301117 - The Jumping Off Place

 

 

Recording status:  NOT recorded

The Empire Builders story aired on this night (November 17, 1930) followed a familiar construct. Announcer Ted Pearson’s proclamation of “The Great Northern Railway presents ‘EMPIRE BUILDERS!” led to a transitional segment that was a staple of the series:

(SPEEDING TRAIN EFFECT UP FROM DISTANCE. FADE TO INTERIOR OF TRAIN EFFECTS, WHICH FADE TO BACKGROUND)

Also true to form was the opening scene, in which the Old Timer, riding aboard the Empire Builder train, encountered a young woman (Betty) who prompted him to tell her a tale to pass the time.

The Old Timer told Betty he had in mind a story about Hester Price, a show girl who decided to follow her true love west on a covered wagon. Just then, a general commotion was raised by others in the Great Northern’s passenger car as everyone started oohing and aahing over the stunning scenery. The train was passing through the Montana Rockies.

WOMAN:            (CALLS)  Oh Betty, you’re missing the most gorgeous views –

OLD TIMER:      That’s right, Miss, I was just settin’ to talk you right out of all this Glacier Park scenery!

BETTY:               Oh, it is wonderful!

OLD TIMER:      Now you just watch for those big signs along the track – the big arrows – an’ they’ll give you the names and height of ‘em.

BETTY:               Here’s one now – St. Nicholas – nine thousand, three hundred and eighty-five feet! Oh, that’s it – way over there. Isn’t it lovely?

It’s my understanding that the Great Northern Railway did in fact place a series of signs along the mainline through Marias Pass, just as the one described in this radio play. They were meant to help passengers on the Empire Builder and the Oriental Limited know which mountain peaks they were looking at as the train skirted the southern boundary of Glacier National Park. In fact, I feel certain that I’ve seen vintage photographs depicting one or more of those signs. Please let me know if you are familiar with any such photos, and especially where they can be found.

The Old Timer told Betty that the Great Northern was the only railroad in the country whose main line trains ran right past a national park.

BETTY:               Oh, I didn’t know that -

OLD TIMER:      Well, that’s a fact, but as I was a-saying the whole trip from Glacier Park to Spokane is one continual picture of mountains, forests, rivers, canyons, gorges. ‘Course there’s lots of nice scenery other places, but I was a-talkin’ about a whole day full of it.

The Old Timer told Betty he was off to the baggage car to check on his ol’ hound dog, January, but that he would come back to the observation car and tell her the story about Hester Price. Betty asked him one favor as he got up to leave…

 

BETTY:               I’ll be looking forward to it. Oh, will you please turn the radio up just a bit.

                             (BOTH LAUGH. MUSIC UP IN MIDDLE OF SELECTION)

ANNOUNCER:   (OVER RADIO)

                             You have just heard “________________________”, a composition by Joseph Koestner, and played for you by Mr. Koestner and his orchestra. This orchestra is the feature of the weekly radio programs of the Great Northern Railway. Mr. Koestner’s next number is  “_____________________”.

The continuity left blank the titles of the two songs to be represented, but drawing attention to Josef Koestner is just one more example of how Empire Builders almost playfully used self-reference to weave not-so-subtle reminders of the railroad into the flow of its broadcasts.

The Old Timer returned from checking in on his pooch, and he and Betty settled into a conversation in the observation car. The Old Timer began his story of Hester Price, the former show girl and the man she was engaged to.

OLD TIMER:      Well, this Hester Price that I was going to tell you about was a little bit of a girl just like you. She was engaged to a big hulkin’ six footer name of Phillip McBride. Hester had been a show girl – and Phil’s Mother and the rest of his folks thought that was just awful …

BETTY:               I should think they’d like her. She must have been amusing.

