Radio dramas come back to life
January 23, 2013
The students in a Washington & Jefferson College intersession class learned a little bit about the radio dramas of yore. Last week, 14 students gathered into campus radio station WNJR and performed the classic, “Sorry, Wrong Number” and premiered “The Last Ride” written by Bill Cameron who also taught the course. The class also listened to a number of classics, including “War of the Worlds” – the 1938 classic that caused chaos when people thought aliens were really invading the planet!
Washington Observer-Reporter Editor Brad Hundt visited the class. The programs performed are archived on WNJR.org.
I loved doing radio drama, and I’m glad to see that the concept is being passed along. Back in the early 60’s, I was one of a group of performers in a radio drama series called “Macabre,” which was produced by the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service for broadcast on AFRTS stations around the world. One week, I’d be an actor. The next week, I might be the engineer. The following week, I could be doing sound effects. It was a wonderful experience! I happy the students at W&J are being afforded this great opportunity to broaden their horizons while learning a bit of the history of broadcasting.
Here’s a link to a webpage about the AFRTS series “Macabre.” It is dated 1961, which was two years before I joined the staff of the Far East Network, but it gives you a sense of the program.
Here is the link… 🙂 http://www.digitaldeliftp.com/DigitalDeliToo/dd2jb-Macabre.html