300428 - Topic: Tempermental opera singer rides the Empire Builder

This episode of Empire Builders was another one of the instances where the story was written by someone you might think of generally as coming from outside the Empire Builders family. Most of the stories used on the series were written by NBC staff writer Edward Hale Bierstadt. Others were usually written by other NBC or McJunkin Advertising Company staff. The GN’s own Harold M. Sims is credited with writing the story or at least composing the plot of several stories. On this night, however, the story was written by someone in the newspaper business – another frequently utilized resource for finding writing talent. However, this author was not the already-known Ben Hur Lampman or Dan Markell (both of Portland, Oregon). No, this time the author was associated with the Hearst-owned San Francisco Examiner – and yet was living in Seattle at the time. The author was documented as Alice Elinor, a.k.a. Alice Elinor Lambert, a.k.a. Alice Elinor Lambert Ransburg.

Alice Elinor Lambert was the birth name given this evening’s author by her parents, the Rev. Charles Edward Lambert (1842-1932) and Ella Amelia "Nellie" (Lathrop) Lambert (1852-1942). Alice was the fourth of seven children born to Charles and Nellie. Alice was apparently a “free spirit” in many respects. She was married at least 2, perhaps 3 times, and engaged or nearly engaged at least once more. She seems to have bounced around several locations on the west coast, including at various times San Francisco, Oregon, and the Washington communities of Seattle, Forks (on the Pacific coast) and Darrington (a tiny logging community tucked deep into the north Cascade foothills). Alice told people she had worked for William Randolph Hearst (in her capacity as a “girl reporter” for Hearst’s Examiner). She also published a few titles through vanity press publishers.

I do not have an official press release for this broadcast, but I do have a couple of published press items that probably got their material from an official release. One of these sources is a wonderful, obscure publication I located in the collection of the University of Washington (Manuscripts and Special Collections). The publication was called Northwest Radio Weekly. It featured program listings for each week, complete with radio station call letters and frequencies. Many of the articles were national in scope, but some concerned northwest radio news and local programming. Empire Builders tended to be mentioned more often if there was a local tie-in, as there was with this broadcast. The following snippet came from the Vol. 1, No. 4 (April 28-May 3, 1930) edition of Northwest Radio Weekly:

The Empire Builders’ program on KOMO, KHQ and KGW, at 6:30 features the story written by a Seattle girl, Miss Alice Elinor, and is described as a story of motion, colored peaks and rushing rivers, having as its setting the luxurious Empire Builder, which is speeding along the southern boundary of Glacier National Park.

Empire Builders typically aired on the West Coast at 7:30pm, but the time of 6:30pm (which was neither an accident nor a typo) reflects the fact that the eastern time zone had switched to Daylight Saving Time by that date, and was therefore airing the live broadcast one hour earlier. Seattle and the remainder of the West Coast were evidently still on Standard Time.

From one other published source (the Great Northern Goat magazine) we get this blurb:

Alice Elinor, on the staff of the Hearst papers on the Pacific Coast, wrote the Empire Builder travel story which will be broadcast April 28.

The Pitssburgh Press had a little more detail to offer about the story in its April 28^th Radio Log:

How Judith Paige, impoverished by her father’s death, unexpectedly realizes a fortune, will be told in the climax of the sketch.

After her father’s death, Judith takes a position as secretary to Mme. Thais, a temperamental opera singer. Enroute West, Mme. Thais meets an old friend, the “Old Timer,” returning from the East after an unsuccessful attempt to locate the owner of a valuable tract of West Coast property.

The plot takes an unexpected turn when the “Old Timer” discovers Judith is the daughter of the man he is seeking.

Harvey Hays and Virginia Gardiner are the featured players in this sketch.

 

Front and back covers of a book by Alice Elinor Lambert, titled "Women Are Like That." Notice the back cover and its map of the lumber country of the Pacific Northwest.

