The Super Chief

Cartoons give their creator plenty of latitude in coming up with characters and situations that could never be real. Dream sequences expand that even more.

Much of Bob Clampett’s final release for Warner Bros., The Big Snooze, takes place in one of Elmer Fudd’s dreams that Bugs Bunny invades to turn into a nightmare. In one scene, he sets up a pop culture pun.

Here are consecutive frames. Clampett has some jarring edits in this short. Dialogue is cut off at least twice and the scene changes abruptly. Here, the background changes and the same drawing of Bugs moves closer to the camera. There’s no logical reason to shoot the scene this way.



Bugs ties Elmer Fudd, Pearl White-style, onto the railroad tracks. There’s a train whistle. Being a Clampett cartoon, Bugs reacts. Good gravy! Here it comes! The Super Chief!” Eventually, Bugs partly out of frame view.



The Super Chief, as everyone knew at the time of this cartoon, was a streamlined diesel passenger train running between Los Angeles and Chicago on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe line. Here’s the pun. The Super Chief is really Bugs in an Indian headdress.



Despite some odd cuts and animation with no dialogue (and vice versa), there are some terrific visuals in this we’re featured here before—the “multiplying” rabbit outlines stomping on Elmer, Elmer in drag doing a Russian dance, the “nightmare paint.” There’s re-use of the log/cliff routine from All This and Rabbit Stew (Tex Avery, 1941). And some Avery-like wolves at Hollywood and Vine chase after Elmer.

Clampett never got a director’s credit and there is no story credit. The animators are Manny Gould, Rod Scribner, Izzy Ellis and Bill Melendez, with Tom McKimson handling layouts and Phil De Guard responsible for the backgrounds. While this was Clampett’s last release, on Oct. 5, 1946, he had one more cartoon that went into production afterwards, Bacall to Arms, but was released before The Big Snooze, on Aug. 3, 1946. Art Davis told researcher Milt Grey “Bacall to Arms was the only one I had a hand in finishing. Any of the other pictures that had already been animated, I didn’t have much to do with.”

The cartoon’s name is inspired by the Warners feature The Big Sleep with Bogart and Bacall. I wondered if the two films were shown together and, sure enough, The Film Daily reported on Nov. 25, 1946 the Interstate circuit booked the two to be shown on the same bill. See an ad to the right.

And Red as Little Eva

Uncle Tom's Cabaña is a stew with ingredients Tex Avery used in other cartoons—visual puns, a climax where things ridiculously escalate, a character talking to the audience, a two phones gag, and, of course, Red on stage with cuts to reactions (by a human, not a wolf) at a cabaret table (and the concept of the cabaret-instead-of-small-home itself).

Even the starting point for the story—a send-up of Uncle Tom’s Cabin—had been tried by Avery at Warner Bros.



I really wish I could get more excited about this cartoon, but I can’t. Red aka Little Eva is too demure on stage. Avery and writer Heck Allen came up with tamer reactions by the wolfish-Simon Legree. Here, he is so fixated on the performance on stage that he substitutes the table for a pie.



The animators are Walt Clinton, Ray Abrams, Bob Bentley and Preston Blair, with backgrounds by Johnny Johnsen. The official release date was July 19, 1947 but, not surprisingly, the Fox Wilshire in Los Angeles screened it on June 24, along with Fiesta, starring Ricardo Montalban and Cyd Charisse. The cartoon was already being advertised in the trades as early as March 1, 1945 as a sequel to Red Hot Riding Hood.

I don’t need to tell you the black stereotypes are the reason this cartoon will never be restored. They outraged what was then called “the negro press” when the short was re-released on Feb. 6, 1954. This is from an unbylined writer in the Pittsburgh Courier, March 6, 1954.

