Myth, Mistake, or Misconception - the recordings available to you (at this time)

Existing recorded episodes of Empire Builders

If you search the internet (including eBay) for episodes of the Empire Builders radio series, you will no doubt come upon a number of sites that list either 9 or 10 episodes, all from the final season of the series (Fall of 1930 to Spring of 1931). In one case, they offer ELEVEN tracks - but not 11 distinct episodes.

As yet, I do not know where or when, exactly, these episodes came to light. The best indication I’ve located so far is a comment made on Elizabeth McLeod’s web site (“Documenting Early Radio”) where she states the recordings were “discovered in the mid-1980s in the corporate archives of the Great Northern Railroad [sic].”

By the mid-1980’s, most corporate archives of the Great Northern Railway were held by the Minnesota Historical Society. The March 3, 1970, merger of the GN, NP, CB&Q, and SP&S railroad companies created Burlington Northern, Inc., which commenced operation of the Burlington Northern Railroad at that time. The officers of the new company had little use for the voluminous material these four companies had accumulated over many decades, so they offered an absolute gold mine to the Minnesota Historical Society in the 1970’s by turning over most of the GN and NP President’s Subject Files and many, many more documents and artifacts.

It is not beyond reason that this collection originally included some sound check recordings of Empire Builders, as Ms. McLeod says. I have contacted MHS on various occasions asking about such recordings, and they insist they have none – other than the 17-disc set of Victor records memorializing the Cascade Tunnel dedication. For that matter, the reference to GN corporate archives might indicate they were salvaged from an undignified fate (i.e., saved from a dumpster) by someone at the GN who recognized their value more than the upper management-types did.

But back to the internet resources for copies of the episodes that you can purchase or download…

First, let me say that I do NOT have copies available for sale or download. I do have copies for my personal use, but I am not interested in getting involved in distributing them. Having said that, you can in fact find the episodes by using Google to find sites where one can purchase or possibly download digitized copies of selected broadcasts of Empire Builders.

Here’s where things get really messed up.

Some sites claim they have ten episodes (not counting the Cascade Tunnel dedication of 1/12/1929). Some even claim they have ELEVEN episodes. They do NOT. Those claiming ten episodes typically have either duplicated the Armistice Day Reunion episode (calling it simply “Armistice Day”), or they have duplicated one of the two episodes typically referred to as “Bert Pond, Worrier and Baby” or “The Depression.” Eleven? That's two of the nine episodes duplicated.

Other than the Cascade Tunnel dedication broadcast of 1/12/1929, there are currently only NINE unique episodes out there. And nearly every one of them is named incorrectly. This is not to bash whomever it was who originally brought these to the market. That person had to give names to these episodes, and they didn’t have much to go by but the audio itself, which failed to title the episodes.

Also, not one site (at the time this is being posted – 1/26/2014) has correctly identified the sequential number of the episodes. They have also, in some cases, BADLY misrepresented some of the original air dates. Here is a review of the NINE extant Empire Builders radio broadcasts (excluding #290112, Cascade Tunnel dedication):

November 10, 1930

 

Please notice the air date was NOT November 11^th – Armistice Day (known since 1954 as Veteran’s Day http://www.va.gov/opa/vetsday/vetdayhistory.asp ). In 1930, November 11 fell on a Tuesday. Empire Builders always aired on Mondays. Hence, a program concerning Armistice Day in 1930 was deemed appropriate for the November 10, 1930, broadcast. One year earlier, on November 11, 1929, Armistice Day did in fact fall on a Monday, and the Empire Builders broadcast of that date was also a story concerning Armistice Day – a story of “Over There.” No recording of this broadcast exists.

Any CD or other digital recording purporting to have an episode called “Armistice Day” and another called “Armistice Day Reunion” most likely includes two copies of the same broadcast – that of 11/10/1930, correctly titled “Armistice Day Reunion.”

This episode is also wrongly claimed to have aired on 12/01/1930. On that date the episode was “The Williamson Survey,” a story of the Great Northern Railway’s completion of their Bieber extension through central Oregon and into California. Again, no recording of the 12/1/1930 broadcast exists.