 

Before a review of the broadcast itself, here are just a couple more comments about the author. Alice Elinor was born Alice Elinor Lambert. The press blurb that appears to have been put out by the GN’s Harold Sims calls her “Miss Alice Elinor.” By the time she wrote this story for Empire Builders she had married Joe Ransburg (many years earlier, in fact), and took his name as hers. Perhaps the name “Alice Elinor” was some sort of writer’s affectation, but an online biography about her indicates she left her husband and children behind in about 1932 to further her writing career. One source (perhaps her actual divorce decree) has suggested she left her family behind specifically due to her husband’s “disrespect of her writing and his alleged derision about it, at least from Alice's point of view.” People do unexpected things for both love and money, and this certainly seems like one of those times where you kind of shake your head about someone – especially a wife and mother, in the early 1930s – abandoning her husband and especially her children as the only option available to advance her career. Perhaps there was a little more to that story.

This night’s story began with a young man named Rodney Harland leaping aboard the Empire Builder train as it pulled out of Glacier Park Station on its way westward toward Seattle. He immediately bumped into his beau, Miss Judith (Judy) Paige. It is soon revealed that Rodney is a newly-minted lawyer with hopes of establishing himself in Seattle. He explained to Judy that until he could do so, which might take at least a year or two, they could not go ahead with their plans to marry. For her part, Judy had gainful if not completely satisfying employment serving as personal secretary to Madame Thais, a French opera singer with a decidedly demanding and generally unpleasant demeanor. And it is further revealed that trains tend to really set her off. Judy described her job for Madame Thais as acting as the fire department:

Well, traveling is hard on Madame Thais, poor dear! Goodness knows, she’s temperamental enough when she’s at home, but on trains almost anything starts her off. She hits the ceiling about three times a day, and blows up. Then when things begin to smolder – I put out the fire.

I don’t have the documentation at hand to prove it, but I believe the role of Madame Thais was played by Empire Builders ingénue Virginia Gardiner.

As Rod and Judy stood there chatting about the merits of looking for work in Seattle, and the joys of spending the summer in a cabin near Glacier Park, Madame Thais appeared. Judy introduced Rod to Madame Thais and explained that Rod’s sister had been Judy’s roommate in college. As this introduction is made, Madame Thais reveals that she, too, has found a friend aboard the train. She introduced Rod and Judy to her old pal, the Old Timer.

Judy asked Madame Thais how she was feeling that morning, and to everyone’s surprise, the old gal said she had slept like a baby. “Not one jerk of the train! Not once did thees engineer break my bones in two. Not once did he snap my head from my poor neck!” Evidently Madame’s travels had not often carried her on the lines of the Great Northern Railway – until now. Judy realized it was getting late in the morning, and perhaps it was too late for Madame to get her breakfast in the dining car. Turns out the old gal had already had a pretty full morning.

JUDITH:               You’ve already eaten!

MADAME:           But of course! First, my bath. On thees train! What a nize bath I have! The little maid in the boudoir, she feex it for me. Such nize big fluffy towels – not little mean ones. Then I dress in two minutes, so good I feel. An’ then I meet Ole Timer, an’ he invite me to breakfast. Such a breakfast we had, did we not, Ole Timer?

Madame Thais continued with her review of the dining car service and (you should see this coming) – she loved it!

MADAME:           An’ Judy, you know something? That waiter – he must know me – my temperament. Before I have my seat, before I lay my bag down, he bring me a cup of hot coffee. Before I order, before have time to get cross, hot coffee I have to keep me happy until my breakfast comes. Is it not wonderful?

PIONEER:            Well, it sure is wonderful coffee, ma’am – but the Great Northern does that for everybody. It’s jest common sense, I reckon. I don’t much hanker after that little preliminary demi tasse cup myself, but it goes strong with most folks. Truth is that until an American’s had his coffee, and until an Englishman’s had his tea in the morning, most of ‘em ain’t fit to live with. People have got to thaw out.

MADAME:           Yes, thaw out! Me, I thaw out so much I eat a breakfast like I never dare before. Little peeg sausages – wheat cakes even! For why should one work an’ toil an’ become a prima donna if not to forget the waistline? Is it not so, Meestair ‘Arlan?

By golly, all that talk of the inviting Great Northern dining car has me feeling a mite peckish, too! But breakfast was over, and the little quartette of friends was relaxing in the observation car. Music carried over the dialog and through the listeners’ radios …

                              (FADE IN CONCERTINA WITH ORCHESTRA)

MADAME:           Mon dieu, where is those music?

JUDITH:               Some one’s turned on the radio. I rather like that old-fashioned concertina.