’Uncle Tom’s Cabana’ Outrages Negro Audiences
What Price Brotherhood If Movies Play Up Handkerchief Heads?
[E-D-I-T-O-R-I-A-L]
The damndest thing in the world is to keep responsible Americans from writing dirty words on fences. The latest episode in this “ignorant compulsion” series is the motion picture cartoon “Uncle Tom’s Cabana,” a base stereotype and an insult to Negros. With the movies trying to buck television it is strange that a studio would distribute such a malodorous thing. What price brotherhood if movies up handkerchief heads?
Even though there has been a general loosening of the Production Code in order to hypo the boxoffice, there is no reason why Negroes should continue to be ridiculed and jeered at in the motion pictures. This medium reaches all levels of mentalities and feeds the flames of prejudice by projecting such canards as “Uncle Tom’s Cabana.”
This uncommonly poor cartoon is showing in theatres all over America right now. Will it be shown in other countries where communism is battling for people’s minds? Are ideas so lacking that movie short subjects must dredge up “Birth of a Nation” material. Or was this thing called “Uncle Tom’s Cabana” the result of thoughtlessness?
Motion pictures are designed to entertain, but the motion picture industry must face responsibilities to itself and the public it serves and seeks. The low buffoonery of Negroes on the screen is not appreciated. The callous depiction of Negroes as lackeys and cretins fresh out of the cotton fields leaves everyone cold because people know better.
It does require genius to point out that other racial and religious groups are never vilified on the screen. The pressure would almost wreck the movies. Negroes must rise in a mass and protest such antic foolishness and “Uncle Tom’s Cabana,” and all other films of this type.
Now where we the state censors when this film (“Uncle Tom’s Cabana”) was released? By showing this during Brotherhood Week was a kick in the teeth to wipe out prejudice in America. With the world in ferment, “Uncle Tom’s Cabana” set the movies back ten years. Withdraw the film immediately, huh?

Evidently, the reviewer somehow missed continual Jewish and Chinese stereotypes in films, cartoons and otherwise. Or the perennial depiction of gays as limp-wristed swishers. Or all Scotsmen being cheapskates. Perhaps they were too busy raising the tired old “Communist” scare.

Regardless, the cartoon doesn’t do a lot for me. Some of the parts are better than the whole.

Jack Benny Will Not Be Seen Tonight. Almost

The show must go on, goes the old entertainment saw.

For Jack Benny, that wasn’t always quite true.

In the radio days, he had an extremely serious case of pneumonia (originally downplayed in the public press) in early 1943 and missed five shows; Orson Welles filled in for him on most of them. There was another show in the late ‘30s when he was bedridden, and then too emotionally upset to do his Sunday show after the death of Carol Lombard in 1942.

It also happened when Benny took on television, and that provided the starting point for a newspaper feature story about him.

The broadcast was supposed to be a live one on February 22, 1953. Reading the story from the Associated Press, I can’t help but think of the pancreatic cancer that claimed Jack’s life at the end of 1974; he complained of stomach cramps then, too. The story made the front page of the Los Angeles Times and several other papers.

Benny Ill, Watches TV Film From Bed
HOLLYWOOD, Feb. 23 (AP)—Instead of appearing on television last night as scheduled, Jack Benny, stricken by the flu, sat up in a hospital bed and saw himself on a TV film. A spokesman reported his condition “fine.”
The comedian was taken to Cedars of Lebanon Hospital early yesterday after suffering from severe stomach cramps. He was stricken about 11 P.M. Saturday after dining at the home of Dory Schary, MGM production chief.
Benny’s wife, Mary Livingstone, took him home and nursed him through the night. Dr. Myron Prinzmetal, summoned early yesterday, drove Benny to the hospital. He will remain there a few days.
Ann Southern Show On
The comedian’s regular Sunday radio show went on the air on schedule; it was taped several days ago. A filmed television show starring Ann Sothern, which occupies the TV tie spot between his appearance every fourth Sunday, replaced his scheduled live TV show.
Benny saw the Sothern telecast in which he had played a bit part.
In his own TV show, he was to have played the role of Dr. Jekyll in the Benny version of “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”

The show was rescheduled for a month later. The Jekyll idea actually originated on radio in late 1941.

The temporary illness gave the Washington Post entertainment writer a chance to do one of those Benny-Isn’t-What-He-Is-On-TV/Radio stories. This was published March 1, 1953.

