mp3 |
| you_are_there___10-10-48.mp3 |
| you_are_there___8-11-47.mp3 |
| you_are_there__1-22-50.mp3 |
| you_are_there___7-04-48.mp3 |
| you_are_there___9-19-48.mp3 |
| you_are_there__2-22-48.mp3 |
| you_are_there___3-27-49.mp3 |