RODNEY:             The Great Northern certainly does well by you here on the Empire Builder.

PIONEER:            Speakin’ of sudden changes of fortune, and hearin’ that there concertina sort of reminds me of somethin’ I saw out here on the line quite a few years ago.

MADAME:           Eet ees a story! This old timer! Always he is full of stories, like the engine is full of steam – yes?

PIONEER:            (CHUCKLES)  Now, ma’am, I hardly know whether to take that as praise or not. This story, though is about one time when fortune turned the wrong way.

RODNEY:             Let’s hear it. Will you?

JUDITH:               Yes, old timer, this is the time and the place.

We can always count on the Old Timer to come through with a nice story. And so the Old Timer launched into another of his interesting tales of the old days on the line of the Great Northern Railway.

PIONEER:            Well, it was just about this time of year, and just about this section of Montana. I was at a little way station here on the Great Northern lines waitin’ for a train east-bound, and listenin’ to an Italian fellow that was playin’ a concertina on the station platform.

(ORCHESTRA UP WITH CONCERTINA:  ORCHESTRA OUT:  CONCERTINA ALONE: STOP:  APPLAUSE FROM SEVERAL PEOPLE)

Among those listening to the music was a married couple named Mickey and Mary Hogan. Their young daughter, Kathleen, was mesmerized by the music being played by a man named Michele Pezza. Mickey explained that Pezza used to be a section foreman on the division. It was soon revealed that Michele Pezza was departing soon to return to his home in Italy. It seems his wife had died and their little girl, Maria, was living with her grandmother. Pezza planned to bring his daughter back to America with him. As the Hogan’s were chatting with Pezza, someone came up with a telegram, calling out for Michele Pezza. The Italian identified himself, and once he read the telegram, he was suddenly overcome with grief. The Hogans pressed him for information. Pezza told them the telegram brought news of his little daughter’s death. He was crushed. The Hogans expressed their deep sympathy as the train pulled in. Pezza was originally going to join them on the train to begin his journey back to Italy, but now he simply stayed behind and mourned the loss of his little girl.

Judy was the first to point out what a sad story that was, to which the Old Timer replied “Fortune doesn’t always choose its time.” Rod responded by pointing out “And fortune isn’t always – good fortune.” Madame Thais, meantime, was in tears.

Rodney broke the collective gloom by asking the Old Timer what he had been up to back East. The Old Timer explained he had been to New York to try to locate a man, but that he came up empty. Well, dog my cats! We just went from one sad story to another one. Or did we?

Rod, Judy, and Madame Thais were none too eager to hear another depressing tale. They weren’t entirely certain they wanted to hear any more details. But the Old Timer pressed on anyway.

PIONEER:            Shucks, I reckon there’s no story about this. Truth is, me and some friends of mine want to build some hotels and golf links, and connect up a little chain of lakes with a good road. Cuss it, we’d have a sportsmen’s paradise! But the man that owns the land, Wesley Paige, has dropped clean out of sight!

MADAME:           Wesley Paige? What you mean – dropped out of sight? Ee ‘as been dead for five years!

JUDITH:               But – he was my father!

PIONEER:            What’s that?

Well, Old Timer – let me take a crack at it. You couldn’t find Wesley Paige because he’s dead. He was survived by his daughter. She’s standing in front of you. Don’t make me repeat this.

MADAME:           Wesley Paige was my little Judy’s father, ole timer. Her mother, she was my dear frien’. Always I have look after her since her mother died. And now, poor child, she is all alone but for me, and I guess I have to take her to Paris with me!

RODNEY:             Not if I can help it!

PIONEER:            Well, you won’t have to take her anywhere, ma’am, if she’ll just sell us that piece of property her father owned! Are you the only heir, Miss Judith?

JUDITH:               Yes – I’m all alone.

MADAME:           Tell me, ole timer, ees this property worth much?

PIONEER:            Well, it’s worth enough so that this little girl won’t have to do anything for a long time to come. It’ll sure keep her going for a while!

What do you know? They’re all riding along on a train, and it appears Judy’s ship has just come in. Judy suddenly realized there was no longer anything to stop Rodney from marrying her, provided he could accept that the money she was about to come into was not simply her money – it would be their money. Just then, the music welled up again:

                                             (ORCHESTRA IN WITH PRELUDE TO SONG)

RODNEY:             Someone’s turned on that condemned radio again!