Just a Nice Guy
The Real Benny’s a Real Doll
By Sonia Stein
THE influenza bug that bit Jack Benny last Sunday must have had cast iron nerve. If ever there was a man who looked to be in the peach of condition (Californians seem to stay perpetually peach instead of pink) it was Benny. For a man who celebrated his thirty-ninth birthday for the twentieth time on Valentine’s Day, Benny cuts a fine figure.
This should come as a terrible blow to fans of the 20-year-old radio character Jack Benny. They know him (Sunday nights at 7 on WTOP) as stingy, aging, bald, foolish, fat, vain and unloved. His gag-writers have created—with his enthusiastic approval—a querulous bachelor covering his baldspot with a toupee in a fruitless attempt to make his friends think he is 39. His acute parsimony leads him to cheat his employes, to take in laundry, to charge guests for refreshments and cigarettes, to wear seedy clothes and to drive around in a moribund Maxwell.
THIS character is so well planted in the American consciousness after Benny’s years as America’s top-rated radio comedian, that a hatcheck girl once flung a dollar tip back at him and begged, “Please, Mr, Benny, leave me some illusions!” If you feel as the hat check girl did, look the other way, because we must in conscience report that Jack is handsome, generous, well-loved, intelligent, happy to admit his 59 years, slim, modest and the owner of a fine head of white hair which he tints steel grey for photographic reasons.
A quietly tailored man, Benny has, nonetheless, a look of the actor about him. He has a commanding “presence” even when he is silent. This looking-like-an-actor situation puts Benny in mind of a joke.
“When I first got on Broadway I wanted people to point at me and say ‘There goes an actor!’ So I bought a flashy Broadway outfit that looked like sunset with buttons. Then, one night as I was leaving the theater I heard a stagehand remark, ‘There goes Benny. He always looks like an actor.’ For a moment I floated on air. Then I heard his companion reply, ‘Yep, Benny always looks like an actor—except when he’s on stage’.”
He does worry about his waistline and diets rather carefully the last two weeks before each of his TV shows (once a month Sunday nights at 7:30 on WTOP-TV). But even during his dieting period last month Jack relaxed his vigil. When a waiter set before him a creamy strawberry parfait at a press luncheon Jack looked sternly at it a moment and then dug in with the explanation that, “It’s not fattening if you don’t order it and I didn’t order it.”
THE conceited aspect of the fictional Benny seems to be practically nonexistent in real life. When Benny was here February 7 to entertain at the Radio Correspondents Association dinner, he had an appointment, at the White House with President Eisenhower, whom he had met In Europe when he was touring Army bases to entertain the troops. Affairs of state necessitated moving the Benny appointment a couple of times. Instead of being hurt or angry, Jack was wreathed in smiles: “Say, that’s very complimentary to me I think. It would have been so much easier for them to just cancel the appointment than to move it, but they keep moving it to try and fit me in,” he said.
On his program Jack not only plays straight man and butt of the jokes for every member of his cast, but works hard to build the others into rounded, popular characters. “People don’t say ‘I listened to Jack Benny last night and he was good,’ they say, ‘I listened to the Jack Benny Show last night and it was good’,” Jack explains. And he considers that smart business tactics. (It’s a little hard to quibble with him on business tactics, since he sold Amusement Enterprises, Inc.—the company under which his various activities are organized—to CBS for $2,260,000. As owner of 60 percent of the firm he got $1,356,000.)
Benny’s program is also the first one on which I ever heard any credits given to the writers.

MENTION of Benny’s writers always brings up the subject of whether or not Jack can be funny on his own. Not noted for ad lib ability on the air, Benny is frequently described as a gifted comedian who can judge humor well and deliver it perfectly, but who cannot write it at all, This certainly doesn’t appear to me to be the case. Although he does not keep up a steady line of gags and tends to discuss his work on a very serious level in terms of general approaches rather than specific jokes, he has a delightful wit which comes through when he is relaxed.
At a recent conference with the press, Benny was discussing the virtues of repeating some of the good shows after a suitable time lapse. “You can repeat the good ones and skip the bad ones,” he said. Then, leaping to his feet as if he had been insulted, be demanded to know, “Who has bad shows?”
Benny has never been accused of off-color humor except by isolated persons who found some item offensive. His good taste in humor goes unchallenged. Ronald Colman, long shy of radio because of a few unpleasant encounters, finally entrusted himself to Benny because he trusted Jack’s sense of good taste. After several succesful [sic] appearances with Benny, Colman and his wife became radio stars on their town show. Dennis Day and Phil Harris also blossomed out with shows of their own after learning some tricks at Benny’s knee.

While Jack personally got positive ink like you just read, his shows didn’t. When the Jekyll episode finally aired, C.E. Butterfield of the Associated Press remarked:

Jack Benny, back on television after missing his February appearance because of a sudden illness, demonstrated that he is at his best when doing a satire. This time he gave attention to “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” which he had rehearsed for February. More rehearsing in March got out all kinks and the end product was near the ultimate in entertainment.