OLD TIMER:      (CHUCKLES)  Well some of the men folks did like Hester, but not many of the women. There was catty women in them days just the same as there is today. Well, Hester began getting it in the neck the very day the train started out from the big river for the far west …

A transitional bridge took the listeners to the rough and woolly country as a wagon train was inching its way west. The effects faded out the sound of the railroad train and replaced that with sounds of creaking wagons, dogs barking, and the clank of chains and cracking of whips. Hester appeared, singing “Oh Susanna” and playing a guitar. She came upon two pioneers named Jake and Martha. Neither of them seemed to think much of Hester.

JAKE:                  (INTERRUPTING)  Hester Price! Now where’d you come from I’d like to know? And what are you doing here?

MARTHA:          Shameless Hussy!

HESTER:             I came from home – and I’m going with Phil …. He doesn’t know it yet though.

Ah, those poor pioneers. How were they to get along with a shameless hussy in their midst? Martha piled it on, calling Hester a “man chaser.” Such harsh words. Jake and Martha seemed ready to run Hester off, telling her she ought to hike back to St. Louis before it was too late. Just then, an older man named Adam Lindsay strolled up. He came to Hester’s defense. Jake and Martha finally backed off. With Jake and Martha gone, Adam and Hester chatted a little. Hester let on that she doubted her usefulness to the wagon train, but Adam assured Hester that she really could be valuable to everyone on the trip, perhaps by singing and getting the pioneers to lighten up a little. Hester had pointed out they all looked like they were “marching to the gates of doom.” She seemed to brighten at Adam’s suggestion.

ADAM:               (CHUCKLES)  Good gal! Lordy. Here comes Phil now.

HESTER:             Now I’m in for it.

PHIL:                   (APPROACHING)  Hester! What in Sam Hill are you doing here?

After only a small amount of protesting, put on for show, Phil admitted he was happy that Hester was along, although he said he was not pleased that she would be facing all the dangers of the rest of the intrepid (if not somewhat morose) pioneers.

Time passed, and the wagon train kept rolling westward. One day, there was a great commotion as the train was abruptly halted. A half-dead man was found lying right in the middle of the trail. In his weakened condition, he told the others in a raspy voice that he had fallen ill, and had insisted the members of his wagon train leave him behind. He was tended to, and there was a quick discussion about how to help him and whose wagon he would ride in. Crusty Jake and Martha were none too charitable in their opinions. Jake coldly stated this was just one more mouth to feed. His idea: “Let’s leave him.” Kindly old Adam Lindsay offered to let the fellow ride in his wagon, and Hester immediately volunteered to help nurse the man back to health. Jake and Martha weren’t finished pouring it on.

JAKE:                         We’re not a-goin’ to have any sick man holdin’ up travel, boss …

MARTHA:                  We’ve already picked up one tramp, an’ that’s enough …

HESTER:                    Why, Martha –

MARTHA:                  Yes, I mean you, Hester Price!

LEADER:                   Come on, men we’re wasting time. Put this man in Adam’s wagon, and let’s be on our way! Look sharp, now!

Some unidentified transition music faded to interior train sounds, which brought the radio listeners back to the conversation between Betty and the Old Timer.

OLD TIMER:              Oh, I tell you, ma’am, they wasn’t all story-book heroes, them early pioneers. Some of ‘em was the grouchiest, most selfish humans you ever saw. But the leader of a wagon-train, his word was law. And so they picked up Hopkins, and little Hester took his welfare on her shoulders too. Well, she nursed him back to life, all right. (CROSSING BELL, OFF)  Then came weeks and weeks of hardship, and some o’ the weaker ones took sick, and some died.

BETTY:                      And Hester – how did she get along?

OLD TIMER:              Bless me, that girl was everywhere … nursin’ the sick … cookin’, sewin’, lookin’ after the children. Then that woman Martha, that was always fussin’ at the poor girl – she took sick, an’

(TRAIN EFFECTS OUT. TRANSITION MUSIC UP. FADE TO WAGON TRAIN EFFECTS, WHICH FADE TO BACKGROUND. MARTHA GROANS.)