JUDITH:               Wait a minute, dear, I like this song. Listen!

(MISS GARDINER SINGS FIRST VERSE OF SONG)

RODNEY:             Who is that? I like it.

JUDITH:               It’s Virginia Gardiner singing on the Empire Builders program of the Great Northern in New York. Quiet now – she’s going to sing the second verse.

(MISS GARDINER FINISHES SONG)

On the one hand, I think it’s kind of clever the way they kept squeezing in some “self-references” by having characters in the radio plays listen to portions of the Empire Builders program, in the very midst of the Empire Builders program. But it’s always been a bit disconcerting the way the Old Timer seems to just barely miss being in the observation car of the train and coming over the radio at the same time. In this case, they seemed to have pushed the boundaries just a bit more. As I mentioned earlier, I suspect Virginia Gardiner played the role of Madame Thais. So shortly after the Old Timer character of Harvey Hays and the Madame Thais character of Virginia Gardiner had departed the scene, here comes none other than Virginia Gardiner singing over the radio in the observation car she vacated just moments before.

Before the radio listeners had much chance to forget the sound of Virginia Gardiner’s singing voice, Madame Thais and the Old Timer strolled right back into the observation car to join Rod and Judy. The story closed after some happy chatter about Rodney and Judith’s pending nuptials, and the Old Timer announcing he was headed to the baggage car to look in on his faithful old hound dog, January.

My copy of this continuity is missing the closing announcement. We’ll just have to assume John S. Young had some glowing comments about the Great Northern Railway, its trains, and the territory it served.

As for the writer, Alice Elinor Lambert Ransburg (who by the way later married another man named Burdick) settled in the sleepy little lumbering town of Darrington, Washington. She lived out her final years there, and for a time was a featured radio personality on station KRKO in Everett. Alice passed away in 1981, just a month past her 95^th birthday. She was considered a genuine town character to the very end.

 

Until next week, keep your dial tuned to Empire Builders!

 

 

300421 - Minneapolis

The Great Northern Railway had its headquarters offices in a large building – the “Railroad Building”, not surprisingly – in downtown St. Paul, Minnesota. St. Paul and Minneapolis comprise Minnesota’s “Twin Cities.” To speak of one, you must usually speak of both. And when it comes to writing on a topic, many neophytes are encouraged to pick a topic that they know about intimately – like their home.

Edward Hale Bierstadt was no neophyte, certainly not in the context of writing fiction, but even professionals ought to be allowed to pluck off some low-hanging fruit now and then. Besides, I doubt he selected the topic himself, anyway. The GN officials clearly wanted some of their stories on Empire Builders to focus on the major cities along their rail lines, from east to west.

Today’s Great Northern Railway Historical Society (comprised of over 2,000 members) holds an annual 4 or 5-day convention. The location is typically selected as representative of either the west end or the east end, in alternating years, of the territory served by the GN. Coincidentally, this summer the GNRHS convention will be held in Minnesota’s Twin Cities – the headquarters hotel for the convention will be in Minneapolis.

Early press write-ups for the Empire Builders program of April 21, 1930, included the following:

Minneapolis, the Mill City, will be the locale of the program of April 21. This evening’s entertainment will feature the beautiful chains of lakes and boulevards for which that city is famous. The story is the work of E. H. Bierstadt, with the collaboration of Perry Williams, Secretary of the Minneapolis Civic and Commerce Association.

               (“The Empire Builders” program pamphlet, Apr 7 – May 12, 1930)

When Empire Builders came on the air that night, radio listeners first heard the strains of a tune called “The Land of Sky Blue Water.” Now, for those of us who grew up sometime in the 1950s through the 1970s, this song title is liable to bring to mind a certain brand of beer. However, much to my surprise, it turns out there has been a song by that title for a lot longer than the beer company was using its variation of the tune.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, much of the country was divided on the subject of music. The influence of Tin Pan Alley-style music was still strong. Jazz as a musical genre was taking hold of the country – or at least significant portions of it. Not everyone was enthralled with it though.