But “Trau” declared it “was not one of his better efforts” and went on:

There might have been some who regarded as inventive the fact that Dennis Day did a “surprise” personation of the Hyde character for the snapper finish, causing Benny to observe that the interference snafued the show. He could have been kidding on the square. The stanza did contain some rewarding sight bits, but not sufficiently to carry the half hour. Jeanne Cagney did what she could as the nurse, Bob Crosby as the interne, with Don Wilson appearing as a London bobby in narration (plus a neatly integrated Lucky Strike plug), and the décor was extra special. Best piece of business was Iris Airian [Adrian], as an old bag, overpowering Benny in his Hyde form in a series of physical tussles that had JB gasping. That and Mel Blanc’s solid sound effects. Overall, the heartiness of a Benny show was missing.

There was also a network transmission glitch, as reported in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

A segment of the Jack Benny Show, telecast locally by WCAU-TV, hit a technical snag last night when trouble developed on the coast-to-coast audio line “somewhere west of Chicago” and some of the spoken parts of Benny’s version of “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” faded and became inaudible.
Benny was presenting the show with Jeanne Cagney and Bob Crosby from the CBS studios in Hollywood when the interruption occurred. A spokesman in WCAU’s control room laid the blame to trouble on the line “somewhere west of Chicago.” He said he did not know what was missing in the dialogue.

Despite mixed reviews (he also got them for his January TV show), Jack’s TV series eventually expanded and stayed on the air for another 12 years. For Jack Benny, the show must go on. And it generally did. For longer than many TV stars.

Fred Brunish, Inventor

We all know Fred William Brunish (named for his father and grandfather, incidentally) was a background artist for Walter Lantz and also made stop motion films for him during the war.

He was a tinkerer, too, and filed for a patent for an automatic slide projector in 1934.

Here's a link to his patent application. It's not all that exciting, but what do you expect from a patent application?

Brunish was born in the Bronx on Dec. 18, 1902. The 1920 Census reports he was a 17-year old fashion sketcher (a 1925 classified ad in the New York Times is below). In 1930, the Detroit city directory gives his occupation as the vice president of the Consolidated Advertising Corp. He didn’t remain in Detroit long. The next year, his family was living in San Diego, where was employed as Consolidated’s art director. He was living in Los Angeles the following year. The City Directory in 1933 lists him as “artist,” and various Voters Lists from 1936 onward give his occupation as “art director.” He was the chief sound engineer and art director for the Royal Revue Film Studio in Hollywood in 1938. Brunish belonged to the Laguna Beach Art Association and there were showings of his work in the mid-1930s.


The 1940 Census says “cartoon picture studio artist.” Walter Lantz cartoons didn’t credit any background artists until 1944 and Brunish’s name doesn’t appear ON screen until the end of 1946, when he is credited on The Wacky Weed. However his 1942 Draft Registration states he was employed at Lantz, and the photo of him above is from when he was working on war-time films for the studio. Late Note: Devon Baxter mentions Joe Adamson's notes state Brunish started work at Lantz on Oct. 24, 1937. Joe wrote a fine biography of Lantz, so he would know.

That year, he was involved with the Motion Picture War Chest drive that year. He also contributed in 1942 to “Communique,” a weekly publication by the Hollywood Writers Mobilization for Defense in cooperation with the Office of Emergency Management. Brunish designed posters alongside Cy Young, Tom McKimson, Frank Tipper, Ozzie Evans, John Walker, Chuck Whitton (both at Lantz) and Ed Starr (later of Screen Gems and Sutherland). In 1947, his watercolour “Sunset on the Pacific” was displayed at the Screen Artists show at the Los Angeles Art Association galleries. Other artists who exhibited works may be familiar from various cartoon studios, including Starr, Ralph Hulett, Basil Davidovitch, Barbara Begg and George Nicholas.

The Lantz studio shut down because of a cash crunch in 1949. In the 1950 census, dated April 5, Brunish is listed as a cartoonist who wasn’t working. When Lantz resumed full operation, Brunish was back. The last cartoon with his name on it was The Great Who-Dood-It, released Oct. 20, 1952 (one of his backgrounds is reconstructed below).


