This artifact from the last gasp of big-broadcast radio was found in the bottom of a cardboard carton (12” x 18” x 42”) labeled Wilmhurst’s Best Eggs (“Something to Crow About”), bought at a country auction in Lower Newton, Indiana, in 1975 (for a bid of $2.50) and containing a small collection of vintage Ball Mason jars. The typescript was in faded purple teletype ribbon on the verso of 23 sheets of faded office stationery headed Fischer King & Parsival, Attorneys at Law,
This literary effort is presented to JPT readers for its historical interest as a fair sample of a “treatment” or script for a popular radio serial, ca. 1952. In 1939, Bobby Watson, Boy of the Rodeo was launched as a daily 15-minute episode, sponsored by Barsco (“The Chocolate Drink Whose Name Sounds Like a Dog Barking”), expanding in 1942 to 30 minutes per day (M-F) on the Mutual Radio Network. The original cast was pretty much sewed into indentured servitude by their contracts and included Ray Bolster, longtime film comedy knockabout as Bobby (listeners never guessed their winsome child hero was 47 years old!), Edwin P. Munster (reduced from evening news reader for numerous on-air gaffs) as Big Luke, Luella Cobby (former Miss New Jersey and medicine-show habitué) as Esmerelda Calzone, DeWitt Clinton Jefferson (later famous in the near-perpetual road shows of Charlie’s Aunt) as Shufflealong Bates, Bobby’s hilarious darky sidekick. Various radio veterans filled in the cast of characters from episode to episode, including such guest luminaries as Bela Lugosi, Barton McLane, Elisha Cook, Sr., the inimitable Mae Bush and many more.
Bobby Watson began as a minor Rin Tin Tin-Lassie-Flicka knockoff that found its own way in the overcrowded late-afternoon serial market and gradually mutated with all the shifts in public taste and interest through World War II, the incipient Cold War and the murky Korean Konflict. Barsco was a loyal and reliable sponsor, offering many promotional items for “Bobbysockers,” as hard-core fans were called in the trade papers. Some fondly recalled gimmicks included a gaudy rodeo belt buckle (an early use for extruded zylon) that housed the Bobby Watson DeKoder Kit, used by so fans to decipher the secret messages broadcast as a series of numbers and letters at the end of each episode. Unfortunately for eager young followers, most messages only said something like “ASK MOM AND DAD TO BUY BARSCO IN THE HUGE ECONOMY SIZE.” Another favorite was a set of Bobby Watson spurs, obtained by mailing in 24 Barsco labels and $1.98 in cash or money order. The spurs prompted a famous court case in
Bobby Watson reflected such socio-political phenomena as McCarthyism, in a series of episodes following the Lavender Cowboys, gunslinging and roping fellow travelers who infiltrated and subverted cattle ranges, bunkhouses and other sanctuaries of American adventure. There was also an ill-fated set of episodes in which Bobby and loyal pal Shufflealong were sent to
Cast members retired or sank into blessed oblivion for the most part. Roy Bolster struggled on in radio and surfaced briefly as an ineffective adjunct character in TV’s mega-hit Howdy Doody. He was cast as a salty old seafarer type called Captain Rumbelow but proved spectacularly inept on-camera and was booed off the stage by the fanatical Doodyites in the live audience. Buffalo Bob himself issued Bolster his walking papers on-air. Edwin P. Munster, after scarifying moments testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee (he remembered only two names from his brief tenure in the Chester Arthur Youth Brigade, a front organization denounced by HUAC), became an executive in the burgeoning plastics trade, ironically ending as a producer of promotional trinkets for the very TV shows that murdered such entertainment as Bobby Watson. Luella Cobby retired to the Show-Biz Veterans Home in
Here is a sample from the script-treatment bundle of Bobby Watson, Boy of the Rodeo, Episode 237. A smudged and nearly indecipherable pencil notation indicates that the story may have been subtitled, “Dark Doings at Durk Downey’s.” Transcribed verbatim with lacunae duly noted.
Scene opens in an abandoned bauxite mine, where Bobby and Shuffle are still trapped by a cave-in, bound by Durk Downey and left as rat-food. A pronounced spooky echo and sfx of rats whining and scrabbling. (NOTE: Keep it down! Last week’s stampede sounded like the
BOB: Gosh, Shuff, I think we’re doomed by that durn Durk Downey and his gang of hoss-thieving and counterfeit-money-making guys!