Some people embraced the relatively new sound of jazz music. Others found it revolting, particularly with its emphasis on saxophones. Some folks compared saxophone music to fingernails scraping on a chalkboard. Either way, the topic was often alluded to in broadcasts and reviews of broadcasts in those days. It seemed to be on the minds of lots of folks. Most people declared that they either enjoyed it or hated it. Here are the opening lines of the April 21, 1930, episode of Empire Builders:

               (ORCHESTRA IN, FADING TO SAXOPHONE SOLO)

MARY:   Tom! Stop that wretched noise!  Stop it, I say!

               (SAXOPHONE STOPS SHORT)

TOM:     What do you mean wretched noise? I’ll bet I can play the saxophone as well as anybody in Minneapolis!

And so we are immediately introduced to our two protagonists, Mary and Tom. Empire Builders toed an interesting line on the subject of popular music. It was essential to the success of many radio series in those days – even a program that consisted of almost exclusively dramatic presentations – to feature a certain amount of popular music. Certainly many radio programs at that time featured little else besides musical performances. To my knowledge, there simply were no radio stations in the early 1930s that played a steady stream of music. I’ve mentioned this before, but until the Hindenburg disaster in 1937, broadcast networks like NBC were unlikely to allow recorded sound in nearly any form: music, spoken word, or even sound effects. Music had to be performed live, because so many radio listeners felt cheated otherwise. And so a series like Empire Builders made at least a reasonable effort to please as many of the listening audience as possible. They included period music whenever the storyline called for it, but they also played popular dance music, the Tin Pan Alley staples, and jazz. Just to show they weren’t “taking sides” in the musical debate, they didn’t shy away from poking fun at jazz, even if it was sometimes showcased on the broadcasts.

Once Mary managed to get Tom to stop playing his saxophone, she likened her disdain for the sound to her similar degree of disdain for the Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce (an odd segue, to say the least). Tom, as it turns out, was a publicity writer for the Minneapolis Civic and Commerce Association. Hey, hang on a moment – wasn’t that Perry Williams fellow who helped Bierstadt write this program . . . wasn’t he with the same Minneapolis Civic and . . . hmmmm . . . coincidence? I think not.

Tom and Mary’s conversation devolved into a pointless debate on the relative merits of industrial progress at the expense of civic beauty, and likewise the virtues of parks and scenic attractions versus economic growth. Mary let on that their engagement should be broken, because they just didn’t really have anything in common. You begin to think Edward Hale Bierstadt didn’t believe young women were capable of sustaining a serious relationship with a man without finding a remarkably superficial and fickle reason to despair over it all.

It was just about this point in the story that the doorbell rang. Mary answered the door only to find the Old Timer. She told Tom the Old Timer was a friend of her fathers. Before long, the Old Timer discovered that Mary had resolved to end her engagement to Tom. The Old Timer, being just slightly more nosey than common manners would permit, was just nosey enough to make sure he dragged this kind of detail out of another fickle young woman within the 30-minute time slot of the broadcast. It wasn’t long before he learned that Mary felt she and Tom just couldn’t agree on things. Tom corrected her. They couldn’t agree on one particular thing.

PIONEER:            Can’t expect to agree on everything, can you? Might be sort of dull for you if you did. What was the one thing that you split on.

MARY:                  Why, it’s this way. Tom handles publicity for the Civic and Commerce Association here in Minneapolis and, naturally, he believes in the things that Chambers of Commerce stand for. And I don’t.

TOM:                    The real trouble is that you don’t understand what modern commerce and industry actually mean.

MARY:                  The trouble is that I understand too well. Take just one instance that we were talking about. If the money that was spent in harnessing St. Anthony’s Falls had been used to make them more beautiful, this city would be a better place to live in!

TOM:                    But, good grief, Mary, don’t you see …

All this discussion of the commerce and scenery Minneapolis and environs prompted the Old Timer to mention he had an unusual dream the night before. Tom and Mary (thank goodness) urged him to describe the unusual dream.

The Old Timer explained that in his dream he could see St. Anthony Falls – not as they were in 1930, but as they were many years earlier. He said there was a canoe coming around a bend in the river, being paddled by a white man, and there were Indians on the bank of the river. The man in the canoe turned out to be a priest, and when he got to shore near the Indians he stepped out and held a crucifix in front of him. Turns out the priest was Father Hennepin. He told the Indians he came in peace, and that he was on a mission to locate new lands to let others know about, and to spread religion.