Brunish died on June 25, 1952 of cirrhosis of the liver. His Los Angeles Times obit mentions nothing of his patent or his film work; it lists him as a "landscape artist" and that he left behind a widow, a son and a sister.

Note: this is a reworking of a post that appeared on the late GAC forums.

Horning in on a Gag

Here’s a stretch in-between drawing from the Little Roquefort cartoon, No Sleep For Percy (1955). The mouse is trying to jar himself loose after Percy the cat rolled up a car window, with Little Roquefort’s head stuck at the top.



The mouse lands on the horn. The sound is pretty weak, at least on versions of the cartoon in circulation. Maybe they didn’t want to drown out Phil Scheib’s atypical score.



The horn is evidently loud enough to wake Percy. Here are random frames of Jim Tyer’s spasmatic animation. Heads that shrink and expand (and do it several times for emphasis), expanded fuzzy fur, eyes that are different sizes, it’s all here.



Percy gets up to chase after the mouse. The cat’s butt is on the ground. Tyer gives him impossible anatomy.



This is just in case theatre audiences mistook this for Tom and Jerry.



This was the final cartoon with Little Roquefort and Percy. Connie Rasinski was the sole director for well over a year and a half and new characters, like Good Deed Daily, were being tried out. Paul Terry hadn’t sold out to CBS yet, but when that happened, Gene Deitch came in to run the creative part of the studio, and another set of new characters arrived.

Take Off, Wolf

What’s more delicious than roast wolf? Or fried woodpecker?

Walter Lantz tried to answer those questions in several cartoons in the mid-1940s, as Woody Woodpecker and the cleverly-named Wolfie Wolf tried to eat each other (the wolf name is from model sheets).

One is Who’s Cookin Who, another cartoon where a personified starvation is staring Woody in the face. The first one is Pantry Panic (1941) and, in a way, this short is a reworking of that cartoon by writer Bugs Hardaway (who gagged the earlier one), cohort Milt Schaffer and director Shamus Culhane.

Since it is now the mid-‘40s, Culhane’s pacing is quicker than the earlier short. In one gag, it takes a handful of frames to get the wolf flying out of the scene.

The first drawing below, the wolf is held while Woody and his bellows boost a fire. Then the wolf realises he is being roasted and leaps up and out of the scene. It takes Culhane six frames. The cross-eyed drawing is held for two frames (as well as the smoke, fire and bedsprings), with only Woody and the bellows moving in the second frame. The next four drawings are consecutive.



You can see the wolf’s head jerking toward the camera (great DVNR, huh?). Culhane liked doing this in his Woody cartoons, sometimes with part of the head out of the frame. You can’t see it unless you freeze-frame it, but you get the feel of it watching the animation.

Showmen’s Trade Review reported on July 7, 1945 the cartoon was being animated, while the Hollywood Reporter of November 8 said Darrell Calker was about to write the score. The cartoon was finally released June 24, 1946.

Les Kline and Grim Natwick are the credited animators, and La Verne Harding and Paul Smith were also at the studio at the time. Terry Lind provided backgrounds.

The almost-expressionless voice of Woody is provided by Hardaway. Will Wright is the voice of Wolfie, while Keith Scott has confirmed Jack Mather has a line as a grasshopper.

Here's Our Next Contestant

Game shows appeal to people for various reasons. One is viewers like to see ordinary people get something for nothing. It’s something they can identify with.

Another is the viewers like to see if they can guess the answer to a question by the host (this applies to the more intelligent of the shows).

Still another is, if TV or movie stars are involved, they enjoy seeing and laughing with the celebrities.

And another is, sometimes, there’s a quirky contestant that the viewers can’t help but like. Some are a little clueless. Others say things that come out of nowhere.

All this goes back before television, into the Golden Days of Radio. That’s where today’s story takes place.

Herald Tribune syndicate columnist John Crosby was bemused by one particular episode of a Monday through Saturday daytime game show called Give and Take. These kinds of programmes give and the contestant takes, if they’re not too much of a dullard. One contestant seems to have got things backward, among other unexpected oddities and non sequiturs that the poor emcee, who had radio and TV experience in 1947, had to roll with.

This column appeared on January 23, 1947.

