Readers Contributions
Introduction
This is an experiment. I hope more people who worked in radio will take the time to educate the rest of us on how it all worked. This article is going to be similar to a Blog. It will be in parts and is Allan's reminiscences of his working life which started in radio. You will see how his radio experience then led to other related work. You have the opportunity to send in questions to Allan via the contact page, about the people he worked with, the shows he worked on or the equipment he used. I will then post the questions and the replies. Occasionally, Allan will consult with colleagues or other experts, so please do not expect instant replies.
I have also added a Contact Form after the latest Chapter in Allan's Reminiscences.
I have also added a Contact Form after the latest Chapter in Allan's Reminiscences.
Allan Black
Sydney producer engineer author Allan Black, started recording radio programs as a trainee in 1956 and sold his company and semi-retired in 2001. Here's his fascinating story.
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All or part of any written material, including graphics and photographs, submitted by Allan Black and contained in any of these ‘Parts’ is strictly copyright. © Allan Black 2016 - 2024.
All other material appearing in these 'Parts' (such as externally sourced photographs, artwork, advertisements, reprints etc.) are copyright their respective copyright owners, and are reproduced here on this website, under the "Fair dealing for purposes of criticism or review" provisions of the Copyright Act, 1968. (Australia)
All rights reserved. Nothing may be stored in a retrieval device for later use. Sight impaired visitors, please visit the home page first.
Part 1
Hello everyone, in 1956 at 16 years of age and straight out of school, I saw this adv. in the Saturday Sydney Morning Herald, for an ambitious youth to learn sound recording, radio, production, and television production.
From my collection here is the original Ron R. Beck adv. It says, 'Experience not necessary, we will undertake the thorough training of the successful applicant.'
From my collection here is the original Ron R. Beck adv. It says, 'Experience not necessary, we will undertake the thorough training of the successful applicant.'
This certainly got my attention, in fact if any production company advertised these details today, they'd be bowled over in the rush. Things have come a long way since 1956, but even back then I knew that applying by letter would be hopeless, the job would probably be filled before the postman got out of bed.
My folks didn't have a phone at that time, so the following Monday morning at 9am, I took a few shillings down to the Post Office and dialled BW 5744 to apply for the job. After a few tries I got through, a secretary asked some questions and gave me an interview time the following day.
My parents made me wear my only suit and a tie, and wished me good luck as I got on a tram heading to the city. I made sure I was early enough but was taken aback by the number of suited applicants waiting in the corridor on the 7th floor at Adyar House, 29 Bligh St. Sydney.
Earlier in 1925, the Sydney chapter of the Theosophical Society had built a 7 story building there, naming it Adyar House after their Indian headquarters. When completed they moved from around the corner in Hunter St. to new offices on the mezzanine floor.
On Monday 23rd August 1926 at 8pm, interests associated with the Society broadcast the official opening of Radio 2GB Ltd. with offices on the 6th floor and a studio on the 7th. The opening broadcast was made from Adyar Hall in the basement, with their low power transmitter located across the harbour in the suburb of Mosman.
2UE moved from their original home studio in Maroubra to 4 new studios on the 4th. floor with offices on the 5th. Later in Dec. 1941, 2GB moved to new studios and their Macquarie Auditorium in Phillip St. Sydney.
On Monday 23rd August 1926 at 8pm, interests associated with the Society broadcast the official opening of Radio 2GB Ltd. with offices on the 6th floor and a studio on the 7th. The opening broadcast was made from Adyar Hall in the basement, with their low power transmitter located across the harbour in the suburb of Mosman.
2UE moved from their original home studio in Maroubra to 4 new studios on the 4th. floor with offices on the 5th. Later in Dec. 1941, 2GB moved to new studios and their Macquarie Auditorium in Phillip St. Sydney.
This picture taken about the late 1930s shows Adyar House, (sometimes called Savoy House) which is not there now and the trams have gone too, but readers might remember the Savoy picture theatre which was on the ground floor. The Theosophical Society leased part of Adyar Hall in the basement to the Green Parrot restaurant. A few years later I would have my breakfast down there when I worked on the 2UE breakfast program with Gary O’Callahagn and Sammy Sparrow.
That old building with its creaky elevator has fond memories for me, I started on the 7th, and eventually worked on the 4th, 5th and the 3rd floors.
In fact Adyar House was a famous building in Australian entertainment. The Theosophical Society hosted Adyar Hall in the basement for lectures and concerts, 2GB and 2UE had offices and studios there, the Australian Record Company was on the 3rd. and the Savoy picture theatre was on the ground floor. For many years American producer Grace Gibson who was to become a big player in Australian radio drama, had offices there on the 3rd. floor.
ARCs 2 studios on the 3rd floor was where Ron R. Beck produced his Larry Kent and Police File radio programs, in their big Studio A. A few years later Natec Sound Studios took over ARC studios on the 3rd, and I would work there as well.
That old building with its creaky elevator has fond memories for me, I started on the 7th, and eventually worked on the 4th, 5th and the 3rd floors.
In fact Adyar House was a famous building in Australian entertainment. The Theosophical Society hosted Adyar Hall in the basement for lectures and concerts, 2GB and 2UE had offices and studios there, the Australian Record Company was on the 3rd. and the Savoy picture theatre was on the ground floor. For many years American producer Grace Gibson who was to become a big player in Australian radio drama, had offices there on the 3rd. floor.
ARCs 2 studios on the 3rd floor was where Ron R. Beck produced his Larry Kent and Police File radio programs, in their big Studio A. A few years later Natec Sound Studios took over ARC studios on the 3rd, and I would work there as well.
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To my surprise I got the trainees job and started one Monday. I met Ron and his staff including the famous script writer the late Fred Parsons. He has a wonderful history, having written comedy scripts for Roy Rene and others. I discovered he would come into the office at 10.00am, write a Larry Kent or Police File 30 minute script, finish by midday, have his sandwiches, then walk around the city planning the next days script, then go home by bus at 5.00pm. And Fred would do this 3 or 4 days a week! He's now honoured by presentation of the prestigious Fred Parsons Award for Services to Comedy, which is presented on special occasions to comedy writers, as well as producers. Fred had an amazing imagination, was a lovely guy, soft spoken always smiling with a great sense of humour. Later he'd spent time showing me tips with script writing and timings. His finished scripts were typed up to a Roneo master by the girls in the office, and they'd run copies for the actors cast in the shows, to be recorded at ARC studios on the 3rd floor.
The late Lowell Thomas, Becks chief engineer taught me how to run their dubbing facility. This was making German BASF 7 inch reel tape copies of the radio program masters to send for broadcast by radio stations around Australia. An average week was making 600 copies on 10 Byer recorders at double speed, 15 inches per second, (38 centimetres per second) Each finished tape had to be spot checked, the box have a written label including the station, be stacked in order, then packed in cartons ready for despatch by post, road, rail or air. Some stations might require 10 tapes in one delivery, so there was a carefully ordered list of work to be followed. After broadcast the tapes were sent back to Becks, I bulk erased each one for reuse, so there was a total circulating library of about 3000 tapes.
Running up to Xmas the work quadrupled when we had to send out in advance, enough programs to cover the holiday season. l remember working 7 days a week and I recall my dad getting angry about this, but it taught me just to get in there and do it. My starting wage was 7 Pounds a week.
The late Lowell Thomas, Becks chief engineer taught me how to run their dubbing facility. This was making German BASF 7 inch reel tape copies of the radio program masters to send for broadcast by radio stations around Australia. An average week was making 600 copies on 10 Byer recorders at double speed, 15 inches per second, (38 centimetres per second) Each finished tape had to be spot checked, the box have a written label including the station, be stacked in order, then packed in cartons ready for despatch by post, road, rail or air. Some stations might require 10 tapes in one delivery, so there was a carefully ordered list of work to be followed. After broadcast the tapes were sent back to Becks, I bulk erased each one for reuse, so there was a total circulating library of about 3000 tapes.
Running up to Xmas the work quadrupled when we had to send out in advance, enough programs to cover the holiday season. l remember working 7 days a week and I recall my dad getting angry about this, but it taught me just to get in there and do it. My starting wage was 7 Pounds a week.
17-07-1957
The other current Ron Beck programs were the Stamina Show and The Ladies College of Knowledge. The SS sponsored by the Stamina clothing company, was a half hour variety program compered by Pat Hodgins with singer Alan Coad, and ads read by Jim Tregonning. Johnny Frost was the resident comedian and each show featured various musical guest artists. Community singing was still big following WW2 when it was a regular event around Sydney, and each program featured 4 songs sung by the audience. We all scrambled around putting sheets with the words of each song on every seat before the doors opened for them.
LCOK sponsored by Vincent's, was a quiz show compered by Ron Beck, with the contestants introduced by Roz Sheekey, they were all selected by prior quizzing. Each series built up to stage winners who all appeared in the end of the year program. I moved onto editing the programs, which both had to run 29mins. 30secs. I remember one years final episode ran over 50 minutes, after I edited in the special ads, the write in contest winner and secret sound winner, both appearing to be interviewed on the show. It ended up on a 10 inch spool.
Remember these were analogue days, no digital computers and it took me 4 days to edit it down to 29.30 with a white China graph pencil marking the edit points on the back of the tape, then cutting it at an angle of 45 degrees with small non magnetic scissors and splicing tape. I never had a tape splicing block, no one mentioned it so I didn't know about them. There was a lot of audience applause which I edited down, and the master tape ended up a mass of edits. After, I carefully copied it in case it broke apart while being dubbed.
Both these programs were recorded in suburban community halls around Sydney and about twice a year Ron and the troupe travelled for 2-3 weeks to record both shows in NSW country towns. I stayed in Sydney, collected the master tapes sent back by Butler Air Transport or ANA, edited them and ran the tape dubbing and despatch schedule.
December 1957 Ron Beck sent my mum and dad an invitation to attend the staff Xmas party. They did and at one point Ron said he had a presentation to make. He called me up and gave me a Swiss Breitling wrist watch with stopwatch. I remember my dear late mother was close to tears and 58 years later I still have that watch, and it still runs.
Ron R Beck Pty Ltd. had grown to be quite a set up with bookings being taken a full year in advance. First a community group would apply to Becks to have the shows produced in their local hall. Following approval, they'd advertise this locally with all their ticket money going to a Charity of their choice. We'd record on a Tuesday and Thursday and Becks troupe would arrive early for a 10am start. The event consisted of at least 2 shows, more in bigger venues. The audiences consisted mainly of housewives, and I learnt the pre show routine featured cast introductions, local gags, awards for community service, prizes and audience singing to warm up everybody up. Then we'd roll the recorders and the first show would start recording.
LCOK sponsored by Vincent's, was a quiz show compered by Ron Beck, with the contestants introduced by Roz Sheekey, they were all selected by prior quizzing. Each series built up to stage winners who all appeared in the end of the year program. I moved onto editing the programs, which both had to run 29mins. 30secs. I remember one years final episode ran over 50 minutes, after I edited in the special ads, the write in contest winner and secret sound winner, both appearing to be interviewed on the show. It ended up on a 10 inch spool.
Remember these were analogue days, no digital computers and it took me 4 days to edit it down to 29.30 with a white China graph pencil marking the edit points on the back of the tape, then cutting it at an angle of 45 degrees with small non magnetic scissors and splicing tape. I never had a tape splicing block, no one mentioned it so I didn't know about them. There was a lot of audience applause which I edited down, and the master tape ended up a mass of edits. After, I carefully copied it in case it broke apart while being dubbed.
Both these programs were recorded in suburban community halls around Sydney and about twice a year Ron and the troupe travelled for 2-3 weeks to record both shows in NSW country towns. I stayed in Sydney, collected the master tapes sent back by Butler Air Transport or ANA, edited them and ran the tape dubbing and despatch schedule.
December 1957 Ron Beck sent my mum and dad an invitation to attend the staff Xmas party. They did and at one point Ron said he had a presentation to make. He called me up and gave me a Swiss Breitling wrist watch with stopwatch. I remember my dear late mother was close to tears and 58 years later I still have that watch, and it still runs.
Ron R Beck Pty Ltd. had grown to be quite a set up with bookings being taken a full year in advance. First a community group would apply to Becks to have the shows produced in their local hall. Following approval, they'd advertise this locally with all their ticket money going to a Charity of their choice. We'd record on a Tuesday and Thursday and Becks troupe would arrive early for a 10am start. The event consisted of at least 2 shows, more in bigger venues. The audiences consisted mainly of housewives, and I learnt the pre show routine featured cast introductions, local gags, awards for community service, prizes and audience singing to warm up everybody up. Then we'd roll the recorders and the first show would start recording.
Part 2
Both shows followed a standard format. The Stamina Show started with a 10second Fanfare played from an English library disc. We used a single speed 78rpm turntable which was fitted into a large women's hat box, and it survived the rough and tumble of being toured around the country. It sat alongside a 5 channel audio mixer next to 2 Byers, a master and a safety recorder, set up on a table just off stage. There were stage, audience mics and 2 large speakers set up for the audience, and all this gear was packed away in cases and carried in the van.
The brass fanfare was followed by Jim Tregonning introducing the radio listeners to the show ....
'The Stamina Clothing Company presents the Stamina Show, today presented from the xyz community hall in the Sydney suburb of xyz and we're the guests of xyz who for the last xyz years have provided services for the good people of xyz.
(Audience applause) '
'And now, here is your compere, Alan Coad'
(Louder applause)
Alan would name the guest artists for this particular program, and away it would go.