Hennepin asked the Natives if the water falls were on their land. They told him the falls marked a boundary to signal their enemies to advance no farther. They told Hennepin the falls were sacred to them. Hennepin said he did not understand why they considered the falls sacred, so one of the Indians began to tell him a legend of long ago, a story about a young chief and his beautiful bride.

The story began with the Chief returning to their home from a council of elders. The council had just passed judgment on him – that because his stature in the tribe was great, that he must take a second wife.

His wife protested, and tried to convince the Chief of how unfair and unfit the idea was. But the Chief was obedient to the council of elders, and insisted he had no choice but to follow their direction. Once more his wife insisted that he not do this, but the Chief finally revealed that it was already done – he had taken a second wife. The first wife was heartbroken, saying “the light has gone from my life – I shall live in the dark forever.”

With a little transitional music, the scene shifted back to Father Hennepin and the Indians on the shore. Hennepin asked if the young woman ever found happiness again.

INDIAN 1:            I will tell you, my white father. It may have been joy that came. Listen! The next morning a hunting party set out from this village, and the hunters gathered on the banks of the Father of Waters, above the Falls, for they were to go up the river in canoes. With them were their women.

(INDIAN TRANSITIONAL MUSIC UP AND FADE)

The young Chief bid the hunters farewell, but as they departed, his first wife came to the shore. The Chief was distracted by the protests of an Indian man named Eagle, whom the radio listeners learned was the brother of the first wife. Eagle chastised the Chief for dishonoring his lodge and for shaming his wife in the eyes of their village. Before the Chief could discern what his wife was up to, the Chief watched as she set herself (I hate to have to say this, but) up a creek without a paddle. Well, okay – it was more like a river. And while it’s true that she didn’t have a paddle, she wasn’t really going up the river – the current naturally took her downstream instead. Right toward St. Anthony Falls.

As the lovelorn young woman drifted over the falls to her certain doom, her brother Eagle became enraged. He blamed the Chief for her death, and took his revenge by cracking the Chief over the noggin.

INDIAN 1:            And so died the warrior, young chief, and so died the woman who loved him. Since that time, white father, far away as the farthest end of the rainbow, the falls have been sacred to my people.

HENNEPIN:         They shall be sacred to me also, red brother. They shall be known to me by the name of my patron saint. St. Anthony of Padua. So shall my people always know them.

(INDIAN MUSIC IN:  TRANSITION TO MODERN THEME:  FADE)

PIONEER:            And that was the first part of what I dreamed.

That was quite the dream. And if that was only the first part, I’m nervous about hearing the second part.

MARY:                  I liked it, even though it was sad. It was beautiful. You see? That’s what I mean. This industrial civilization has spoiled all that. The falls aren’t sacred now.

TOM:                    But the romance hasn’t gone. It’s still all there!

PIONEER:            Wait a minute. You haven’t heard the rest of my dream yet. There’s more to come.

Yeah – wait! I’ve got about five hundred adorable photographs of my grandkids you simply have to see. Come back! Don’t go . . . I was going to make espresso . . .  Well what do you know? It seems Mary and Tom are just aching to look at all those photos and have some espresso . . . er, hear the rest of the dream, that is.

MARY:                  Oh yes! Do tell us the rest.

TOM:                    We certainly don’t want to miss anything, sir.

PIONEER:            I don’t aim that you shall. Besides, the second part sort of hitches on to the first. Well, in my dream I seemed to drift along through the centuries until I heard (Music; medley forester songs, fade to chopping of axes)  the noise of axes in the forest, and I knew the white man had come.

The Old Timer told Tom and Mary about some loggers who were chopping down some enormous trees, which they then floated down the river to a mill.

PIONEER:            And then I saw the logs floating down the big river. You can see the old boom sites to this day. The timber just naturally had to come here because St. Anthony’s Falls gave ‘em power for the new mills. Ever listen to a saw mill saw?

(SOUND OF THE BIG MECHANICAL SAWS CUTTING THROUGH LOGS)

                              Yes, it’s like that. And then, after a while, when the forests were cut away, great wheat fields came in their place, and there were flour mills where the saw mills used to be. Seemed to me, in my dream, that I could hear the sifting and the shuffling of the big machines that turned the wheat into flour for the world.

