Radio, TV, and Books

In 1950, I was 11 years old and busy trading comic books and reading stuff from my father’s library. He was an antique dealer and frequently brought home books and beautiful works of art to display in our small 2 bedroom attached house in Brooklyn. I read the works of Mark Twain and Charles Dickens. Twain was funny, but Dickens could paint a picture that excited my imagination. For example, Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities began this way: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

I was thrilled by radio shows, such as “The Shadow”, “Superman”, and Jack Benny. My older brother and I stared at the five-inch rounded rectangular display of stations. We could not know that the TV picture would, one day, be located, in that display area, in the center of the almost five feet high, polished dark oak radio, where we listened to music that provided the mood for the stories that followed. I loved the music from the “Lone Ranger”. It was my,then, unknowing window to enjoying classical music.

The funniest joke I remember was when I heard the comedy of Jack Benny. He played a very cheap guy. One day, we heard the gravelly voice of a crook say: “This is a gun on your back. Your money of your life!”. What followed was about 3-4 minutes of complete silence! Then, the crook yelled at him again, “Well, which is it, your money or your life? Benny’s annoyed response was: “I’m thinking! I’m thinking!” We just broke up, laughing!

The show that gave me the strongest vision that I still remember was when Jack Benny needed some money for a trip and had to go to his vault. He opened the door and complained how dark it was. You can clearly hear his footsteps, as he walked further and further down the stairs. At one point, he yelled, “What was that?” and said: “Oh, it was just the alligator. He pondered, for a moment, why the alligator looked so heavy and then remembered that the he hadn’t seen the veterinarian come back up since last week.

Creaky doors kept opening and closing and multiple locks had to be opened for each door. More footsteps, and he kept walking down the stairs until he saw the vault. The sound of hundreds of keys was heard, as he unlocked the vault and saw the safe. I could “see” the vault and safe, as well as those heavy large old keys that he carried on a metal chain.

He opened the safe after entering too many numbers and, when it opened, you could hear loud sirens, train noises and boat whistles. As he counted the bills, he heard a noise and it was Ed. Ed had apparently had been down there for many years. Feeling sorry for Ed, Benny said that he would let him come upstairs. Ed thanked him again and again! There was a sound of crashing metal from the chains on Ed’s feet. Finally, he unlocked the chains and took him upstairs, Ed complained that the light was too strong. He had never seen a lighted lamp before. Benny tried to explain electricity to him, but gave up and said that Ed would like his refrigerator, Ed said that he was very hungry and would love to eat one. I still can see that dark passageway, the alligator, the creaky vault, the big keys, and poor Ed.

The radio became almost obsolete by the time the TV shows exploded on our TV screens. My father was an early adaptor of technology and, one day, brought home a TV. He was also way ahead of everyone I knew in buying an adapter for color TV! At least, it was what he thought it was. In reality, it was a clear plastic cover for the TV, held by black rubber suction. The screen was colored light blue at the top, pink in the middle, and green, and brownish colors towards the bottom. We were excited when we could see the Lone Ranger ride his horse over the green planes, with the blue sky in the background. A close-up of our hero, with a blue head and greenish nose was much less impressive. Eventually, we took it down.

By 1955, I was 16 and starting college. I did watch the Sid Caesar Show of Shows, Milton Berle’s Texaco Star Theatre, Ed Sullivan, and Red Skelton. I loved to laugh! I did, however, note how the visual media cheated me by not leaving anything to my imagination. My love, however, besides my 15-year-old girl-friend (who became my wife), became science fiction books, such as the works of H.G. Wells. My favorites were The Invisible Man, War of the Worlds, and The Time Machine. Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was another favorite.

Now, many years have slipped by. Radio is just a distant memory. My reading of books was impaired for many years, while I was working. Ironically, I improved my editing skills by creating three text books for a N.Y.C. Publisher, and what is now called The International Cosmetic Ingredient Dictionary and Handbook. Now that my work life is coming to an end, I bought my first book, in a while. I am busy, mostly with sculpting, am writing again, and hope to do some painting and/or drawing, at Pelican Preserve.

TV shows, for the most part, remain a disappointment to me. But, something new has happened. What goes around comes around. I am now, hopelessly addicted to TV! Thanks to President Donald Trump and his cast of characters, Twitter, Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC, for bringing us the most addicting melodrama ever watched on TV, since the downfall of President Richard Nixon!

Norman F. Estrin, Ph.D., Radio, TV, and Books, Jan. 29, 2018