Many times we'd be revisiting a hall for the 4th and 5th time so the mostly female audience would be comfortable and at ease. But on a cold wet Tuesday morning, it still took some effort to get them going, and Becks troupe were masters at doing this. I remember after the warm up, a quick confab back stage summed up the situation, and the troupe responded accordingly. Alan Coad with his repartee, Jim with his custom written ads, and Johnny Frost with his fun and jokes.
But things didn't always go to plan. One session, we were in the old Grace Auditorium at the Grace Bros. store in Broadway Sydney. It was a cold very wet windy day and the guest artists, Enzo Topanno and his wife Peggy Mortimer, were late, caught in the traffic. The Topannos were wonderful artists, Enzo played a variety of instruments, including accordion and all the mouth organs and Peggy sang beautifully. Both had years of stage experience.
But they were late so we started recording up to the point where they would appear on stage. At that point Lowell and I stopped the recorders and Ron explained to the audience what was happening. He then had the task of keeping them amused while we waited. He told joke after joke, Alan filled in, with Jim and Johnny. But no Peggy and Enzo.
We started to be concerned with the hall booking time but eventually we got word they were here and Ron who was exasperated by this time, stepped up to the mic and said, 'At last they're here, start recording' We did, and Ron says to the audience 'Here comes Enzo now, with his organs in his pockets'
That did it, the ladies in the audience twittered and Ron tried to cover up what he'd just said. But the more he did the more they laughed and the worse it became. Eventually our audience just went hysterical, they cried and howled. We stopped the recorders but the more Ron tried to calm them down the worse things got, he'd just step up to the mic, smile, and off they'd go again.
Well we never got to finish recording that show, our hall time ran out, Ron explained we had to close, and the audience emptied out. I think the half finished show just sat on our shelves, till it got thrown out.
The brass fanfare was followed by Jim Tregonning introducing the radio listeners to the show ....
'The Stamina Clothing Company presents the Stamina Show, today presented from the xyz community hall in the Sydney suburb of xyz and we're the guests of xyz who for the last xyz years have provided services for the good people of xyz.
(Audience applause) '
'And now, here is your compere, Alan Coad'
(Louder applause)
Alan would name the guest artists for this particular program, and away it would go.
Many times we'd be revisiting a hall for the 4th and 5th time so the mostly female audience would be comfortable and at ease. But on a cold wet Tuesday morning, it still took some effort to get them going, and Becks troupe were masters at doing this. I remember after the warm up, a quick confab back stage summed up the situation, and the troupe responded accordingly. Alan Coad with his repartee, Jim with his custom written ads, and Johnny Frost with his fun and jokes.
But things didn't always go to plan. One session, we were in the old Grace Auditorium at the Grace Bros. store in Broadway Sydney. It was a cold very wet windy day and the guest artists, Enzo Topanno and his wife Peggy Mortimer, were late, caught in the traffic. The Topannos were wonderful artists, Enzo played a variety of instruments, including accordion and all the mouth organs and Peggy sang beautifully. Both had years of stage experience.
But they were late so we started recording up to the point where they would appear on stage. At that point Lowell and I stopped the recorders and Ron explained to the audience what was happening. He then had the task of keeping them amused while we waited. He told joke after joke, Alan filled in, with Jim and Johnny. But no Peggy and Enzo.
We started to be concerned with the hall booking time but eventually we got word they were here and Ron who was exasperated by this time, stepped up to the mic and said, 'At last they're here, start recording' We did, and Ron says to the audience 'Here comes Enzo now, with his organs in his pockets'
That did it, the ladies in the audience twittered and Ron tried to cover up what he'd just said. But the more he did the more they laughed and the worse it became. Eventually our audience just went hysterical, they cried and howled. We stopped the recorders but the more Ron tried to calm them down the worse things got, he'd just step up to the mic, smile, and off they'd go again.
Well we never got to finish recording that show, our hall time ran out, Ron explained we had to close, and the audience emptied out. I think the half finished show just sat on our shelves, till it got thrown out.
After 6 months, I'd learned how to set the equipment and the hall up, each one having slightly different requirements. At home one night, the phone rang and Lowell says to me, he's ill and won't be able to do the show the next day, and do I think I could record it? I said I could but I was too young to drive the van. So next morning Jim arrived and drove me out to Hurstville in Sydney, where the show was to be held.
He helped unload and set up the gear, and Ron and the troupe duly arrived, the audience were let in and the warm up completed.
I sat at the gear and Jim got the Ok to record and I started the recorders and cued the fanfare. Just at this point Ron Beck standing behind me, put his hand on my shoulder to provide support, and surprised I half turned bumping the turntable. The pickup arm jumped off the disc onto the rubber pad underneath it, and it ran around creating an enormous rumble sound. I'd opened the audio fader and the frightening loud noise was fed out into the audience speakers. Panic! some women at the back ran out the door.
I stopped the tapes, we apologised, reset the start, and off we went again to successfully finish the shows, which were my first recording job in the industry.
Nothing was ever mentioned about that, all in a day's work.
He helped unload and set up the gear, and Ron and the troupe duly arrived, the audience were let in and the warm up completed.
I sat at the gear and Jim got the Ok to record and I started the recorders and cued the fanfare. Just at this point Ron Beck standing behind me, put his hand on my shoulder to provide support, and surprised I half turned bumping the turntable. The pickup arm jumped off the disc onto the rubber pad underneath it, and it ran around creating an enormous rumble sound. I'd opened the audio fader and the frightening loud noise was fed out into the audience speakers. Panic! some women at the back ran out the door.
I stopped the tapes, we apologised, reset the start, and off we went again to successfully finish the shows, which were my first recording job in the industry.
Nothing was ever mentioned about that, all in a day's work.
Part 3
With his radio production business doing very well, all his programs rating well around Australia and all his sponsors happy, Ron Beck decided to buy his own premises, a good investment as well as saving rent. He could also convert and build a voice recording studio, to save the on going costs of hiring ARC, the Australian Record Company studios, on the 3rd floor at Adyar House, 29 Bligh St.
So one Monday morning early in 1957, we all helped in moving the recording gear and offices from the 7th floor at Adyar House, to this old disused 2 story corner shop on the corner of 69 Reservoir and Commonwealth Sts. Surry Hills. Thinking ahead Ron also bought the vacant tenement house next door at No. 71, for the offices of his company. Judging by the model Holden A parked in Commonwealth St., this rare photo was shot about 1953-54 before the old building next door B, was demolished resulting in a small car park at 69 for the staff after we all moved in. To celebrate Ron and his wife Betsy bought a bright red monster Chevrolet Bel Air, he’d just get it through the back gate to park so close to the rear of 69 you could just squeeze past it.
Lowell Thomas and I set up the 10 Byer dubbing tape recorders on the ground floor old shop counters so I could continue with my radio program dubbing program. We removed all the boards covering the upstairs windows C, to provide more daylight for scriptwriter Fred Parsons to move into the big empty top floor, and continue producing his Larry Kent and Police File unique radio scripts on his big green Remington typewriter. I could easily see that Ron and Lowell’s idea to build a small voice studio on the ground floor of No. 69 would work well, but as it turned out that never happened because television was coming. But I did record Stamina and Rola radio commercials with Jim Tregonning in the back room, I hung carpets on the walls to deaden the room echos and that worked well.
Because there was no furniture in Fred’s room, his two finger typing echoed round the walls, and I clearly remember the clack-clack-clack-clack sound. It never seemed to stop. Over many years sound producers develop their 'sound memories' it's a tool of the trade.
Despite his sparse surroundings, Fred worked on unperturbed, creating his wonderful scripts. I remember, one day Jack Davey the famous radio star, came to visit Ron and Fred and Mr. Davey with his white hair dyed light blue, to suit the early TV cameras which couldn't handle 'white' .. was introduced to me and shook my hand.
Ron and Lowell decided I should gain more experience and sent me back to ARC studios one day a fortnight, to learn to do studio sound effects. Producer Don Crosby did the Larry Kent show, I Hate Crime, and the first live studio sound effect I ever did, was the knockout punch by Kent when he finally downed the criminal. Don and actor Ken Wayne showed me how to do it and I walked around rehearsing by punching my closed left fist into my open right palm, whack! Whack! After 5 mins I stopped this because my hand was getting sore.
When my cue came in the sound effects pit at the back of the studio, I knocked chairs over, bumped the table, smashed dishes and right on Larrys cue ... I went WHACK!! and fell down on the floor. We all stayed still while the closing music played out. The red studio recording light went out, and the actors in the episode slowly turned around and gave me a round of applause. You don't forget things like that.
Stereo sound was coming and the Melbourne based Rola Company, which sponsored Larry Kent, decided to produce a stereo tape player for sale to the public. They contracted Ron Beck to produce a stereo demo. program for the public and Lowell and I went around Sydney recording stereo on a custom 2 track recorder that Rola built.
So one Monday morning early in 1957, we all helped in moving the recording gear and offices from the 7th floor at Adyar House, to this old disused 2 story corner shop on the corner of 69 Reservoir and Commonwealth Sts. Surry Hills. Thinking ahead Ron also bought the vacant tenement house next door at No. 71, for the offices of his company. Judging by the model Holden A parked in Commonwealth St., this rare photo was shot about 1953-54 before the old building next door B, was demolished resulting in a small car park at 69 for the staff after we all moved in. To celebrate Ron and his wife Betsy bought a bright red monster Chevrolet Bel Air, he’d just get it through the back gate to park so close to the rear of 69 you could just squeeze past it.
Lowell Thomas and I set up the 10 Byer dubbing tape recorders on the ground floor old shop counters so I could continue with my radio program dubbing program. We removed all the boards covering the upstairs windows C, to provide more daylight for scriptwriter Fred Parsons to move into the big empty top floor, and continue producing his Larry Kent and Police File unique radio scripts on his big green Remington typewriter. I could easily see that Ron and Lowell’s idea to build a small voice studio on the ground floor of No. 69 would work well, but as it turned out that never happened because television was coming. But I did record Stamina and Rola radio commercials with Jim Tregonning in the back room, I hung carpets on the walls to deaden the room echos and that worked well.
Because there was no furniture in Fred’s room, his two finger typing echoed round the walls, and I clearly remember the clack-clack-clack-clack sound. It never seemed to stop. Over many years sound producers develop their 'sound memories' it's a tool of the trade.
Despite his sparse surroundings, Fred worked on unperturbed, creating his wonderful scripts. I remember, one day Jack Davey the famous radio star, came to visit Ron and Fred and Mr. Davey with his white hair dyed light blue, to suit the early TV cameras which couldn't handle 'white' .. was introduced to me and shook my hand.
Ron and Lowell decided I should gain more experience and sent me back to ARC studios one day a fortnight, to learn to do studio sound effects. Producer Don Crosby did the Larry Kent show, I Hate Crime, and the first live studio sound effect I ever did, was the knockout punch by Kent when he finally downed the criminal. Don and actor Ken Wayne showed me how to do it and I walked around rehearsing by punching my closed left fist into my open right palm, whack! Whack! After 5 mins I stopped this because my hand was getting sore.
When my cue came in the sound effects pit at the back of the studio, I knocked chairs over, bumped the table, smashed dishes and right on Larrys cue ... I went WHACK!! and fell down on the floor. We all stayed still while the closing music played out. The red studio recording light went out, and the actors in the episode slowly turned around and gave me a round of applause. You don't forget things like that.
Stereo sound was coming and the Melbourne based Rola Company, which sponsored Larry Kent, decided to produce a stereo tape player for sale to the public. They contracted Ron Beck to produce a stereo demo. program for the public and Lowell and I went around Sydney recording stereo on a custom 2 track recorder that Rola built.
A.B.C. Weekly photo supplied by Craig Nugent.
Here’s a 1959 publicity photo of myself and Ron showing the stereo recorder on the left, it’s power supply on the right, the 2 Rola speakers, the 2 Altec Lansing cardioid mics and the Rola custom designed and built stereo recording console on the bottom. All this gear was also built with the intention of selling to radio and recording studios with the coming of stereophonic programs. I remember we set up on Museum underground rail station and recorded the sounds of electric trains arriving and departing, their very loud horn blasts echoed around the station walls in stereo and really impressed listeners, and us. We also recorded a Fred Parsons
specially written episode of Larry Kent in the 2UE studios at Hosking Place. The clever producer Don Crosby, indicated the actors stereo positions at the mics. with various colours marked in their scripts, matching coloured tape markings on the studio floor. This worked and lead actor Ken Wayne and the other actors had never seen or heard anything like it, the looks on their faces when we played it back for them in stereo was something to see.
Lowell and I also recorded a small orchestra there, in stereo, and sections of these recordings were edited together for demonstration to the public. To do this, Rola arranged with the David Jones Market St. store to play our 20 min. stereo demo. tape in a small theatre they built on their second floor. We used our stereo recorder, that’s all we had. This was well advertised in the press and a Rola salesman was there to run it every half hour, answer audience questions and take deposits for the new Rola stereo tape players, and advertise the proposed stereo tape library. But all this was too far in advance of commercial stereo recordings, and we were all disappointed when nothing eventuated.
Lowell and I also recorded a small orchestra there, in stereo, and sections of these recordings were edited together for demonstration to the public. To do this, Rola arranged with the David Jones Market St. store to play our 20 min. stereo demo. tape in a small theatre they built on their second floor. We used our stereo recorder, that’s all we had. This was well advertised in the press and a Rola salesman was there to run it every half hour, answer audience questions and take deposits for the new Rola stereo tape players, and advertise the proposed stereo tape library. But all this was too far in advance of commercial stereo recordings, and we were all disappointed when nothing eventuated.