(FLOUR MILL SOUND EFFECTS IN AND OUT)

                              Well, the Washburns and Pillsburys, the wise old New Englanders, took over the power sites at the falls and built flour mills. You’ll see the same names that are on these mills on flour sacks and barrels all over the world. That’s how Minneapolis became the flour milling center of the world – because it was built by the old mill stream.

(OLD MILL STREAM IN AND OUT)



Vintage fold-out postcard view of the Stone Arch Bridge and the Minneapolis milling district.  Author's collection

Mary wasn’t buying the value of all that commerce. She pined for the unspoiled beauty of the St. Anthony Falls before the commercial activity and mill building and such. But she was up against the Old Timer, and he rarely came up short in this kind of conversation.

MARY:                  That’s what I’m complaining about. You’ve taken away the Falls, and all that you’ve got left is machinery.

PIONEER:            Not quite all. There’s more than just machines. There’s all the romance of Jim Hill building the Great Northern Railroad, for instance right there. The old bridge that Jim Hill built over the Mississippi, near the falls, one of the most beautiful bridges in this country, that’s still there! Why there’s all the romance in the world right there!

(START TRAIN EFFECT:  FULL UP:  FADE INTO DISTANCE)

                              That must have been the Empire Builder, or maybe ‘twas the Oriental Limited on its way out to the Pacific.

Then the Old Timer really began to pour it on. I suspect Perry Williams took hold of the typewriter at this point to inject some of his city-boosting rhetoric.

PIONEER:            It wasn’t all industry either. And it wasn’t all commerce. Those two brought prosperity, and prosperity brought all sorts of things. One thing was the big, new municipal air-port here in Minneapolis.

(AIRPLANE EFFECT   FADE INTO DISTANCE)

                              The city grew and spread until there were eleven natural lakes some of ‘em three miles ‘round, big enough for most any kind of a boat, ‘cept maybe an ocean liner, and all linked together by parkways – inside the city limits, and more than a hundred-and-thirty public parks were created for all the people to enjoy. Beauty wasn’t forgotten. Haven’t you young folks ever gone out to the lake side on a late afternoon in summer when the birds were just saying Goodnight, and the music of a band came to you across the water. Maybe there was someone out in a boat with a mandolin too.

(FADE IN BIRDS; THEN DISTANT BAND; THEN NEARER MANDOLIN)

At this point Tom was practically frothing with enthusiasm, and even Mary was coming around.

PIONEER:            Well, there’s two sides to most everything in this world, though folks usually only take the trouble to look at one of ‘em. Civilization, the growth of commerce and industry mean that most everybody today can have the comforts and luxuries even that only a few people used to be able to have. But you can’t have anything in this world unless you pay for it, and civilization, like everything else, has got to be paid for.

The Old Timer advised Tom and Mary that his dream wasn’t quite over yet. Mary was getting just as skeptical about this peculiar dream sequence as most of the listeners, one would think.

MARY:                  Do you often have dreams as long as this one, Old Timer?

PIONEER:            (chuckles)  Only when it’s necessary, Miss Mary.

Tom and Mary prodded the Old Timer to keep at it with his seemingly endless nocturnal yarn spinning.

PIONEER:            Well, I dreamed I was right here in this room, and both of you were here too. But you couldn’t see me because it was all a dream. Miss Mary here was just singin’ a song.

(ORCHESTRA IN:  FADE TO PIANO AND SONG:  “WATERS OF MINNETONKA” OUT)

TOM:                    By George, Mary, I liked that! Sing another.

MARY:                  No, Tommy, you’ve had enough for now. And, besides, I’m not the only one in this family that does tricks. Where’s that saxophone of yours?

The Old Timer summed up his dream with a commentary between Tom and Mary that seemed to flow about like this: “aw shucks, the city is growing and now that we’re married we did our part in that arithmetic and gee isn’t this a swell place to live and raise a family and oh, boy, we’re just awfully happy.”

PIONEER:            And that’s the end of my dream!

MARY:                  Old Timer, I think it’s the end of our dream too.

TOM:                    What do you mean, Mary?

MARY:                  We just don’t need to dream anymore because this dream is coming true.

TOM:                    You really mean it?

MARY:                  I really mean it.