I commented last week about the quality of sound effects on Empire Builders. Few of us alive were there to hear those radio broadcasts, and those who are must have been very, very young at the time. With the poor 3^rd and 4^th generation re-recordings of the broadcasts as our only existing reference, I tend to give a high degree of credence to the published critiques of those who heard the broadcasts live. And while we might still agree the sound effects accomplished in the early 1930s were a far cry from what could be accomplished today, it seems the Empire Builders broadcasts did impress their contemporary listeners to a significant degree. Here’s another blurb from the time, published in the Decatur Review on November 18, 1930 (the day after this broadcast): “Say what you will of the dramas of the Empire Builders, you'll have to admit that this program has the best imitation of a train heard on the air and that's something.”

Back to the story. It seems crotchety old Martha was now under the care of Hester too. She injured her back somehow, and was enduring terrific pain with every jostle and jolt of the wagon in which she was riding. As Hester offered up another hot towel for Martha to apply to her sore back, Martha finally thawed out her cold appraisal of “Hester the tramp.” Hester got Martha to settle into a restful sleep, and Hopkins (the half-dead guy they almost ran over with the wagon train) came to the wagon and summoned Hester outside. Hopkins then revealed he was head over heels with Hester, admitted that he knew she was engaged to Phil, and then lamely pleaded with Hester to reveal “… is there a chance for me?”

Uhhh…. no. Hopkins let Hester know how much he appreciated all her attention and care in bringing him back from near death. I think Sigmund Freud termed this sort of thing “transference”: the patient falls in love with the nurse. Hester humbly tried to shrug it off.

HESTER:        Oh, Hopkins, I didn’t do so much! I’d do that for – anybody.

HOPKINS:      Hester, I’ll never say anything to you again about this, but I wanted you to know that I love you – and – Oh, I guess I’m a damn fool – but you’ve done so much for me and Phil has, too – I’m sorry I said anything. Forget it, won’t you?

HESTER:        No, I won’t forget it, Hopkins. It’s awfully sweet of you – but, after all, I belong to Phil, you know.

The transition that followed this dialog also informed the listeners of the musical skills of one Hester Price.

(TRANSITION MUSIC UP, FADING TO FIDDLE ATTEMPTING TO PLAY. “ARKANSAS TRAVELER” STOPS AFTER TWO ATTEMPTS)

ADAM:           Dad gum it! I don’t know the rest of that tune!

HESTER:        Give up? All right. Give me the violin!

ADAM:           Violin! That’s a fiddle!

(“ARKANSAS TRAVELER” IS PLAYED VERY NICELY)

For your listening pleasure, if you have a mind, here’s a link to a circa 1929 recording of “Arkansas Traveler” performed on fiddle, guitar, and harmonica: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bm-fwrp35Js

By now the intrepid pioneers had been wagon-training west for over five months, and they were finally climbing the Cascade Mountains. In fact, they pretty much made it to the end of the trail, if not quite their destination.

(SOUND ALARM ON COWBELLS. OFF CALLS OF “WHOA”! ETC. WAGON TRAIN COMES TO A HALT)

PHIL:              Wonder what they’re stopping all of a sudden for this way.

MRS.               I guess we’ve reached the top. Must be something wrong as usual! Get out McBRIDE:     and see, Phil.

ADAM:           (OFF)  Holy thunders! She must be 200 foot down – sheer drop!

HOPKINS:      The women and children ain’t never goin’ to get down a cliff like that! There ain’t nothin’ to hold on to!

JAKE:             What in God’s name will we do with the wagons and oxen? We’ve got to go on!

HOPKINS:      Yes, we can’t turn back now with Winter so close and our supply runnin’ short.

HESTER:        Careful, Martha, don stand too close to the edge!

MARTHA:      Lord, have mercy on us! We’ve reached ‘The Jumpin’ Off Place!’

The term “jumping off place” typically suggests the point at which a journey is begun, although it can also refer to a final or extreme condition. Depending on your perspective, this juncture of the story may have served as either. A brief piece of transitional music brought the radio listeners back into the Empire Builder train.