Here is a German 7 inch BASF tape box from my collection, dated 1957 with my initials AB, on the right hand side. Note the various radio shows listed there, with the recording halls and some of the hundreds of radio stations which broadcast Ron Becks shows. The last entry at the bottom was by Lowell, because by that time I'd left the company to go to 2UE.
The popular serial, Hagen's Circus is also listed. In late 1957, Ron Beck flew to the USA, New Zealand and South Africa, in the hope of selling his radio programs abroad. I'm not sure which shows he eventually did sell but one was Hagen's Circus, which he sold to a South African radio network. I remember the excitement in the office while we waited for his international phone call to tell us details of his trip.
Now Hagen's Circus was recorded on 16" disc transcriptions and had to be copied to magnetic tape for Sth Africa. That was my job and I carefully dubbed 730 x 30 min eps, over about 4 months. Then a safety tape copy had to be made, this was all done on separate gear to my day job in a back room of the shop, on headphones.
Each morning I arrived by tram from my parents house in Bondi, alighted in Elizabeth St and walked up Reservoir St. to the shop at No. 69. Surry Hills in those days was a seedy part of Sydney especially at night, and because I worked very late, I had to walk past Thomos Two Up school and about 3 brothels. So help me, at 17yrs. of age I was on nodding terms with about 20 ladies of the night. My dear late dad said to me, "You’d better keep that quiet from your mother and sister.”
But one day something terrible happened.
The popular serial, Hagen's Circus is also listed. In late 1957, Ron Beck flew to the USA, New Zealand and South Africa, in the hope of selling his radio programs abroad. I'm not sure which shows he eventually did sell but one was Hagen's Circus, which he sold to a South African radio network. I remember the excitement in the office while we waited for his international phone call to tell us details of his trip.
Now Hagen's Circus was recorded on 16" disc transcriptions and had to be copied to magnetic tape for Sth Africa. That was my job and I carefully dubbed 730 x 30 min eps, over about 4 months. Then a safety tape copy had to be made, this was all done on separate gear to my day job in a back room of the shop, on headphones.
Each morning I arrived by tram from my parents house in Bondi, alighted in Elizabeth St and walked up Reservoir St. to the shop at No. 69. Surry Hills in those days was a seedy part of Sydney especially at night, and because I worked very late, I had to walk past Thomos Two Up school and about 3 brothels. So help me, at 17yrs. of age I was on nodding terms with about 20 ladies of the night. My dear late dad said to me, "You’d better keep that quiet from your mother and sister.”
But one day something terrible happened.
Part 4
But before I tell you about that, some unusual incidents occurred ...
One morning out in a small Sydney suburban hall as we arrived to record the shows, we found the only place to put some of the gear was in the halls kitchen, just off the side of the stage. It was tiny and the only place to put one of our valve amplifiers ... was in the kitchen sink. I thought about this, then went out to the truck and got a big shifting spanner to tighten off the sinks water taps, then we set everything else up, turned the power on and tested it all. All OK!, the audience settled in, we did the warm up, then started recording the first of the programs.
A few minutes in there was a loud BANG! the power went off, the hall lights went out, our 2 Byer recorders stopped dead and Pat Hodgins and Co. at the mics., stood staring out into the darkened hall. He apologised to the startled audience and filled in, while Lowell and I scrambled round to fix things.
What happened was, an elderly committee lady decided she wanted to make a cup of tea during the show. Not being able to turn the kitchen tap on by hand, she found her own big spanner and Bang! she flooded our amp. and short-circuited it, blowing the halls main fuse stopping the show.
By now the troupe took things like that in their stride and we moved on.
Ron Beck was born in Broken Hill in 1916 and grew up in Adelaide.
He performed in local theatre productions, and joined J. C. Williamson's as a principal comedian in 1942/43. When I first read that, it explained how Ron started to develop his talent as an all round entertainer. But you have to be a good businessman and motivator of others to run a successful company and Mr. Beck was all of these things. When he met the lovely Betsy, they married and raised 2 sons. Ron eventually passed away in Brisbane in 1990.
Engineer Lowell Thomas once showed me a selection of different size nails he carried, to replace the old power board fuses out in ancient country halls, while the shows were being recorded on tour. An important part of those shows was, before they left each hall, Lowell put the old fuse back, so later some poor soul didn't overload the power board start a fire and burn the place down.
I continued to do live sound effects for Larry Kent and Police File at ARC. Recording to master tapes had taken over from recording direct to disc masters a few years before. All Sydney radio actors now had previous 'disc experience' which meant they never faltered, if they did the recording stopped and the disc master was thrown out. They all had to go back and start again, losing a lot of time and money. So even though there seemed to be a relaxed atmosphere in the studio, it was a very serious costly business, and I learned important lessons in always being ready for the cues.
For the half hour programs Larry Kent and Police File, producer Don Crosby got the scripts and cast the actors for the shows assisted by Fred and Ron. On the day of the recording, Don arrived early at ARC with the script copies, and passed them out as the actors arrived. I believe leads, eg: Ken Wayne, got theirs a few days earlier. I got mine early, and marked up my live sound effects list. We rehearsed the first 1/4 hour, got direction from Don then recorded it, had a short break then did the same for the second 1/4 hr.
ARC had items for studio sound effects, for various 'footsteps' sounds there were small, sand, gravel and floor board areas. I found 'walking' hard at first, it took a lot of practice and I took in 4 different pairs of my shoes. There was a car door, and a cupboard with a window frame and a door built in, along with many household items, crockery, cutlery etc. There was a telephone receiver with various ringing sounds available and of course guns with the pins removed. Gun shots, motor vehicle, weather, industrial sounds and music breaks, came from discs played on cue by the panel operator in the booth.
Two half hour shows a day was the usual ARC recording schedule and occasionally I was invited to have lunch with some of the actors, across at the Wentworth Hotel. A short time after this 'bad guy' shot someone in Police File, he was eating a salad and telling us jokes.
About this time some friends and I started listening to the BBC radio comedy 'The Goon Show' which started here in 1953. It really sparked our imaginations, we grouped around the radio on Sunday nights to devour the 2FC broadcasts. Readers might know of it, it's still being broadcast somewhere in the world, and later at 2UE I would work on commercials with one of its stars, the comedy genius Spike Milligan.
One morning out in a small Sydney suburban hall as we arrived to record the shows, we found the only place to put some of the gear was in the halls kitchen, just off the side of the stage. It was tiny and the only place to put one of our valve amplifiers ... was in the kitchen sink. I thought about this, then went out to the truck and got a big shifting spanner to tighten off the sinks water taps, then we set everything else up, turned the power on and tested it all. All OK!, the audience settled in, we did the warm up, then started recording the first of the programs.
A few minutes in there was a loud BANG! the power went off, the hall lights went out, our 2 Byer recorders stopped dead and Pat Hodgins and Co. at the mics., stood staring out into the darkened hall. He apologised to the startled audience and filled in, while Lowell and I scrambled round to fix things.
What happened was, an elderly committee lady decided she wanted to make a cup of tea during the show. Not being able to turn the kitchen tap on by hand, she found her own big spanner and Bang! she flooded our amp. and short-circuited it, blowing the halls main fuse stopping the show.
By now the troupe took things like that in their stride and we moved on.
Ron Beck was born in Broken Hill in 1916 and grew up in Adelaide.
He performed in local theatre productions, and joined J. C. Williamson's as a principal comedian in 1942/43. When I first read that, it explained how Ron started to develop his talent as an all round entertainer. But you have to be a good businessman and motivator of others to run a successful company and Mr. Beck was all of these things. When he met the lovely Betsy, they married and raised 2 sons. Ron eventually passed away in Brisbane in 1990.
Engineer Lowell Thomas once showed me a selection of different size nails he carried, to replace the old power board fuses out in ancient country halls, while the shows were being recorded on tour. An important part of those shows was, before they left each hall, Lowell put the old fuse back, so later some poor soul didn't overload the power board start a fire and burn the place down.
I continued to do live sound effects for Larry Kent and Police File at ARC. Recording to master tapes had taken over from recording direct to disc masters a few years before. All Sydney radio actors now had previous 'disc experience' which meant they never faltered, if they did the recording stopped and the disc master was thrown out. They all had to go back and start again, losing a lot of time and money. So even though there seemed to be a relaxed atmosphere in the studio, it was a very serious costly business, and I learned important lessons in always being ready for the cues.
For the half hour programs Larry Kent and Police File, producer Don Crosby got the scripts and cast the actors for the shows assisted by Fred and Ron. On the day of the recording, Don arrived early at ARC with the script copies, and passed them out as the actors arrived. I believe leads, eg: Ken Wayne, got theirs a few days earlier. I got mine early, and marked up my live sound effects list. We rehearsed the first 1/4 hour, got direction from Don then recorded it, had a short break then did the same for the second 1/4 hr.
ARC had items for studio sound effects, for various 'footsteps' sounds there were small, sand, gravel and floor board areas. I found 'walking' hard at first, it took a lot of practice and I took in 4 different pairs of my shoes. There was a car door, and a cupboard with a window frame and a door built in, along with many household items, crockery, cutlery etc. There was a telephone receiver with various ringing sounds available and of course guns with the pins removed. Gun shots, motor vehicle, weather, industrial sounds and music breaks, came from discs played on cue by the panel operator in the booth.
Two half hour shows a day was the usual ARC recording schedule and occasionally I was invited to have lunch with some of the actors, across at the Wentworth Hotel. A short time after this 'bad guy' shot someone in Police File, he was eating a salad and telling us jokes.
About this time some friends and I started listening to the BBC radio comedy 'The Goon Show' which started here in 1953. It really sparked our imaginations, we grouped around the radio on Sunday nights to devour the 2FC broadcasts. Readers might know of it, it's still being broadcast somewhere in the world, and later at 2UE I would work on commercials with one of its stars, the comedy genius Spike Milligan.
A friends father owned an early Novatape brand valve tape recorder made in Sussex St. Sydney, anyone recall that machine? He once lent it to me while the family went on holiday. It had a radio receiver which could record on the tape, and one night I recorded a track from a new release played by Lyall Richardson on 2KY. It was from the new LP, 'Brubeck Time' by the Dave Brubeck Quartet. I played it repeatedly and it got me started with an interest in jazz, which was to play a big part after I started my own company.
After the Ron Beck BASF tapes were broadcast around Aust. they were all returned to us. I bulk erased them (all audio magnetically wiped off) and stacked them in a box for reuse. These were then copied with the latest programs, and sent back out to radio stations for broadcast. Each of our 10 Byer recorders would of course, erase these tapes while copying, but bulk erasing them first was a safety step, just in case.
It was early December with the additional work to cover the Xmas holidays. In late January the Ron Beck troupe would depart for another country tour, recording more Stamina and LCOK shows.
After the Ron Beck BASF tapes were broadcast around Aust. they were all returned to us. I bulk erased them (all audio magnetically wiped off) and stacked them in a box for reuse. These were then copied with the latest programs, and sent back out to radio stations for broadcast. Each of our 10 Byer recorders would of course, erase these tapes while copying, but bulk erasing them first was a safety step, just in case.
It was early December with the additional work to cover the Xmas holidays. In late January the Ron Beck troupe would depart for another country tour, recording more Stamina and LCOK shows.
From the Geoff Marshall collection
Here is an interesting ticket to ‘Admit One’ for the 30 minute Aspro and Stamina Shows in Newcastle, 160kms north of Sydney. No year is listed but it’s 1955 or earlier, because when I joined Ron Beck in 1956, the Aspro Show had already finished to be replaced by the Vincent’s program, ‘Ladies College of Knowledge’ with a similar quiz format to the Aspro Show.
Note: Ron R. Beck Radio Productions is not mentioned here, but 2NX-2NM and the Macquarie 2GB Network is, they probably paid for printing the tickets. NX-NM would start promoting the April recording date earlier in their programs, giving out the ‘free’ tickets in shopping centres etc.
Noting the times on this ticket: At 9.30am, compare Alan Coad and Jim Tregonning will get the audience warmed up by conducting a song or two, then they’ll introduce guest artists for the Stamina Show, recording from 10am. Then after a short audience intermission, quizmaster Ron Beck with Roz. Sheeky will start recording the Aspro Show with Ncle. quiz contestants previously selected. And this will be in the huge 800 seat Newcastle City Concert Hall, great acoustics, big audience sounds, at the peak of Ron R. Beck Radio Productions operations.
As I said previously something terrible happened. In 1958 in Sydney, I’m working long hours flat out dubbing programs and I select 10 BASF tapes for the next run, but I grab from the newly returned tape stack, before they are bulk erased. While this run is dubbing, I recount the tapes completed and discover I’ve already finished the number required for this program. So I stop the run halfway through, rewind them to the start, put them in their boxes ... and ... accidentally ... put them ... in the completed stack.
Note: Ron R. Beck Radio Productions is not mentioned here, but 2NX-2NM and the Macquarie 2GB Network is, they probably paid for printing the tickets. NX-NM would start promoting the April recording date earlier in their programs, giving out the ‘free’ tickets in shopping centres etc.
Noting the times on this ticket: At 9.30am, compare Alan Coad and Jim Tregonning will get the audience warmed up by conducting a song or two, then they’ll introduce guest artists for the Stamina Show, recording from 10am. Then after a short audience intermission, quizmaster Ron Beck with Roz. Sheeky will start recording the Aspro Show with Ncle. quiz contestants previously selected. And this will be in the huge 800 seat Newcastle City Concert Hall, great acoustics, big audience sounds, at the peak of Ron R. Beck Radio Productions operations.
