Many among the crowd did not hesitate to shout out the familiar line that the sound of galloping evoked.
“Hi-yo Silver, away!”
The group of nearly 100 people gathered last Friday at the Coast Bellevue Hotel where the Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound organization presented “A Grand Salute to Shows and Stars from the Golden Age of Radio.”
During the two-day event, familiar radio personalities – such as Dave Parker who appeared in the Lone Ranger that originated from the radio station WXYZ Detroit – recalled moments working in radio.
“The Lone Ranger, who can forget that?” Parker said during the event. “Every day you see reference to it in the news, like ‘the silver bullet is no answer to our problems.’”
Parker is working on a documentary called “Remembering Radio” that features several radio shows of which he played the first 15 minutes to the audience.
Lone Ranger fans Anna and Frank Denton of Burien said Parker’s presentation brought back a lot of memories of all the radio shows they enjoyed throughout the ’30s and ’40s.
“My parents were big One Man’s Family fans,” Frank recalled of the radio series that debuted in the ’30s and went on for years. “Every Sunday night, that was the show where we all sat around and watched the radio.”
Anna remembers going over to her friend’s house during the summer to listen to scary stories on the radio.
“All these neighborhood kids would gather around the kitchen table and we’d turn off the lights and listen to ‘Lights Out’ and ‘The Whistler,’” she said. “Us younger ones, if we got too scared or cried, we would be sent home. So we had to be very brave and listen.”
Others recalled fond memories as well.
Seattle resident Dick Bonesteel, 77, referred to radio listening as “theater of the mind” and enjoyed creating his own mental scenes. He remembers as a boy taking his radio off his bedroom dresser at night and putting it next to his pillow. When his parents thought he was asleep, he would watch the glowing radio dial and listen to his favorite, The Lone Ranger.
“Radio was the form of entertainment that we grew up with, aside from going to the movies,” said Seattle resident Bill Parker, 77. “The thing is, you could just sit there and listen to whatever was being broadcast. In the afternoon, you’d come home from school and listen to ‘juveniles’ – 15 minute broadcasts for kids, like Dick Tracy and Captain Midnight.”
The Bellevue event also featured radio show recreations, including a performance by some of the people who appeared on the original Great Gildersleeve and The Bickersons radio series.
During the Great Gildersleeve recreation, Jim French played the role of a husband who was engaged to two women. French produces “Imagination Theatre” programs in his Bellevue studio and performed before a live audience four times a year at the Kirkland Performance Center.
Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound president Paul Secord of Kirkland said there are many collectors and old-time radio enthusiasts who grew up with the medium, but the event was also geared toward newcomers.
“We want people who don’t know about old-time radio to seek it,” Secord said. “We want young people interested in learning about it to seek it out because it’s a form of entertainment.”
Carrie Wood can be reached at cwood@reporternewspapers.com or 425-453-4290.
Learn more
For information about Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound, visit www.repsonline.homestead.com.