OLD TIMER:  And there they was. Unable to budge an inch farther. Five months of heart breaking travel behind and this steep cliff making it impossible for them to go ahead. It would have taken weeks to cut their way round through the woods and with the snow beginning to fly and starvation staring them in the face it looked like they was at the end of their rope at last. And no mistake. The Jumping Off Place.

BETTY:          You don’t mean – Did they really jump off?

OLD TIMER:  (CHUCKLES)  Well now I’m coming to that. The leader called a meeting of all the men …

(TRAIN EFFECTS OUR TRANSITION MUSIC UP AND OUT)

The wagon train boss rounded up the men and they all got to figgerin’ and thinkin’ about what in blazes they could do. The broadcast shifted back to the Old Timer once more to fill in some chinks.

OLD TIMER:  Well they managed to cut a trail down the side of the cliff. A narrow one but wide enough to get the people and the oxen down and they killed some of the oxen to make ropes out of their hides. And then they took all their covered wagons to pieces and they was ready to let them down over the cliff but then came another hitch.

BETTY:          Those poor souls. What is it this time?

OLD TIMER:  Well about half way down the side of the cliff there was a sharp ledge sloping right out at the only place where they could let the ropes down. They couldn’t let anything down without the ledge cutting the rope. So there they were. Stumped again.

(TRAIN EFFECTS OUT. TRANSITION MUSIC UP. FADE TO BABBLE OF VOICES)

Then Adam came up with a solution.

ADAM:           That ledge down there is pretty slopey but we could let a man down on the rope and he might be able to stick there and then we could get a forked pole and hold the rope away from the sharp ledge while we let the loads down. You only have to push the rope out about six inches.

LEADER:       No good. The man couldn’t stand on that ledge.

ADAM:           But, boss, look! See them dwarf cedars down there? Just little bushes but a man could hold on them, that is, maybe he could.

LEADER:       I wouldn’t ask any man to take a chance like that.

The lovelorn Hopkins, who had volunteered to be left for dead by his earlier wagon train, and feeling that he didn’t have much left to live for anyway, stepped up to try to save the pioneers. Hopkins bravely lowered himself down the cliff in order to help guide the rope away from the sharp ledge, but a lone bush he was holding for support gave way, and he plummeted down the cliff to his death. Then Phil stepped up and claimed he could succeed where the first man failed. His mother, Mrs. McBride, had kittens. Fiancé Hester flipped out too. Others jumped into the assault on Phil’s judgment, the consensus being it was bad. Then the brave and formidable Hester rose once more to the occasion.

HESTER:        Give me the rope.

PHIL:              What are you going to do?

HESTER:        I’m the one that’s going down.

PHIL:              Oh, Hester I won’t let you.

HESTER:        I can do it. I know I can. Listen folks it’s crazy for a big six foot man to try to go down there but I can do it. I only weigh 90 pounds and that ledge. Why, it’s just my size.

LEADER:       Well it does sound reasonable, Hester, but it’s too much of a chance for you to take.

HESTER:        Chance! Haven’t we all been taking chances day after day? You let me. I’ll strap myself to one of those bushes and you see if I don’t stick on.

Jake helpfully weighed in with “somebody’s gotta do it.” Just as long as it wasn’t him, or Martha. Maybe some shameless hussy, if only they could find one. Oh yeah, they did…

So now Phil had kittens while Hester was lowered down the cliff. She grabbed hold of one of the cedar bushes, and it held. A forked pole was lowered to her and she evidently saved the wagon train. Phil gushed to his mother “isn’t she wonderful? What do you say now, Mother?” Good ol’ Mom came around, telling her son “if you don’t marry that girl the first chance you get you’re no son of mine, Philip McBride.”

That, unfortunately, is the end of the copy of the program’s continuity that I have. It’s missing the closing comments, which may have identified a few of the players, besides the obvious casting of Harvey Hays as the Old Timer.

So until next time, keep those dials tuned to Empire Builders!