As I said previously something terrible happened. In 1958 in Sydney, I’m working long hours flat out dubbing programs and I select 10 BASF tapes for the next run, but I grab from the newly returned tape stack, before they are bulk erased. While this run is dubbing, I recount the tapes completed and discover I’ve already finished the number required for this program. So I stop the run halfway through, rewind them to the start, put them in their boxes ... and ... accidentally ... put them ... in the completed stack.
Uh oh, they were packed and sent out to Macquarie network stations. About a week later, on 10 of these stations around Australia, the scheduled show suddenly cut to a show they'd broadcast about a month earlier. The first I got to know of it was one morning, Lowell said to me in a quiet voice, "Ron wants to see you in his office"
I can't remember exactly what Mr. Beck said, but I do remember he was very worried that I was going to be the only one in charge of his recording company while everyone was away on the January tour. I must have stumbled through an apology, because stunned I went downstairs, and after that bad experience I renewed procedures. The country tour went very well, program tapes came in went out, and life returned as before.
But in 1956, Channel 9 had announced they would start transmitting as Australias first television station. The Ron Beck staff saw the writing on the wall, as one by one Mr. Becks radio sponsors slowly deserted him to allocate their radio budgets, for the new medium television. The troupe planned to record their final radio shows.
One afternoon in September 1959, Mr. Beck called me to his office to explain the situation and that he'd be closing his recording company. He said he'd arranged a job interview for me with Alan Faulkner, general manager of Radio 2UE. Ron didn't ask me whether I wanted it, my boss and mentor just said he'd arranged it.
So the following Tuesday morning I arrived on the 5th floor at 29 Bligh St. and sat in the 2UE reception area, waiting for my interview.
I can't remember exactly what Mr. Beck said, but I do remember he was very worried that I was going to be the only one in charge of his recording company while everyone was away on the January tour. I must have stumbled through an apology, because stunned I went downstairs, and after that bad experience I renewed procedures. The country tour went very well, program tapes came in went out, and life returned as before.
But in 1956, Channel 9 had announced they would start transmitting as Australias first television station. The Ron Beck staff saw the writing on the wall, as one by one Mr. Becks radio sponsors slowly deserted him to allocate their radio budgets, for the new medium television. The troupe planned to record their final radio shows.
One afternoon in September 1959, Mr. Beck called me to his office to explain the situation and that he'd be closing his recording company. He said he'd arranged a job interview for me with Alan Faulkner, general manager of Radio 2UE. Ron didn't ask me whether I wanted it, my boss and mentor just said he'd arranged it.
So the following Tuesday morning I arrived on the 5th floor at 29 Bligh St. and sat in the 2UE reception area, waiting for my interview.
Part 5
My time at Ron R. Beck Recordings Pty. Ltd. had come to an end, and even now looking back over 50yrs. I'm kinda sad writing this. Funny how you really only want to remember the good times, but I can imagine the despondent mood around the offices as Ron's staff knew their time was finishing too.
I don't know details of the very last 'Stamina Show', but after broadcasting more than 500 weekly episodes, each Macquarie Network radio announcer would have routinely read out "We've just heard the last broadcast of the Stamina Show, next week at this time you'll hear ...."
The same would have been announced after the very last broadcast of the 'Ladies College of Knowledge' too. Around Australia, Ron Beck, Pat Hodgins, Alan Coad and the troupe were household names and many disappointed listeners would have called and written to them, and their local station. But radio was moving on.
Ron and Betsy Beck sold both their Surry Hills premises and their lovely Castle Hills home named 'Dunrath.' It was originally built by Francis De Groot, the man who on Saturday 19th March 1932, rode up on his horse with his sword and unofficially cut the ribbon at the opening of the Sydney Harbour bridge. I spent a weekend at Dunrath, when we were recording for the Rola stereo demo tape and using the special stereo recorder that Rola built, I recorded a table tennis match in their games room. I placed our 2 Altec Lansing mono mics at the net in a crossed pair and captured the match in the left and right channels. Ron and his son played, but it didn't feature in the Rola David Jones demo program, because after the powerful rumbling stereo sounds of the electric trains coming and going, sadly my ping pong recording didn't cut it.
But even now, recalling Mrs. Beck serving dinner on Saturday night for her family, and me, reminds me how I was treated as a member.
I don't know details of the very last 'Stamina Show', but after broadcasting more than 500 weekly episodes, each Macquarie Network radio announcer would have routinely read out "We've just heard the last broadcast of the Stamina Show, next week at this time you'll hear ...."
The same would have been announced after the very last broadcast of the 'Ladies College of Knowledge' too. Around Australia, Ron Beck, Pat Hodgins, Alan Coad and the troupe were household names and many disappointed listeners would have called and written to them, and their local station. But radio was moving on.
Ron and Betsy Beck sold both their Surry Hills premises and their lovely Castle Hills home named 'Dunrath.' It was originally built by Francis De Groot, the man who on Saturday 19th March 1932, rode up on his horse with his sword and unofficially cut the ribbon at the opening of the Sydney Harbour bridge. I spent a weekend at Dunrath, when we were recording for the Rola stereo demo tape and using the special stereo recorder that Rola built, I recorded a table tennis match in their games room. I placed our 2 Altec Lansing mono mics at the net in a crossed pair and captured the match in the left and right channels. Ron and his son played, but it didn't feature in the Rola David Jones demo program, because after the powerful rumbling stereo sounds of the electric trains coming and going, sadly my ping pong recording didn't cut it.
But even now, recalling Mrs. Beck serving dinner on Saturday night for her family, and me, reminds me how I was treated as a member.
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Here’s the advertisement that Ron Beck placed in the Australian edition of the 1959 Broadcasting and Television Yearbook. It’s interesting for a number of reasons, first is Mr. Beck had 2 companies registered, one for his radio productions and this one for other ventures, already aware that his company’s future is in television. But he doesn’t want to close off his involvement with his world class radio productions, because even though his radio sponsors have now gone over to television, all his programs are still sitting on the shelf.
And Mr. Beck knows they still have valuable earning capacity, especially in overseas markets, eg: New Zealand, Singapore and South Africa. This adv. is probably being run in those countries as well. So the radio shows continue to be advertised, along with new features for any future productions, ‘Play-Beck exclusive copyright free music.’ and ‘Music and Drama in Stereophonic Sound.’ Both these are certainly possible with the test recordings that engineer Lowell Thomas and I had conducted, but in the 1960s, radio stations broadcasting in stereo are still in the future. For me, the last 2 paragraphs are ... very sad. And that’s because as the Yearbook is published near the end of the year and corporate ads. have to be confirmed a few months earlier, Mr. Beck already understood that any new radio productions will not happen, and he’d be leaving Sydney to pursue a future in television. |
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In the early 1960s, the Becks moved to Melbourne and Mr. Beck went into TV production there. 'The Long Arm' was the program he produced as Channel 10s first Australian drama. This followed on from his police style radio shows, but it had a short run. Mr. and Mrs. Beck spent a short time in real estate, then semi-retired to Ballarat. Fred Parsons moved on to writing for more shows, including Graham Kennedys hugely popular 'In Melbourne Tonight'. And Freds daughter recently told me, her dad never retired .... after a long and illustrious career.
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Here is a great picture of Fred and Ron from Fred's wonderful book, 'A Man Called Mo' I'd say this picture is a set up because they were always having fun. Here Fred is explaining a script idea to Ron, but Mr. Beck is turning his nose up at it. In the foreground is the 'turntable in the hat box' that Lowell and I used, to play the Stamina Show fanfare for the show at the halls. The white knob at the front is its volume control.
What did I learn at Becks, well if you name any Australian city and town, I'll tell you its radio station. Hey! it's a party trick. But I'd also learned more than enough to take me to 2UE as a 19yr old panel operator, and I still have Rons reference and the Breitling watch he presented to me. |
Although I can't say for sure, I believe Mr. Beck called upon the 'old boys network' to get me that interview with Mr. Faulkner. In those days, radio was populated with gentlemen who've come through the school of hard knocks, the best of them graduating with honours. And I was about to meet another one, Mr. Ken Stone, the 2UE program manager.
2UE was then owned by the Lamb family, who also owned 2KO in Newcastle. Later they were granted the TV licence there and Ken Stone played a huge part in NBN Channel 3s development, and mine.
So on Friday 9, October 1959, I left Surry Hills to go back to work at 29 Bligh St. this time on the 4th floor at 2UE, still the oldest operating radio station in Australia. They started on 26 Jan. 1925, and like all new employees since they started broadcasting, I had to prove that I could do it too.
When I was a very young kid in Wollongong, I listened to 2WL and wondered how they managed to get the next orchestra into the studio, so quickly after the previous one finished playing. One day I figured it out ... of course! they had 2 studios! I didn't know about records or turntables, and here on my first day at 2UE I saw they had 8 turntables in their on-air studio and booth, and a total of 12 in their other 3 production studios.
And it worked like this, new 2UE panel operators 'dualled' that is, I was scheduled to work with each of the other 7 ops, while I learned the routines. We were all around the same age and I started with 8hr day shifts, watching in the on-air booth, then sitting in the booth operators chair while the 15 minute morning serials played on air. I moved out when the commercials came, watching my partner cue those discs and play them to air ... carefully noting how it was all done.
2UE was then owned by the Lamb family, who also owned 2KO in Newcastle. Later they were granted the TV licence there and Ken Stone played a huge part in NBN Channel 3s development, and mine.
So on Friday 9, October 1959, I left Surry Hills to go back to work at 29 Bligh St. this time on the 4th floor at 2UE, still the oldest operating radio station in Australia. They started on 26 Jan. 1925, and like all new employees since they started broadcasting, I had to prove that I could do it too.
When I was a very young kid in Wollongong, I listened to 2WL and wondered how they managed to get the next orchestra into the studio, so quickly after the previous one finished playing. One day I figured it out ... of course! they had 2 studios! I didn't know about records or turntables, and here on my first day at 2UE I saw they had 8 turntables in their on-air studio and booth, and a total of 12 in their other 3 production studios.
And it worked like this, new 2UE panel operators 'dualled' that is, I was scheduled to work with each of the other 7 ops, while I learned the routines. We were all around the same age and I started with 8hr day shifts, watching in the on-air booth, then sitting in the booth operators chair while the 15 minute morning serials played on air. I moved out when the commercials came, watching my partner cue those discs and play them to air ... carefully noting how it was all done.
For technical readers only, here is my sketch of the on-air booth layout with the 6 turntables, drawn on the back of my first operators Women's schedule. I drew this to take home to learn the layout. It's interesting that each of the 6 turntables had only 2 speeds. TT 1 and 8 are 10" diameter, 33&1/3 and 45rpm and TT2,3,6 and 7 are 16" 33&1/3 and 78rpm. So you had to be aware of this when more of the newer format records appeared as only 2 turntables had 45rpm speed. The Rola tape playback units are inputs 4 and 5.
All the morning serials were on 16 inch transcription discs, they played at 33/1/3 rpm, with 78 needles, tracking from inside to the outside edge, the reverse of today's LPs. They came in large paper jackets, were heavy and you had to be careful handling them. Right in front of me there was a big clock, accurate to the split second so I could play music out to the hour, finishing right at the first hourly time pip. With my Breitling and that clock I developed a sense of timing, that works to this day. (My wife will tell you otherwise of course :)
But back to the story. It's also interesting that there were no girl panel operators at 2UE at that time, nor any female staff announcers, nor any females on the sales staff. And I don't believe this was intentional, it's just the way it was in the late 1950s, today it's different of course. But the staff in the 4th floor record library and 5th floor schedules dept. were very competent young ladies, these were positions that required fast accurate typing.
There was a morning tea trolley steered around both floors by a cheerful Mrs. Scott ... and you got a biscuit.
Mondays and Thursdays at 11.30am, the feisty radio personality Andrea used to host her half hour program, 'My World with Andrea', together with Tom Jacobs and invited guests. Andrea always brought in a plate of delicious cakes for the 4th floor on-air staff, and this contributed to the wonderful morale at the station, which translated out on-air to all the listeners.
So the 6 turntables around me were all in use, and I clearly remember thinking, 'Oh boy! if I swing around in this swivel chair fast enough I could easily knock the pickup off the record playing on air, and all Sydney would hear it' At first you really watch out for that, to the amusement of the other guys.
But that's what my partner was watching for, much later when I was teaching new ops, one or two didn't make it, they eventually freaked out and froze under the pressure ... you almost had to lift them up out of the chair before they seriously screwed something up.
So things were going well, as on the 4th floor at 2UE, the electric atmosphere, the fast times, the fun and adrenaline rushes became very intoxicating.
All the morning serials were on 16 inch transcription discs, they played at 33/1/3 rpm, with 78 needles, tracking from inside to the outside edge, the reverse of today's LPs. They came in large paper jackets, were heavy and you had to be careful handling them. Right in front of me there was a big clock, accurate to the split second so I could play music out to the hour, finishing right at the first hourly time pip. With my Breitling and that clock I developed a sense of timing, that works to this day. (My wife will tell you otherwise of course :)
But back to the story. It's also interesting that there were no girl panel operators at 2UE at that time, nor any female staff announcers, nor any females on the sales staff. And I don't believe this was intentional, it's just the way it was in the late 1950s, today it's different of course. But the staff in the 4th floor record library and 5th floor schedules dept. were very competent young ladies, these were positions that required fast accurate typing.
There was a morning tea trolley steered around both floors by a cheerful Mrs. Scott ... and you got a biscuit.
Mondays and Thursdays at 11.30am, the feisty radio personality Andrea used to host her half hour program, 'My World with Andrea', together with Tom Jacobs and invited guests. Andrea always brought in a plate of delicious cakes for the 4th floor on-air staff, and this contributed to the wonderful morale at the station, which translated out on-air to all the listeners.