Aside from the Cascade Tunnel dedication (#290112), the “Armistice Day Reunion” program (#301110) is the earliest existing recording of this series. It is also contains the earliest known recording of the voice of actor Don Ameche.

December 22, 1930

The correct title of this broadcast is “Attar of Roses.” Purveyors of this episode typically call it some variation of “Columbia River.”

By the way . . .

Betty White – Betty Marion White – beloved star of such TV shows as “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “The Golden Girls,” and “Hot in Cleveland” DID NOT APPEAR ON EMPIRE BUILDERS. Ever. More on this in a future blog.

December 29, 1930

This broadcast is correctly titled “New Year’s Story,” but most often you will see this episode listed as “Girl Leaves Boy for Singing Job in Seattle.” The real story title may seem unimaginative, but at least it’s not such a dreadful mouthful as what’s being used.

January 5, 1931

 “Prosperity Baby” is the correct title of the episode aired on January 5, 1931. Sources selling this episode call it “Bert Pond, Worrier and baby,” “Billion Dollar Baby,” or simply “The Depression.” This night’s story appears to have been recycled on May 18, 1931, as either “The Billion Dollar Baby” or “The Million Dollar Baby.” Some newspaper accounts in May of 1931, acting on early press releases, indicated this program would air on May 25, 1931, but the NBC program logs held by the Library of Congress indicate this story was swapped with another (“On Time Hank”), and actually aired on May 18^th.

January 12, 1931

Information updated/corrected January 17, 2016

This episode is typically reported by those selling copies of it as “Charlie’s Flue [sic]” or some variation of that, plus or minus “Montana Snow” and/or “A Job for Jimmy.”

The true title of this broadcast, if any such title was intended, is not known. In my own log, I have provided a topic for this broadcast, that of “telegrapher revived from coma.”

The correct title for this broadcast is "A Long Distance Call." I have written about this episode at this link: 310112 - A Long Distance Call

Oddly, this peculiar and not-very-believable story is said to have been based in fact.

January 19, 1931

Information updated/corrected January 17, 2016
 

This episode has a legitimate name, and it is NOT “Glacier National Park” as is typically cited. The correct name of this episode is “Thriller Films, Inc.” – a story written by W.O. Cooper. I really messed this one up - my apologies! I did locate a reliable title for this story - "Nan o' the Northwest."

January 26, 1931

Once more, the title of this broadcast that is typically provided is simply incorrect – no doubt a reasonable effort to create something meaningful based on the recording itself. I doubt I would have come up with anything better myself, given that obvious limitation.

However . . . the correct title of this program is “La Mariposa.” I do not speak Spanish, but I understand mariposa means “butterfly” in English. I like “The Butterfly” (but in Spanish) better than “Joaquin Murietta,” the usual title given incorrectly to this broadcast. Murietta is in fact a character in this story, and is a real figure from early California history.

Variations of the wrong episode title include “Juaquin Murietta” (Joaquin spelled with a “u” instead of an “o”), and an even more unfortunate variation, “Joachin Noriega.”

 

February 2, 1931

This episode does not seem to have suffered the fate of most of the others addressed in this post. The correct name of the episode is “James J. Hill” . . . although if we were to split hairs, the first episode to air as part of the weekly Monday night series, and retold in this broadcast of 2/2/1931, had a subtitle: “Background of Empire.”

Curiously, the continuity prepared for the 2/2/1931 broadcast has a significantly different preamble than what is captured in the existing recording. Last-minute changes were not uncommon, nor were ad-libs by the actors. But other than a short amount of discourse between the Old Timer and actresses Flynn and Husting, the 310202 script retained most of the 290114 script with pretty faithful replication.

February 16, 1931

Again, with nothing more than the recording to squeeze a title out of, this episode is currently represented by an incorrect title. This one typically gets “Spike Wants the Girl” as its title, although the correct title is simply “Glacier Park Dance Hall.”

There you have it: only NINE recordings available at this time, plus the Cascade Tunnel dedication broadcast. The operative words being “at this time . . .”

Stay tuned, Empire Builders fans.