When one thinks of old time radio, one thinks of the 1930s through the 1950s. It was the 1920s, though, where radio became a craze like no other! Here from early issues of RADIO DIGEST, we have a radio-centric comic strip. I confess to not even GETTING much of the specific gags herein, but I do like the cartooning. Apologies for one stereotypes in this very specialized, historic strip.
1 comment:
A fascinating relic of bygone times! You needn't worry about not getting the jokes, because they ain't funny, McGee (radio reference).
In commercial radio's early days hobbyists made up a big part of the audience. Sort of like the early days of personal computers, when alongside commercial ads the magazines ran articles on building custom computers and writing code. Many of these gags reflect the competition to claim bragging rights for picking up the most distant station.
I actually got to experience a little of the "long distance thrill"as a fourth-grader in the early 60s. Undiagnosed eye problems frequently sent me to bed with a headache long before I was sleepy. I'd listen to the bedside clock radio--an AM radio, of course--and discovered that by fiddling with the antenna I could pick up stations from Canada, the Midwest, even the East Coast if I was lucky.
By the way, reading these strips I get the sneaking suspicion that the author really didn't know much about radio and was faking it. Maybe dumb jokes like "paw-took-it" got him off the hook for an issue.
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