RADIO IN REVIEW
By JOHN CROSBY
Mrs. Caniff Goes to Town
To the student of human nature, audience participation shows generally reveal only that a great many citizens are hopelessly greedy and totally misinformed. However, on rare occasions, the master of ceremonies will unearth a gold mine of personality and character. I'm speaking specifically of Mrs. Caniff, who appeared recently on a program called "Give And Take" (CBS network 2 p. m. Saturdays and 10 a. m. Mon.-Friday outside of New York.)
Before we get into Mrs. Caniff's unique personality, it might be well to describe "Give And Take." It’s a quiz program presided over by a good-natured gentleman named John Reed King, an ornate handle that would look better on a supreme court justice than on a master of ceremonies. As I understand it. Mr. King invites members of the audience to come up and help themselves to tablesful of loot. The only requirement is that they answer a few questions, most of which would insult the intelligence of your ten-year-old son. Was Washington’s birthplace in Massachusetts or Virginia?)
* * *
You can’t miss on this program. Mr. King, for instance, asked one contestant whether the title page of a book was on the left or right hand side of the book. The man guessed the left side. After informing him that this was the wrong answer, Mr. King asked the second contestant whether the title page of a hook was on the left or right hand side of the book. The second guy got it right. Process of elimination, you see.
Well, that’s just background. The real heroism of this story is Mrs. Caniff, whose accent suggests she lives in New York City. Mr. King asked her a question which comes up on all these giveaway programs. “Where are you from?” inquired Mr. King.
“De Far East,” said Mrs. Caniff happily.
“The Far East!” exclaimed Mr. King.
“Foist Avenoo,” explained Mrs. Caniff.
Right there, Mr. King appeared to take stock. You run into a lot of problems as emcee of an audience participation show and the worst problem of all is a participant who has more personality than you have. Mrs. Caniff was one of those problems. “Now, Mrs. Caniff, just look over those tables and tell me what you’d like to have. How about that toaster over there — chromium plated, automatic.” . . .
“I got three toasters at home,” said Mrs. Caniff benignly. “I give you one.”
Mr. King explained hopelessly that he gave away on this program; he didn’t get them. "Let’s look over some of the other things. Forget the toaster. There’s a wonderful assortrnent of.” . . .
“I’m expecting a baby,” said Mrs. Caniff.
“You’re . . . uh . . . when?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow!”
“Not tomorrow,” said Mrs. Caniff briskly. “I have company coming in tomorrow.”
“Look, Mrs. Caniff, time is running short. We have come to the point in this program when” . . .
“Don’t you ask me questions?” inquired Mrs. Caniff anxiously.
“I’m trying to . . .”
“I like the bedspread.”
“Good!” shouted Mr. King. “The bedspread! Now listen carefully, Mrs. Caniff. Tell me” . . .
“And the layette. Right there—the layette.”
“You said the bedspread. No, you can’t have them both. Now listen carefully, Mrs. Caniff. Tell me what is wrong with this sentence. ‘A horse divided against itself cannot stand.’ What is wrong with that sentence?”
* * *
Silence fell on the program, as Mrs. Caniff wrestled with the problem. ‘A horse divided against itself cannot stand,” repeated Mr. King. “What is wrong with that sentence?”
“I need my glasses,” said Mrs. Caniff.
“She needs her glasses,” muttered Mr. King. “Now why on earth . . . . Well, she’s GETTING her glasses.” Again silence enveloped the program while Mrs. Caniff got her glasses and put them on. “A horse divided against” . . .
started Mr. King.
“House,” said Mrs. Caniff promptly. “House is de woid. Not horse.”
“That’s correct,” shouted Mr. King. “And here is the bedspread. No, we haven’t got a coffee-maker, Mrs. Caniff” . . .

The rest of the Crosby columns for the week:

Monday, January 20: A special series of programmes by Norman Corwin about world unity. Evidently Crosby was impressed with Corwin, as this was the second column in two weeks which mentioned the series.
Tuesday, January 21: The early days of radio advertising. Crosby plugs a book.
Wednesday, January 22: The Count of Monte Cristo is on Mutual. Crosby mentions television for a second time, though he focuses on baseball, which isn't played in January. New York had three stations at the time (plus one experimental outlet no one counted), Los Angeles had a pair, Chicago was getting by with one, as were Schenectady, Washington and Philadelphia.
Friday, January 24: Another dramatization of the news, this one on Mutual.

You can click on the stories to enlarge the copy. Cartoons are from the Daily News in Los Angeles.