So the 6 turntables around me were all in use, and I clearly remember thinking, 'Oh boy! if I swing around in this swivel chair fast enough I could easily knock the pickup off the record playing on air, and all Sydney would hear it' At first you really watch out for that, to the amusement of the other guys.
But that's what my partner was watching for, much later when I was teaching new ops, one or two didn't make it, they eventually freaked out and froze under the pressure ... you almost had to lift them up out of the chair before they seriously screwed something up.
So things were going well, as on the 4th floor at 2UE, the electric atmosphere, the fast times, the fun and adrenaline rushes became very intoxicating.
Part 6
In those days 2UE was owned by the Lamb family from Newcastle, and audience ratings were the best in Sydney, especially the 5-8.30am weekday breakfast session. Gary O'Callaghan hosted this top rating program playing Top 40 discs with the operator playing 4x30 sec. ads after each disc. From 8.30 the morning duty announcer presented the recorded 'Family Chemist' program then various 15 minute serials till 11.30. On Mondays and Friday's ' My World' with the feisty Andrea and Tom Jacobs ran till noon, then 30 minute midday news. More music, then on Tues. and Thurs. 'Lunch with Ken Stone' went from 1-2pm. Afternoon music with various announcers till 4pm when Ward 'Pally' Austin, Tony Withers then Bob Rogers presented Top 40 till 6.45pm. (In July 2016 at the time of writing, after 55 years Bob is still on air presenting his programs in Sydney. I had coffee with him at a Senior Citizens function and he's as sharp as ever.)
The 15 min. zany comedy 'Yes What' was broadcast from a 16" transcription disc and if Bob ran overtime a bit, the operator knew from the duration on the disc label, that this episode was not going to finish in time before the 7pm news. Here was another surprise, I first saw the op. speed the 33 1/3 disc up by carefully placing his fingers on the label and slowly speed the disc round and round up to about 35-36rpm speed. Amazing! I knew I was going to have to do this too. The trick was to speed it up, but not so the actors voices sounded to fast ... but for how long did you have to do this?
Well that was anyone's guess, but I saw some of the very experienced operators look at the sped up disc, study the times, then say 'now that will finish in time.' And it usually did.
From 7.30 till midnight Doug Harris (then later Len London) presented the program 'Sound', playing 12" album favourites on the 2 turntables in the on air B studio. The midnight to dawn announcer did 12-5am, playing Top 40 ... then it all started over again.
The 8 staff panel ops. worked a schedule of 7 days, 2 air shifts a day, 5.00am-2pm and 2-10pm including Monday to Friday, 9-5pm in the 3 production studios. Payday was every 2nd Thursday and everyone was scheduled in, to be paid by cheque. The puzzle was, mostly there wasn't quite enough work for 8 ops on Thursdays and it was a business to keep looking busy. I was learning the ropes .. and using my sense of timing tricks that Fred Parsons taught me. At the very end of all these articles, I'll explain some.
Here I am at the AWA console in production Studio C, with 4 Commonwealth Electronics 12A turntables, each with an MBH pickup, all proudly made in Australia.
Each of the 3 UE production studios could be switched to go on air when B studio was under maintenance, but then we had only 4 turntables not 6, making the job just a tad more difficult.
Note: I'm smoking a Marlboro cigarette, we all did in those days.
In studios A,C and E we recorded disc jockey programs for the Network, Whitfords Theatre ads. for movie theatres, the daily Stock and Market reports relayed to 2GZ Orange and later, I panelled a historic drama titled 'Dynasty of Death' for Reg Hepworth Productions.
After 'dualling' for about 2 weeks, my boss Jack Pettit checked with me and next Thursday afternoon I saw my first scheduled solo shift, posted on the notice board. Next week it would be 9am-12 on-air, lunch, then production till 5pm.
This turned out to be a wonderful time to work in Australian radio, and at the top commercial station in the country.
So I worked the 7 day roster together with the other operators. There was also a location recording job to do which was 2UEs National Old Time Dance program with Jack Papworths orchestra. During my time, this was held at The Albert Palais on Parramatta Rd. Leichhardt every Friday night, and the ops. job was to operate the recording console over looking the hall, while the orchestra played for the hall full of dancers of all ages. You rarely see this any more, but I remember it was quite a scene, about 100 couples swirling around in synchronised dance time with the orchestra.
The 15 min. zany comedy 'Yes What' was broadcast from a 16" transcription disc and if Bob ran overtime a bit, the operator knew from the duration on the disc label, that this episode was not going to finish in time before the 7pm news. Here was another surprise, I first saw the op. speed the 33 1/3 disc up by carefully placing his fingers on the label and slowly speed the disc round and round up to about 35-36rpm speed. Amazing! I knew I was going to have to do this too. The trick was to speed it up, but not so the actors voices sounded to fast ... but for how long did you have to do this?
Well that was anyone's guess, but I saw some of the very experienced operators look at the sped up disc, study the times, then say 'now that will finish in time.' And it usually did.
From 7.30 till midnight Doug Harris (then later Len London) presented the program 'Sound', playing 12" album favourites on the 2 turntables in the on air B studio. The midnight to dawn announcer did 12-5am, playing Top 40 ... then it all started over again.
The 8 staff panel ops. worked a schedule of 7 days, 2 air shifts a day, 5.00am-2pm and 2-10pm including Monday to Friday, 9-5pm in the 3 production studios. Payday was every 2nd Thursday and everyone was scheduled in, to be paid by cheque. The puzzle was, mostly there wasn't quite enough work for 8 ops on Thursdays and it was a business to keep looking busy. I was learning the ropes .. and using my sense of timing tricks that Fred Parsons taught me. At the very end of all these articles, I'll explain some.
Here I am at the AWA console in production Studio C, with 4 Commonwealth Electronics 12A turntables, each with an MBH pickup, all proudly made in Australia.
Each of the 3 UE production studios could be switched to go on air when B studio was under maintenance, but then we had only 4 turntables not 6, making the job just a tad more difficult.
Note: I'm smoking a Marlboro cigarette, we all did in those days.
In studios A,C and E we recorded disc jockey programs for the Network, Whitfords Theatre ads. for movie theatres, the daily Stock and Market reports relayed to 2GZ Orange and later, I panelled a historic drama titled 'Dynasty of Death' for Reg Hepworth Productions.
After 'dualling' for about 2 weeks, my boss Jack Pettit checked with me and next Thursday afternoon I saw my first scheduled solo shift, posted on the notice board. Next week it would be 9am-12 on-air, lunch, then production till 5pm.
This turned out to be a wonderful time to work in Australian radio, and at the top commercial station in the country.
So I worked the 7 day roster together with the other operators. There was also a location recording job to do which was 2UEs National Old Time Dance program with Jack Papworths orchestra. During my time, this was held at The Albert Palais on Parramatta Rd. Leichhardt every Friday night, and the ops. job was to operate the recording console over looking the hall, while the orchestra played for the hall full of dancers of all ages. You rarely see this any more, but I remember it was quite a scene, about 100 couples swirling around in synchronised dance time with the orchestra.
Len London was the popular compere with a guest vocalist, and there was not much for me to do, we always set the AWA mics up in the same position and the orchestral balance was the same every week. The program was fed by landline and recorded back at the 2UE studios and later many tape copies were dubbed and sent out to the Major Network stations. It was broadcast on Sunday nights with excellent audience ratings around the country.
My breakfast shift was 5-9am, then 45min. for breakfast at the Green Parrot restaurant downstairs, then production till 12. This was good in summer, living at Bondi meant I could go surfing in the afternoon and I quickly developed a tan. 2UE had a taxi booked at 4.30am to deliver each breakfast operator to Bligh St. because public transport timetables weren't reliable in 1960. I got to know each taxi driver, I think they took turns with their pickups.
One near disaster occurred about June 1960. My parents went on holiday while my sister and I looked after the house. We decided to paint the bathroom as a surprise for them, bought the paint and set to it. After the first painting night, I left the bathroom door open and went to bed setting my alarm for 4am, for the cab into 2UE for the breakfast session.
About 4.30, there was a pounding on my bedroom window by my cab driver. I fell out of bed half paralysed, I had lead poisoning from the paint. I managed to wake my sister, get help for her from next door, grab my clothes and fall into the cab. When I got to 2UE, the shocked duty engineer filled me with coffee and in my pyjamas, I started the show far too busy to get dressed.
Gary O'Callahagn was supportive and told my 'paint poisoning' story on air. Immediately the phones started with callers telling me to 'hang in there the show must go on and always put a bucket of water in the room, to draw the lead out of the air.' Next day I did this and it worked! My sister recovered and my folks loved the bathroom. Of course lead in paint is now banned and a fun end to this was, at 8.30am, the library girls coming into work on the 4th floor, giggling at me in my pyjamas while making ribald and unprintable comments.
When he arrived, program manager Ken Stone who always listened in, just shook his head saying 'you'd better get dressed before Alan Faulkner sees you.' I managed to do this and finish my shift.
At 8.15 each weekday morning 'Sammy the Sparrow' arrived by his 'helicopter' to join Gary for all the kids listening. Gary was a master at doing this, always had great stories and Sammy was very popular. When I first started I was staggered to see how the panel operator 'presented' the sound of Sammys helicopter arriving. He put a rolled up piece of cardboard in the revolving blades of a 12 inch desk fan and switched on his air mic. Fading the sound of the chopper in as Gary introduced Sammy, the operator then turned the fan off, so the blades slowed down and Gary thumped his desk as the helicopter landed. A superb example of on air teamwork.
You had to see this to believe it, and later I saw groups of visitors staring through the glass window with their mouths open. The thing to do was always keep a straight face. But the 'cardboard in the fan' thing was hard to do on a very busy morning, and later, an acetate disc recording of it was made to ease our workload. Same deal, you just turned the turntable off and it slowed down and stopped, landing Sammy's chopper. Easy :)
My breakfast shift was 5-9am, then 45min. for breakfast at the Green Parrot restaurant downstairs, then production till 12. This was good in summer, living at Bondi meant I could go surfing in the afternoon and I quickly developed a tan. 2UE had a taxi booked at 4.30am to deliver each breakfast operator to Bligh St. because public transport timetables weren't reliable in 1960. I got to know each taxi driver, I think they took turns with their pickups.
One near disaster occurred about June 1960. My parents went on holiday while my sister and I looked after the house. We decided to paint the bathroom as a surprise for them, bought the paint and set to it. After the first painting night, I left the bathroom door open and went to bed setting my alarm for 4am, for the cab into 2UE for the breakfast session.
About 4.30, there was a pounding on my bedroom window by my cab driver. I fell out of bed half paralysed, I had lead poisoning from the paint. I managed to wake my sister, get help for her from next door, grab my clothes and fall into the cab. When I got to 2UE, the shocked duty engineer filled me with coffee and in my pyjamas, I started the show far too busy to get dressed.
Gary O'Callahagn was supportive and told my 'paint poisoning' story on air. Immediately the phones started with callers telling me to 'hang in there the show must go on and always put a bucket of water in the room, to draw the lead out of the air.' Next day I did this and it worked! My sister recovered and my folks loved the bathroom. Of course lead in paint is now banned and a fun end to this was, at 8.30am, the library girls coming into work on the 4th floor, giggling at me in my pyjamas while making ribald and unprintable comments.
When he arrived, program manager Ken Stone who always listened in, just shook his head saying 'you'd better get dressed before Alan Faulkner sees you.' I managed to do this and finish my shift.
At 8.15 each weekday morning 'Sammy the Sparrow' arrived by his 'helicopter' to join Gary for all the kids listening. Gary was a master at doing this, always had great stories and Sammy was very popular. When I first started I was staggered to see how the panel operator 'presented' the sound of Sammys helicopter arriving. He put a rolled up piece of cardboard in the revolving blades of a 12 inch desk fan and switched on his air mic. Fading the sound of the chopper in as Gary introduced Sammy, the operator then turned the fan off, so the blades slowed down and Gary thumped his desk as the helicopter landed. A superb example of on air teamwork.
You had to see this to believe it, and later I saw groups of visitors staring through the glass window with their mouths open. The thing to do was always keep a straight face. But the 'cardboard in the fan' thing was hard to do on a very busy morning, and later, an acetate disc recording of it was made to ease our workload. Same deal, you just turned the turntable off and it slowed down and stopped, landing Sammy's chopper. Easy :)
Part 7
Here is my first days on-air schedule, notice it's titled 'Womens' not 'Morning' probably because 2UEs morning audience was mostly housewives. Also the 'When a Girl Marries' episode is numbered 2780! and it was sponsored by the Samuel Taylor Company (Louie d'Fly to you and me, played by our dear friend, the very clever, the late actor Ross Higgins, who was always great fun to work with). The commercial track numbers on every adv. disc label had to be carefully checked while cueing it up on a turntable for broadcast, some discs had many tracks.
Broadcasting the wrong commercial meant writing an entry in the log book and a 'make good' that's a free playing of the correct one, if you could find a spot in the schedule to play it.
Just after the 10am time pips sounded each weekday morning, the duty announcer read ... '2UE the time is 10 o'clock and the Commonwealth Bank is open for business' We played 3 sets of 2UE Morse Signals from a disc, then pressed a remote button for the hourly 1 minute news headlines, read from the booth in the news room which was set up in Studio A. When I started in 1959, Studio A was still a large recording studio, where before I joined, Howard Craven had presented his 'Rumpus Room' kids program live to air at 5pm.
I gradually built up speed in, well everything. To keep up with the others who'd been there much longer, I learned to always be on time and work at least 30 mins ahead when on air, in case an adv. or the next episode of a serial was the wrong one ... or missing. At 9am each morning, the operators log book was read by the Operations manager Syd Emerton, and subsequent action taken.