Well, there you have it: a swell story that managed to bring Mary back to her fickle senses and get on with her betrothal to her beloved. Tom even asked the Old Timer to serve as his best man. And then, wouldn’t you know it, Mary asked Tom to play another tune on his saxophone.

(SAXOPHONE SOLO IN:  MINNESOTA UNIVERSITY SONG:  FADE TO ORCHESTRA FOR TRANSITION)

As that lovely tune faded out, John S. Young closed the program with the night’s commentary on the peerless comforts and amenities found only onboard a Great Northern passenger train.

CLOSING ANNOUNCEMENT:

               Hours slip away like magic for travelers in the luxurious trains of the Great Northern Railway. Their pathway lies past the emerald lakes of Minnesota, through evergreen forests and fragrant valleys, along the course of ten great rivers, beside tumbling cataracts and lacey water-falls – through a land of romance. You glide swiftly and smoothly through a clean, green country, behind powerful oil burning and electric locomotives, which leave no trail of smoke or cinders. Hundreds of miles of road bed are ballasted with dustless, washed gravel, and other long stretches are oiled throughout the summer months as carefully as any well-traveled highway. Smoothness and cleanliness, combined with luxurious comfort, attend your journey on the Oriental Limited and the new Empire Builder. These trains leave Chicago daily, at eleven o’clock in the morning, and at ten-fifteen at night, for Minneapolis, St. Paul, and the four great cities of the Pacific Northwest, Spokane, Seattle, Tacoma and Portland.

 If there's a moral to this story (and I'm not saying it needs one), perhaps it's that you ought to watch those spicy foods too close to bedtime. Otherwise you're liable to start dreaming up stories about Catholic priests and Indian girls in canoes and whatnot.

 

Until next week, keep your dial tuned to Empire Builders!

 

 

300414 - Topic: Fighting and Preventing Wildfires

I’m working without either a continuity or official press release for this episode, so I’m afraid I don’t have much to write about. That said, I can always find something.

Harold Sims came up with the plot for this broadcast, and George Redman was slated to write the continuity. Beyond that, I’m not sure how much of a role either man played. However, I do know that Sims lived in southern Idaho for a few years before his stint in Portland, from where he moved out to the Twin Cities to work for the Great Northern Railway. I can see Sims having sufficient knowledge of the geography of Idaho to feel comfortable ginning up this story. I can’t put my hands on it at the moment, but I swear I have some form of documentation that states this episode used Idaho as its locale.

One of the GN’s little pamphlets used to alert ticket agents and interested listeners to upcoming programs lists the following synopsis for the April 14 episode:

The destruction wrought by man’s carelessness will provide a stirring melodrama for the second April program. It will be a continuous succession of thrills culminating in a forest fire and will have as its object a lesson in fire prevention.

The Washington State Forestry Conference convened on April 16 (two days after this broadcast) and passed a resolution saluting the Great Northern Railway for its April 14 Empire Builders broadcast, in which attention was drawn to the serious hazards of human-caused wildfires. Here is the letter they sent to GN president Ralph Budd.
 

The featured speaker on this evening’s Empire Builders broadcast was, appropriately enough, the chief of the United States Forest Service, Robert Y. Stuart. During the Great War, Stuart served in France, and returned with the rank of Major.

A blurb in the Hartford (Connecticut) Courant stated that “R. Y. Stuart, head of the United States Forestry Service, will speak during the Empire Builders program over WBZ and WJZ tonight at 10:30.”



Major R. Y. Stuart. Press photo issued 3-31-1933 - Author's collection

Major Robert Y. Stuart (1883-1933) was the fourth Chief of the U.S. Forest Service, serving in that position from 1928 to October 23, 1933. It was in the spring of 1933 that President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed legislation creating the Civilian Conservation Corps. One of the primary and first missions of the CCC was to help reforest the nation’s woodlands. This effort fell under the management of the US Forest Service and Major Stuart.

By the way… the reason I know the precise date of the end of his service in that office is that his career came to a very abrupt and tragic end on that day.   

I don't enjoy posting such somber information two blog submissions in a row, but the fact is, Major Stuart died that day. He fell out of his seventh floor office window in Washington, D.C. He was succeeded in the role of USFS Chief by his colleague, Ferdinand A. Silcox.