Starter of this subject: Edwin Brooks
Last post in this subject: 9/2/2001
Messages in this subject: 2
| Edwin Brooks | 9/2/2001 2 replies |
| I hope this isn't too esoteric. As a relative newcomer to OTR (even though I was there for much of the first time around) I was recently listening to a Fred Allen broadcast from 1949. Prior to the show (as well as at the end) the announced notes that Fred Allen will guarantee that if a listener is called on the telephone and fails to win a prize BECAUSE he/she was listening to Allen, then Allen will reimburse that listener for the amount of that "missed" prize. My main qustion is who/what show/what organization was calling people on Sunday nights to award prizes? I just don't remember anything like that (maybe because I never won!!1). Also, a simple question: When did Allen's Alley become Main Street or vice versa? Thanks Edwin |
| Elizabeth McLeod | 9/2/2001 1 replies |
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The "insurance" offer was Allen's response to "Stop The Music," an ABC quiz program aired opposite the Allen show. The idea of the program was that the orchestra would play a musical selection, and a listener at home would be called and asked to identify the song. Cash prizes would be awarded to anyone who was able to do so. The insurance offer was posted by Allen beginning in November 1948 as a running gag and as a commentary on the venality of audiences -- but it was also a legitimate offer, which continued for several weeks before being withdrawn.
"Allen's Alley" became "Main Street" when the Ford Dealers of America took over sponsorship of Allen's program in January 1948. The idea was simply an excuse for a sponsor tie-in -- Allen would "drive up in his new Ford," meet Portland, and go for a "walk down Main Street," where he'd meet the Alley characters, and then pause at the Main Street Ford Dealer for the commercial. In reality, Allen never owned a "new Ford" -- he hated cars, preferring to walk or take the subway, and as long as he lived he never had a driver's license. |
| Edwin Brooks | 9/2/2001 0 replies |
| Thanks, Elizabeth, "Stop the Music" comes back to me now...as a matter of fact I have a 78 rpm record which was used to play a home version. I did not remember, though, that listeners could call in (or vice versa) and somehow I must have slept all the way through Main Street--that isn't familiar at all and in '48-'49 it certainly should be. |