On the breakfast show, you arrived at 5am, to check all your scheduled ads were in the shelves in front of you. These were put there by last nights operator just before he went home, from a trolley bin full of ads in the back of the booth. These were loaded daily, by the ladies from the sales/schedules dept. on the 5th floor.
Broadcasting the wrong commercial meant writing an entry in the log book and a 'make good' that's a free playing of the correct one, if you could find a spot in the schedule to play it.
Just after the 10am time pips sounded each weekday morning, the duty announcer read ... '2UE the time is 10 o'clock and the Commonwealth Bank is open for business' We played 3 sets of 2UE Morse Signals from a disc, then pressed a remote button for the hourly 1 minute news headlines, read from the booth in the news room which was set up in Studio A. When I started in 1959, Studio A was still a large recording studio, where before I joined, Howard Craven had presented his 'Rumpus Room' kids program live to air at 5pm.
I gradually built up speed in, well everything. To keep up with the others who'd been there much longer, I learned to always be on time and work at least 30 mins ahead when on air, in case an adv. or the next episode of a serial was the wrong one ... or missing. At 9am each morning, the operators log book was read by the Operations manager Syd Emerton, and subsequent action taken.
On the breakfast show, you arrived at 5am, to check all your scheduled ads were in the shelves in front of you. These were put there by last nights operator just before he went home, from a trolley bin full of ads in the back of the booth. These were loaded daily, by the ladies from the sales/schedules dept. on the 5th floor.
Here is a picture contributed by colleague Cliff Curll, who is sitting in the on air B booth. You can see the 6 turntables I described in Part Five, all with Sydney made MBH pickups and BSR (Birmingham Sound Recorders) belt drive turntables from the UK.
Behind him you can see the 2 shelves where we stored the adv. discs with the phone and clock in the middle. Those shelves held about 200 discs in their cardboard sleeves, and that clock ran exactly to the correct second. Much later, at 5am I used to let down the front of that console and use a toothbrush dipped in Iso-propyl alcohol, to clean the studs on the back of all the faders, those rotary volume controls, so they wouldn't make a static noise on air.
From 5.30am to 8.30 it was non stop, literally, you worked to the split second to get all the ads to air, a block of 4 after every Top40 hit. Slowly I got my 'act' together. On that swivel chair Cliff is sitting on, I wound it fully down then back up 22 turns to get my comfortable sitting height, and wore sand shoes with rubber soles to grip the floor to spin it around. The coffee percolator was in the control room, and I needed time to get in there for a cuppa. So I noted the longest Top 40 records, and studied the playlist each morning, to work out my coffee times.
Thursday late night shopping had commenced, so Thursday breakfast became the busiest session, with all the sponsors wanting their ads broadcast in their correct slot, especially in 'prime time' which was 7.30-8.30am. That's when most listeners would be having breakfast, paying more attention and thinking about their Thursday night shopping list. It still happens today, even in television.
Gary O'C. was always in top form, with ad-libs like, "The peak traffic goes in cycles .... and cars and trains and buses" And with split second timing he'd announce, "You squeeze the lemon and out come ..." followed by the 6 hourly time pips.
I always imagined the whole of Sydney smiled at those bits and working away in the booth, I did.
Behind him you can see the 2 shelves where we stored the adv. discs with the phone and clock in the middle. Those shelves held about 200 discs in their cardboard sleeves, and that clock ran exactly to the correct second. Much later, at 5am I used to let down the front of that console and use a toothbrush dipped in Iso-propyl alcohol, to clean the studs on the back of all the faders, those rotary volume controls, so they wouldn't make a static noise on air.
From 5.30am to 8.30 it was non stop, literally, you worked to the split second to get all the ads to air, a block of 4 after every Top40 hit. Slowly I got my 'act' together. On that swivel chair Cliff is sitting on, I wound it fully down then back up 22 turns to get my comfortable sitting height, and wore sand shoes with rubber soles to grip the floor to spin it around. The coffee percolator was in the control room, and I needed time to get in there for a cuppa. So I noted the longest Top 40 records, and studied the playlist each morning, to work out my coffee times.
Thursday late night shopping had commenced, so Thursday breakfast became the busiest session, with all the sponsors wanting their ads broadcast in their correct slot, especially in 'prime time' which was 7.30-8.30am. That's when most listeners would be having breakfast, paying more attention and thinking about their Thursday night shopping list. It still happens today, even in television.
Gary O'C. was always in top form, with ad-libs like, "The peak traffic goes in cycles .... and cars and trains and buses" And with split second timing he'd announce, "You squeeze the lemon and out come ..." followed by the 6 hourly time pips.
I always imagined the whole of Sydney smiled at those bits and working away in the booth, I did.
Part 8
2UE in the 1960-70s was a great place to work. There certainly was some talent and characters in the announcing staff. When I worked there, DJ Bob Rogers led the Top 40 charge, he prided himself on getting the first release of any top artist before anyone else, and he did.
Qantas pilots used to bring him the latest singles, hits direct from the USA and EMI here kept him up to date with their latest. Later when the Beatles were well on their way, EMI raced their latest hits in to Bob. These were on the Parlophone label and Bob told me he wished he still had them. Even though these original discs have been played a few times, today they would be worth a small fortune.
The late DJ Ward 'Pally' Austin was a real character, he dressed in white shirt and white jeans. One day he decided the panel operators should all wear imported Italian Bardelli shoes, from Reynolds Bros. shoe shop in bohemian Rowe Street, near Martin Place. So we all hiked off to their salon and bought these classy Italian 'Winklepickers' Remember them? £9/19/6 a pair, with sharp pointed toes, and if you didn't get exactly the right fit, they eventually hurt like blazes. Ward probably got a discount for his custom ordered white ones, part of the scene back then.
The tall Greek DJ Tony Withers, was another character. Mostly all us operators were broke just before payday, and smiling Tony was always lending each of us something to tide us over. Tony did weekdays 4-5.30pm and Saturday night, 7.30 to midnight, so he took over just as the Sat. night operator was winding down. Tony wasn't good at playing his own discs on the 2 turntables in air Studio B, so the operator took all his discs and played everything from Studio B, sometimes right out to midnight.
Tony eventually retired from Sydney, went to London changed his name to Tony Windsor and joined UK pirate radio stations. One was 'Radio Caroline' transmitting from a ship in the English Channel. We all said, "What! Tony is a terrible sailor, he'll get sea sick at the first sign of bad weather."
However Tony wasn't in good health and sadly passed away in 1985 at the age of 64. Here in Sydney we all drank a toast to TW at the Wentworth Hotel, just across from the 2UE studios in Bligh St.
The Wentworth Hotel was also where the 2UE company doctor had a surgery, and once a year, the Lamb Family paid for every staff member to have a complete medical check. Your appointment was given to you with your pay cheque. This was many years before Medicare and contributed to staff morale.
Qantas pilots used to bring him the latest singles, hits direct from the USA and EMI here kept him up to date with their latest. Later when the Beatles were well on their way, EMI raced their latest hits in to Bob. These were on the Parlophone label and Bob told me he wished he still had them. Even though these original discs have been played a few times, today they would be worth a small fortune.
The late DJ Ward 'Pally' Austin was a real character, he dressed in white shirt and white jeans. One day he decided the panel operators should all wear imported Italian Bardelli shoes, from Reynolds Bros. shoe shop in bohemian Rowe Street, near Martin Place. So we all hiked off to their salon and bought these classy Italian 'Winklepickers' Remember them? £9/19/6 a pair, with sharp pointed toes, and if you didn't get exactly the right fit, they eventually hurt like blazes. Ward probably got a discount for his custom ordered white ones, part of the scene back then.
The tall Greek DJ Tony Withers, was another character. Mostly all us operators were broke just before payday, and smiling Tony was always lending each of us something to tide us over. Tony did weekdays 4-5.30pm and Saturday night, 7.30 to midnight, so he took over just as the Sat. night operator was winding down. Tony wasn't good at playing his own discs on the 2 turntables in air Studio B, so the operator took all his discs and played everything from Studio B, sometimes right out to midnight.
Tony eventually retired from Sydney, went to London changed his name to Tony Windsor and joined UK pirate radio stations. One was 'Radio Caroline' transmitting from a ship in the English Channel. We all said, "What! Tony is a terrible sailor, he'll get sea sick at the first sign of bad weather."
However Tony wasn't in good health and sadly passed away in 1985 at the age of 64. Here in Sydney we all drank a toast to TW at the Wentworth Hotel, just across from the 2UE studios in Bligh St.
The Wentworth Hotel was also where the 2UE company doctor had a surgery, and once a year, the Lamb Family paid for every staff member to have a complete medical check. Your appointment was given to you with your pay cheque. This was many years before Medicare and contributed to staff morale.
Contributed by Ken Stone’s daughter Mrs. Jenny Denham
The management hosts the 2UE staff Christmas party held on the roof of Adyar House. I joined the company just in time for this last one here, before it moves location.
Because the Christmas radio ratings put 2UE on top again, on the left here’s happy program manager Ken Stone next to smiling announcer Murray Finlay, with other staff enjoying the party. Note they’re all wearing their identification tags, even in 1959, security is important. Murray tells me he worked at 2WG Wagga and 2TM Tamworth before joining 2UE. In late 1961, he will accept the position as nightly newsreader at the new NBN Channel 3 Newcastle, also owned by the Lamb family.
All the staff are invited so most of us 8 panel operators are here. We all take turns with a drink, some eats then running down to the 4th floor to relieve the on air op, while he comes up to enjoy the party. 30 mins. each was the timing but as the night goes on, this varies somewhat. But next year the party will move to the Killara Golf Club which has larger facilities and because there’s some stories about empty beer cans being thrown down into Bligh St.
At Killara we operators put on a funny stage show sending up the DJs. (Well we thought we were funny) This was well before Police roadside breath testing, and we all seemed to get home without any strife.
Because the Christmas radio ratings put 2UE on top again, on the left here’s happy program manager Ken Stone next to smiling announcer Murray Finlay, with other staff enjoying the party. Note they’re all wearing their identification tags, even in 1959, security is important. Murray tells me he worked at 2WG Wagga and 2TM Tamworth before joining 2UE. In late 1961, he will accept the position as nightly newsreader at the new NBN Channel 3 Newcastle, also owned by the Lamb family.
All the staff are invited so most of us 8 panel operators are here. We all take turns with a drink, some eats then running down to the 4th floor to relieve the on air op, while he comes up to enjoy the party. 30 mins. each was the timing but as the night goes on, this varies somewhat. But next year the party will move to the Killara Golf Club which has larger facilities and because there’s some stories about empty beer cans being thrown down into Bligh St.
At Killara we operators put on a funny stage show sending up the DJs. (Well we thought we were funny) This was well before Police roadside breath testing, and we all seemed to get home without any strife.
There was another job the operators did, and it was going out to Randwick race course with famous 2UE horse racing commentator Des Hoysted, to b/cast the day's racing calendar. The ops job was to test then run the gear, cue the 2UE control room when a race was about to start, cue Des with the crossover and monitor his sound levels. This one mid week race day, the wind was blowing a gale. The commentators box sat on top of a tall mast on top of the big grandstand, and to get to it, you had to climb 2 sets of steep ladders, and climb in through a trapdoor in the floor. On this day, the box was waving around in the wind, and I watched Des take it all in his stride, after my stomach settled down that is.
The late Mr. Hoysted was a gentleman of the turf. He knew every single jockeys colours from memory, and despite using a pair of binoculars, he had amazing eyesight, he could identify the jockeys on the other side of the course when I couldn't even see the horses. Another highlight was the colourful racing characters who climbed the ladders into our small box to say g'day to Des, and whisper their race tips. The box could only accommodate one at a time so between races, each one knocked on the trapdoor and I lifted it up to let him in.
These guys were straight out of Guys and Dolls, dressed in 1950s flamboyant Zoot Suits with conversation to match. It was another world.
The late Mr. Hoysted was a gentleman of the turf. He knew every single jockeys colours from memory, and despite using a pair of binoculars, he had amazing eyesight, he could identify the jockeys on the other side of the course when I couldn't even see the horses. Another highlight was the colourful racing characters who climbed the ladders into our small box to say g'day to Des, and whisper their race tips. The box could only accommodate one at a time so between races, each one knocked on the trapdoor and I lifted it up to let him in.
These guys were straight out of Guys and Dolls, dressed in 1950s flamboyant Zoot Suits with conversation to match. It was another world.
Part 9
John Laws and Bob Rogers 1961
The top DJ rivalries and occasional 'differences of opinion' are outside the scope of these articles. But I can tell you of one incident.
Bob Rogers was very proud of getting the latest hits before anyone else. He used to record the sponsored Reg. A. Baker 30 min program in 2UE Studio E, for b/cast on 2KO Newcastle. It was sent up the line to KO in advance, and a hot US artist at the time was Freddie Canon, the 'explosive' Freddie Canon.
Bob received his latest hit, immediately played it on air and included it in his next Baker program. At this stage DJ John Laws was working on 2KO, he recorded his 'Latest and Greatest' program there, and sent it down the line to 2UE for b/cast at 5.30 - 6pm, just before 'Bob Rogers at 6' which was live to air.
A few days later, we suddenly heard that same Canon hit in Lawsies show. Bob was furious, he called operator John N. and me to his office and growls, 'Laws stole that Canon disc off my Baker show tape!'
We had to agree, there was probably no other way. Bob says 'Fix it!'
So Johnny and I came up with the idea of playing the sound of a giant explosion over the start of Canons next hit, just after Bob introduced it. The idea being that if it was copied, we'd all hear the explosion.