SHUFF: Aw, gee, boss, it cain’t be that bad. But I sure do wisht it wasn’t so danged black in here! I think this here ole mine shaft is prolly filled with the ghosties of ten million ole miners who died down here. And I know I seen bats on our way down!!! Wooeee—I does not abide no bats!!! If I was not tied up with this here baling wire I’d make my feets do they stuff.
BOB: Shhh! I think I heard something!
SHUFF: Yeh, I heered something too, ten thousand hungry rats fightin with them bats to see who get first dibs to bite us!!!
BOB: No, I think it’s someone digging! Listen! (Faint sfx of pick, shovels, stones, etc., and for god sake make it sound real!)
SHUFF: Wooeee!!! I hope it big ole Luke an the Bar-B-Q gang. We gotta tell em about Durk Downey’s plot an the bum they plant at the National Bank!
BOB: Yes! I can see a light! Hooray! (Sfx of rocks and timber crashing, muffled voices, and improv something halfway probable!)
LUKE: Bobby, lad, is it you in there? Are you OK?
BOB: Yeh, it’s me and Shuffle, and they didn’t hurt us, but we’re all tied up in baling wire. We gotta tell you—
LUKE: Save your breath, boy, till we get you out of here. The whole place could collapse like a house of cards! (Sfx of scrabbling, heavy breathing—DON’T USE THE DAMN HORSE SOUNDS!)
SHUFF: I’se here, too Mister Luke!!! We’se really glad to see you, we gotta tell you—
LUKE: Didn’t I just say to keep it down, you dunderheaded darky? If this roof goes you won’t be no bigger than a grease spot. Or, given who you are, maybe an Ink Spot!!!
(Sfx of digging, groaning, muffled shouts, racing footsteps, then a godawful crash THAT’S GOT TO SOUND LIKE A MINE COLLAPSE AND NOT A TROLLEY-CAR COLLISION!)
LUKE: Wow, that was a close shave, young Bobby! Another second you’n Rastus here would be playin your golden harps! And us, too, I guess.
BOB: Luke, we gotta tell you bout Durk
LUKE: Now, now, there’ll be time enough when we get back to the bunkhouse and Esmerelda can make us up some flapjacks ‘n eggs ‘n bacon, and we can wash it all down with a great big mug of steaming hot Barsco. Remember—you can count on Barsco to settle your nerves and give you the strength to carry on!
SHUFF: Lookee, Mizter Luke, we gotta tell you that ole Durk Downey aims to blow up the bank and kidnap Mizz Esmerelda!! We heered ‘em talkin all about it while they wired us up like
LUKE: Bobby! Is this right? What all did you hear?
BOB: We been tryin to tell you, it’s just like Shuff says—they stuck a bomb in the Poseyville National Bank, set to go off at three o’clock! And on the way they said they’d go to the Bar-B-Q and capture Esmerelda for a prisoner so you wouldn’t interfere with their evil plans!
******* LACUNA: PAGES DEFACED OR MISSING *******
LUKE: We taught those varmints a lesson, son! They’ll be on their way to Brushywood for a good many years, if I don’t miss my guess. It shows how you can’t get away with crime, but it can get away with you. You got to live the good life and do the right thing, because no crime ever pays. Right, pardner?
BOB: Right, Big Luke. And they’ll never forget this lesson from you, I’ll say!
SHUFF: Yassir, Mizter Luke, you done cooked their geeses good’n proper. An you got the money an Mizz Esmeralda back, too. Now I’m all ready for that Barsco you was telling ‘bout. I ain’t et in so long my legs done got hollow!
Theme music, fade-out, announcer guff.
####
The following is in pencil:
Will somebody spend some time supervising George? He’s so damn deaf he can’t tell a train whistle from a cannon shot. Last week, he used breaking glass sfx for Esmerelda’s entrance and inserted “Nearer My God, to Thee” as background music for the big saloon scene. We’ve had numerous complaints, and not just from kids, either! And when are we going to get an announcer who doesn’t always sound halfway potted? This guy Hansbury has the phoniest English accent I ever heard. Can him!!! —Arnie M.
Copyright 2007 All Rights Reserved
Inutility
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