Well Bob recorded his Baker show a few weeks later, and included Canons new hit with our explosion over it. "Here's the explosive Freddie Canon!" The record starts ... BOOOMMM!! and Freddie does his thing. Smiles all round, that was it.
A few days later, the same hit suddenly appears in Laws show, minus our big Bang! Amazing! how did he do it? We figured Laws must have spent hours reconstructing the opening, from chords later in the song, and this was in the days before computer editing. John Laws was a master at it.
He was so fast on air, at 2KO he was his own panel operator with a sense of timing, that has never left him. His background theme was 'Walkin Behind Miss Lucy' by Karl Kress, and he could actually put his hand on it, instantly stopping the 10" disc between beats, while it played on air. Like 2UE there was special rubber mats under the discs on all the turntables so we could cue discs up to about 2mm from the start of sound and let them go on air, with an open fader. Lawsie would hold the disc while he talked, then let it go on his cue, it started so quickly it didn't wow! It sure made for exciting listening for his fans.
Presentation was and still is, everything.
Bob Rogers was very proud of getting the latest hits before anyone else. He used to record the sponsored Reg. A. Baker 30 min program in 2UE Studio E, for b/cast on 2KO Newcastle. It was sent up the line to KO in advance, and a hot US artist at the time was Freddie Canon, the 'explosive' Freddie Canon.
Bob received his latest hit, immediately played it on air and included it in his next Baker program. At this stage DJ John Laws was working on 2KO, he recorded his 'Latest and Greatest' program there, and sent it down the line to 2UE for b/cast at 5.30 - 6pm, just before 'Bob Rogers at 6' which was live to air.
A few days later, we suddenly heard that same Canon hit in Lawsies show. Bob was furious, he called operator John N. and me to his office and growls, 'Laws stole that Canon disc off my Baker show tape!'
We had to agree, there was probably no other way. Bob says 'Fix it!'
So Johnny and I came up with the idea of playing the sound of a giant explosion over the start of Canons next hit, just after Bob introduced it. The idea being that if it was copied, we'd all hear the explosion.
Well Bob recorded his Baker show a few weeks later, and included Canons new hit with our explosion over it. "Here's the explosive Freddie Canon!" The record starts ... BOOOMMM!! and Freddie does his thing. Smiles all round, that was it.
A few days later, the same hit suddenly appears in Laws show, minus our big Bang! Amazing! how did he do it? We figured Laws must have spent hours reconstructing the opening, from chords later in the song, and this was in the days before computer editing. John Laws was a master at it.
He was so fast on air, at 2KO he was his own panel operator with a sense of timing, that has never left him. His background theme was 'Walkin Behind Miss Lucy' by Karl Kress, and he could actually put his hand on it, instantly stopping the 10" disc between beats, while it played on air. Like 2UE there was special rubber mats under the discs on all the turntables so we could cue discs up to about 2mm from the start of sound and let them go on air, with an open fader. Lawsie would hold the disc while he talked, then let it go on his cue, it started so quickly it didn't wow! It sure made for exciting listening for his fans.
Presentation was and still is, everything.
All pop recording artists drop into their local radio stations to record promos for the stations DJs, especially with the release of their latest single. At 2UE I’m sitting at the desk in Studio E doing promos for Bob Rogers recording the BeeGees, they’re a lot of fun to work with. Without their guitars they sing in 3 part harmony … “1-2-3- Hullooo Hulloooo Hullooooooo! we’re the BeeGees and we’re on, the Bob Rogers Shooooowww!” They sound great but their father stands right behind them and if anyone gets out of tune he swipes the offender over the back of the head with the resulting YELP!
Bob has previously told me to record everything and later, during one weekend show at ratings time, he plays a few of the blown takes without telling the boys or their father. I believe they were slightly offended by this, but Bob’s listeners love this stuff - and his ratings prove it.
Bob has previously told me to record everything and later, during one weekend show at ratings time, he plays a few of the blown takes without telling the boys or their father. I believe they were slightly offended by this, but Bob’s listeners love this stuff - and his ratings prove it.
Both John Laws and Bob Rogers have staying power, as I write this in 2016, more than 50 years later they're still going strong on Sydney radio.
The station owners back in the 1960s, the Lamb family included all the 2UE and 2KO staff in their family, and if you were scheduled to work on Xmas day, you got a Christmas lunch. I well remember sitting at the B console on air on Dec 25, it would have been 1960, with a tray on the desk in front of me, eating my Xmas turkey dinner between breaks.
Everyone on duty got one and they were delicious, delivered hot on a custom tray under a fancy tureen. They came direct from the kitchens of the 5 star Wentworth Hotel opposite the studios in Bligh St. Yum!
The station owners back in the 1960s, the Lamb family included all the 2UE and 2KO staff in their family, and if you were scheduled to work on Xmas day, you got a Christmas lunch. I well remember sitting at the B console on air on Dec 25, it would have been 1960, with a tray on the desk in front of me, eating my Xmas turkey dinner between breaks.
Everyone on duty got one and they were delicious, delivered hot on a custom tray under a fancy tureen. They came direct from the kitchens of the 5 star Wentworth Hotel opposite the studios in Bligh St. Yum!
Part 10
If you let six lively, young, creative, handsome (sic:) guys loose on Australias top radio station, even though we knew we could get into serious trouble, we did get up to some stunts.
Bob Rogers encouraged 'gimmicks' in his shows, these were very short excerpts from comedy records, Stan Freburg, Bob Newhart, Jonathan Winters and of course, the BBC Goon Show.
A short time before it was needed, a suitable 'comedy line' had to be found and cued up, and it had to relate to what Bob was talking about at the time.
So that meant we had to know every comedy routine on every record and cue it up very fast ... as well as b/cast the commercials.
Some operators were better than others at this, and that fostered friendly competition.
Bob Rogers encouraged 'gimmicks' in his shows, these were very short excerpts from comedy records, Stan Freburg, Bob Newhart, Jonathan Winters and of course, the BBC Goon Show.
A short time before it was needed, a suitable 'comedy line' had to be found and cued up, and it had to relate to what Bob was talking about at the time.
So that meant we had to know every comedy routine on every record and cue it up very fast ... as well as b/cast the commercials.
Some operators were better than others at this, and that fostered friendly competition.
But it started to get a bit out of hand, here's a 1960 staff memo from program manager Ken Stone. There must have been some management indecision about the use of 'gimmicks' because while they did contribute to 2UEs on air 'personality' the memo says we have to 'stop gimmicking' sponsors ads. Then in a handwritten penciled note at the bottom, Ken says "PS. Where sponsor requests gimmicking his recorded ads, we will permit it" And noting the added value of gimmicks in their commercials without any costs to them, some sponsors did!
When things calmed down here's another stunt we got up to, getting 'fake' copy b/cast on the station. Like today, some sponsors wanted their commercials delivered by a station personality, so these ads were either written by their advertising agency, or a 2UE copy writer.
Here's two, first written by 2UE panel operator, Chris Bearde who went on to write very successful comedy material for early television. He eventually relocated to Canada then California, to become famous for writing TV shows like Laugh In, and others.
These ads were slipped into the duty announcers schedule when he was out in the toilet ...
'Are you tired and listless? Is your memory failing you? Do you forget important details? Are your friends and family worried about you?
Then you need Brains the Wonder Head Filler! Yes regular applications of Brains the Wonder Head Filler will change your life, and your family will notice an improvement in your well being ... etc. etc.
So it looked like the real thing, we typed this ad. on 2UE script paper with a fake approval stamp and file number. The trick was to place it well down in the duty announcers schedule without him noticing, usually late at night after things settled down. I never actually saw any results but I sure heard about them.
Mostly new announcers were the target, but a few of the older ones got nearly all the way through this next one before they woke up ...
The Alcatraz Appliance Company announces a new product for this winter ... The Electric Chair! Do you feel the cold?, freeze every winter? Then this new electric chair will keep you warm, toasty and happy. Yes it's easily set up and plugged into the power and the family will immediately notice the shocked look on your face ... and so on.
Cliff Curll told me, one night 2UE personality Dick Fair came out of Studio B while his record was on air, walked up the corridor into B booth and said 'Cliffy, have you got this Alcatraz ad in your schedule?'
Dick was a bit slow.
But there was an even better episode. A regular 2UE sponsor, FJ Palmers the clothing store chain wanted to heavily advertise their new range of men's pyjamas. The BBC Goon Show comedy genius Spike Milligan was in Sydney recording his ABC radio show, The Idiot Weekly. Someone suggested we should get Mr. Milligan to come in and read the Palmer commercials in Goon Show style. Spikes agent negotiated his fee and he was booked about a week in advance.
The deal was, 2UE to write the adv. copy in Spikes style. Johnny N. and I got the job to write the ads, because we knew all the Goon Show records. We worked flat out, writing 10x30 second ads. hoping Mr. Milligan would select (read like) at least five of them.
The morning of the recording, Spike arrives on time, is ushered into Studio E, introduced to us ... and reads through our ads. We were ready to go, and to our amazement, Spike put all our ads to one side saying, 'Ok mateys let's go!' So help me, he ad-libbed all 10 ads. We were speechless, after each one Spike memorised the salient points in the next one then delivered it as one of his famous Goon Show characters. And what was just as astounding they were all just on 30secs each.
Here was another example of professional timing, Fred Parsons would have loved it.
Scheduled on air the ads were a sensation, FJ Palmers sold out of their new pyjamas in double quick time. Most of the 2UE staff thought Johnny and I had engineered the whole thing, our stocks were sky high, we thought we should ask for a raise. We didn't, but looking back we'd learnt more lessons in the art of radio.
Part 11
One morning in the corridor on the 4th floor, I clearly remember Syd Emerton the 2UE operations manager asking me, 'Do you want to consider doing permanent breakfast shifts?'
I didn't have to think twice, because that would mean no weekend work, no night shifts and I'd have every afternoon free and every night free for social events, even though I had to get out of bed each weekday at 4am., get dressed, a light breakfast and jump in the booked taxi for the 20 minute ride to Adyar House. Today when I hear or see any breakfast session hosts at work, I certainly appreciate how it regulates their whole lifestyle, especially if they have kids.
Also it meant a sort of promotion, because breakfast was a high profile session, matching the level of working with Bob Rogers, and best of all, I enjoyed it.
I didn't have to think twice, because that would mean no weekend work, no night shifts and I'd have every afternoon free and every night free for social events, even though I had to get out of bed each weekday at 4am., get dressed, a light breakfast and jump in the booked taxi for the 20 minute ride to Adyar House. Today when I hear or see any breakfast session hosts at work, I certainly appreciate how it regulates their whole lifestyle, especially if they have kids.
Also it meant a sort of promotion, because breakfast was a high profile session, matching the level of working with Bob Rogers, and best of all, I enjoyed it.
Gary O'Callaghan 2UE Breakfast Announcer
So I started working 5 weekday breakfast sessions with Gary O'Callahagn, 5am-12 noon with the cab drivers having just one address to call at for the pickup. In those days at 4.30am, it was a valuable regular fare, and eventually the drivers conducted a lottery for the booking, to avoid any conflict. The winner got the job for 2 weeks, then they ran it again.
When they eventually found out about me being 'first prize' the girls who ran a weekend chicken raffle at the Bondi Surf Club, gave me hell. I can't relate their comments, but some were very funny.
Then UE management realised the other operators needed to keep their hand in, so I worked breakfast Mon-Thurs., and on Fridays I did 9-5, on production, while the others rotated on the early shift.
But I really got down to some tight presentation, and I wondered why I was given that session, some of the other guys were just as fast. It was because I never missed a commercial break, by that I mean with nearly 200 discs on the shelves in front of you (see the pic in Part Nine) you had to be able to find each of the 4 discs needed for the next break ... and fast.
So after each break I had started shelving the discs alphabetical order, that meant with Arnotts biscuits on the far left, and Weetbix on the far right, I could clear the turntables of the last break, quickly grab the next 4 discs, maybe a promotions disc, cue them all up and maybe grab a slug of coffee, all well within the playing time of the Top 40 hit that Gary was broadcasting at the time.
It worked well, Gary was happy, the sponsors and management were happy, the cab drivers were happy and my girlfriend at the time, was also happy.
Sometimes the schedule called for live ads, copy read by Gary. If we had 2 in one block with 2 recorded ads, sometimes I'd start, sometimes Gary started. I called the shots, so I'd just say 'I'll start' or 'You start' on his talkback and we both knew what that meant. And I worked it out beforehand, sometimes my first recorded ad matched the Top40 hit that had just finished, sometimes Gary's ad did.
However a couple of unusual things happened, one morning about 7.15 Gary and I discovered the new sponsors advertising copy for a very special prime time promotion was missing from both our schedules. He said he'd seen it at the briefing, knew where it was and as the 7.30 news took 6 minutes, he figured he could dash up to the 5th floor, grab it and return in time. So soon as the news reader started, Gary took off.
Disaster! he accidentally locked himself in upstairs. To this day I don't know how he did it, but with about a minute to the end of the news, I thought, uh oh! Basil the duty engineer had raced off upstairs to find him, and I was left there with most of Sydney listening.
Nothing for it, after the newsreader signed off, I opened my mike, back announced the news said '2UE time is 23 minutes to 8' played the scheduled ad, then a Top 40 disc. Basil located Gary, he returned with the lost advertising copy and we continued the breakie without saying anything about our recent drama.
And it was like nothing unusual had actually happened, except, everyone who came into work that morning, passed by the booth and gave me the thumbs up. Everyone, Syd Emerton, Jack Pettit, Ken Stone, Mrs. Scott the tea lady and most of the library and copy dept. girls, all looked in. The staff in the Savoy theatre and the Green Parrot restaurant when I went downstairs for breakfast, even the cleaners. Then my mates, their folks and the guys and gals at the Bondi Surf Club.
But the happiest of all, would have been our new sponsor who got their special promotion under way on time, and probably never knew the trouble we went to to do it.
And if you want any real indication of how popular Gary O'Callaghan was, that was it. He hosted the top Sydney radio breakfast program for 27 years.
Part 12
The Top 40 discs in the 1960 era had two things in common, they were all monaural and they all were analogue recordings, recorded direct to magnetic tape. The band was in the studio with the singer and 2-3 minutes after they started recording, they had a finished song all complete with nothing more to be done, apart from mastering it. That's maybe adding some high frequency boost, compression, that's limiting the dynamic range and in some cases, fading the ending out.
This was standard practice and with a good engineer it took about 3 hours. In some cases it resulted in a huge world wide hit which sold millions of discs returning a lot of money. Fame and fortune resulted and in the case of the Rolling Stones, 50 years later they're still at it, one of the very few who started with analogue mono vinyl recordings, moving to stereo and onto digital CDs ... and they're still performing the same songs.
The studio recording musicians in that era were top class, unassuming guys and gals but very clever and creative, they all knew each other. They arrived on time ready to go, because anyone not ready would hold up the session and these musicians were expensive. Working with them was great fun, sometimes it was difficult to get them all together because each was in high demand, but when you did this fun came out in their music. Unlike today when it sometimes takes weeks to finish one digital song because of multitrack recording, overdubbing, piecing together various takes by new artists, indecision, special effects and remixes. Don't get me wrong, today there are wonderful recordings, it's just that here on Ian's website, I can tell you what it was like in the early days, and the great times we had.
In 1959 after 2UEs Rumpus Room with Howard Craven ended its live broadcasts from Studio A and before it was transformed into the 2UE newsroom, A was hired out for music recording sessions. My mate Cliff Curll recorded the Allen Brothers and Tommy Tychos orchestra, and one single that I did in 1960, was for Rob E. G., (Robie Porter) a B side titled 'Whiplash.' It included the sound of a stock whip 'crack' to be added in, and after auditioning all the sound effects in our library, Robies producer decided to bring in a professional from Sydney's Royal Easter Show, which was on at the time.
This friendly farmer from the outback brings in a couple of big stock whips, the largest of which we figured, would give us the best sounding 'crack.'
But the ceiling in Studio A wasn't quite high enough for someone to crack a big stock whip. We tried it sideways but he couldn't get the action right, so we figured if he was careful he could crack the whip from the overhead position. But he was so hesitant it still wasn't quite right, and with time running out, the producer says, "Ok try a big crack" and our farmer rolls up his sleeves. I started the recorder, gave him the signal and he raises the big whip. But the end of it wrapped itself around a fluorescent glass tube in a light fixture in the ceiling and he brings down the whip, and the tube, crashing down for a fantastic sounding 'crack', and the sound of glass crashing onto the studio floor. The farmer was horrified, he apologised and with us trying not to laugh I stopped the recorder and said to the producer, "We'll have to try something else"
The session finished, a studio cleaner came in, we eventually recorded our big whip crack sound effect in 2UEs Hosking Place studio and Robies 'Whiplash' got up to about 10 on the charts.
Here is the famous RCA Studio B in Nashville Tennessee, the number of famous artists who recorded in this studio in the 50s, 60s and 70s will make your head spin. Roy Orbison, The Everly Bros, Connie Francis, Chet Atkins and Elvis, who recorded over 200 songs there. All the music recorded in there in those days was mono, recorded direct to tape. They now run tours of the studio and my wife and I enjoyed our visit there. They show you the scrapes out on the parking lot wall where Dolly Parton dented her car when she was running late for a session. The studio is classed as a historic landmark and it's now used for teaching audio recording courses.
All the current Top 40 singles at the time were on 45 rpm 7" discs with an A and B side. At 2UE our 45 speed turntables were adjusted to run at about 48 rpm. This was kept under wraps and not noticeable to our listeners, I don't know of anyone complaining about it. But it meant our music sounded 'brighter' than the other stations, and we could get more advertising time, well maybe an extra 30 second spot per half hour.
I recall Bill Robbie our chief engineer being worried because the 2UE management wanted him to increase the output volume of the station transmitter by a few decibels (louder) But this would run the big transmitter valves hotter, thus shortening their useable life, and they were very expensive ... which came out of Mr. Robbies engineering budget. The management usually got what they wanted so it probably happened. I never 'dial twisted' so I don't know whether it actually did.
The idea of these 2 increases was, anyone radio 'dial twisting' or 'surfing' would hear 2UEs music slightly louder and brighter, therefore psychologically better than the competition.
This was standard practice and with a good engineer it took about 3 hours. In some cases it resulted in a huge world wide hit which sold millions of discs returning a lot of money. Fame and fortune resulted and in the case of the Rolling Stones, 50 years later they're still at it, one of the very few who started with analogue mono vinyl recordings, moving to stereo and onto digital CDs ... and they're still performing the same songs.
The studio recording musicians in that era were top class, unassuming guys and gals but very clever and creative, they all knew each other. They arrived on time ready to go, because anyone not ready would hold up the session and these musicians were expensive. Working with them was great fun, sometimes it was difficult to get them all together because each was in high demand, but when you did this fun came out in their music. Unlike today when it sometimes takes weeks to finish one digital song because of multitrack recording, overdubbing, piecing together various takes by new artists, indecision, special effects and remixes. Don't get me wrong, today there are wonderful recordings, it's just that here on Ian's website, I can tell you what it was like in the early days, and the great times we had.
In 1959 after 2UEs Rumpus Room with Howard Craven ended its live broadcasts from Studio A and before it was transformed into the 2UE newsroom, A was hired out for music recording sessions. My mate Cliff Curll recorded the Allen Brothers and Tommy Tychos orchestra, and one single that I did in 1960, was for Rob E. G., (Robie Porter) a B side titled 'Whiplash.' It included the sound of a stock whip 'crack' to be added in, and after auditioning all the sound effects in our library, Robies producer decided to bring in a professional from Sydney's Royal Easter Show, which was on at the time.
This friendly farmer from the outback brings in a couple of big stock whips, the largest of which we figured, would give us the best sounding 'crack.'
But the ceiling in Studio A wasn't quite high enough for someone to crack a big stock whip. We tried it sideways but he couldn't get the action right, so we figured if he was careful he could crack the whip from the overhead position. But he was so hesitant it still wasn't quite right, and with time running out, the producer says, "Ok try a big crack" and our farmer rolls up his sleeves. I started the recorder, gave him the signal and he raises the big whip. But the end of it wrapped itself around a fluorescent glass tube in a light fixture in the ceiling and he brings down the whip, and the tube, crashing down for a fantastic sounding 'crack', and the sound of glass crashing onto the studio floor. The farmer was horrified, he apologised and with us trying not to laugh I stopped the recorder and said to the producer, "We'll have to try something else"
The session finished, a studio cleaner came in, we eventually recorded our big whip crack sound effect in 2UEs Hosking Place studio and Robies 'Whiplash' got up to about 10 on the charts.
Here is the famous RCA Studio B in Nashville Tennessee, the number of famous artists who recorded in this studio in the 50s, 60s and 70s will make your head spin. Roy Orbison, The Everly Bros, Connie Francis, Chet Atkins and Elvis, who recorded over 200 songs there. All the music recorded in there in those days was mono, recorded direct to tape. They now run tours of the studio and my wife and I enjoyed our visit there. They show you the scrapes out on the parking lot wall where Dolly Parton dented her car when she was running late for a session. The studio is classed as a historic landmark and it's now used for teaching audio recording courses.
All the current Top 40 singles at the time were on 45 rpm 7" discs with an A and B side. At 2UE our 45 speed turntables were adjusted to run at about 48 rpm. This was kept under wraps and not noticeable to our listeners, I don't know of anyone complaining about it. But it meant our music sounded 'brighter' than the other stations, and we could get more advertising time, well maybe an extra 30 second spot per half hour.
I recall Bill Robbie our chief engineer being worried because the 2UE management wanted him to increase the output volume of the station transmitter by a few decibels (louder) But this would run the big transmitter valves hotter, thus shortening their useable life, and they were very expensive ... which came out of Mr. Robbies engineering budget. The management usually got what they wanted so it probably happened. I never 'dial twisted' so I don't know whether it actually did.
The idea of these 2 increases was, anyone radio 'dial twisting' or 'surfing' would hear 2UEs music slightly louder and brighter, therefore psychologically better than the competition.
Here is a replica of 2UEs original brass centre weights for 45rpm discs. It's attached to a plaque presented to our late 2UE program manager Ken Stone, from appreciative staff. Mr. Stone deserves a story of his own here and his dear wife Eileen asked me to deliver the eulogy at Kens funeral in 2013. It was an emotional time for all of the packed congregation who attended his service at Parramatta.
When I resigned to go to NBN 3 in Newcastle in Dec. 1961, I took the original of this brass weight because the brand new TV studios didn't have any. Each 2UE studio had a few of these weights and you could also use them to add weight to a 12" or 16" transcription disc while it was on its turntable. There were also heavier weights in case a large transcription disc was slightly warped.
During WW2 many transcription discs were thick glass based, coated with acetate, this saved aluminium for use in the war effort. The late 2UE political commentator Ormsby Wilkins once gave me a set of WW2 V (Victory) discs. These were produced in the USA for broadcast to allied troops in the Far East, they were glass based and heavy, if you handled one carelessly and dropped it, it shattered. I made a basic turntable capable of playing 16 transcriptions to hear these discs. Famous American recording artists at the time donated their services for recorded concerts, and I remember hearing Duke Ellington's Orchestra followed by Count Basies band.
Ormsby Wilkins started at 2UE in early 1963, he was a noted political newspaper journalist never having worked regularly on radio previously. He was 2UE/2KOs answer to 2GBs very popular Eric Baume.
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Here is a great caricature of Ormsby, it captures his persona to a tee and he was a great advocate for us young guns, while we were working out our next move in radio. However Ormsby had a very distinctive sound, it wasn't unpleasant but it certainly wasn't the expected radio sound and it caused some concern with management. Recently a colleague from those times, Brian Lehman and I discussed Ormsby and his work, and in early 1963, I clearly remember being rostered to work with Ormsby in Studio E, where we spent a few hours trying every mic. we had, to hear which sounded best for his voice. In the end he sounded much the same on all our mics. and Ormsby went on to produce his Ormsby Wilkins Reports, a 10 minute commentary on the days events. It was broadcast after the 7PM and 10PM news on 2UE and 2KO. |
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So in the late sixties it was all valves, no digital anything, no digital recorders, no multitrack recorders, no digital editing, no computers and no mobile phones. When you switched on a new valve audio console, as it warmed up, the aroma was intoxicating. Sometimes there would be 50-100 new valves which gave off a wonderful smell. A strong cup of coffee those valves and oh boy! you were right for the day.
Part 13
This is Part 13, I'm not superstitious and I hope you're not :) Since I started this series quite a few of the old school have called to say hello, and I've renewed contacts from those days.
At 2UE in my time there, life was great, I paneled the breakfast program which had settled into a routine.
In 1960, operator Johnny N. and I enrolled in the Film and Television Production 2 year course at the North Sydney Tech. We attended Monday and Thursday night lectures, 6-9pm. TV was in the very early stages, black and white, small screen and all valves. We enjoyed the practical studio instruction and there was all trades in the course, accountants, bank tellers, builders and of course actors, all vying to get into this new medium, television.
At 2UE in my time there, life was great, I paneled the breakfast program which had settled into a routine.
In 1960, operator Johnny N. and I enrolled in the Film and Television Production 2 year course at the North Sydney Tech. We attended Monday and Thursday night lectures, 6-9pm. TV was in the very early stages, black and white, small screen and all valves. We enjoyed the practical studio instruction and there was all trades in the course, accountants, bank tellers, builders and of course actors, all vying to get into this new medium, television.
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This photo was taken at Sydneys Mascot airport reception area in early 1961. The 2UE management team was greeting Alan Faulkner and Stewart Lamb just after they returned from the new ‘talkback radio’ fact finding trip to California. They got off the Qantas airliner and came straight into 2UE studios, and called a managers meeting.
The instant result was, I was on air when program manager Ken Stone, walked into B booth just before the 11am News and said to me, "All the serials are finished, we're playing music from now on." I'd learned to roll with the punches by that time but I was stunned. I had 2 more serials scheduled before Andreas My World program at 11.30, so Ken informed the announcer, then took the cancelled 16" transcriptions with him back to his office.
Messrs. Lamb and Faulkner obviously knew what was going to happen when they flew to the U.S.A. In California they listened to the new radio ‘talkback programs’ with listeners talking to announcers on a 7 second delay, in case the announcer wanted to cut off their conversation for some reason. Instantly messrs Lamb and Faulkner knew this was going to cause the biggest radio revolution since Australian radio started.
That morning, I was instructed to attend a managers meeting after my breakfast program shift. During that meeting I was asked to give up my early shift and produce a new afternoon program called .. Soundabout. This was the next move up for me so I did, back working weekdays, 9-5pm. From my collection, here is the newspaper adv. for the new program, Soundabout.
Messrs. Lamb and Faulkner obviously knew what was going to happen when they flew to the U.S.A. In California they listened to the new radio ‘talkback programs’ with listeners talking to announcers on a 7 second delay, in case the announcer wanted to cut off their conversation for some reason. Instantly messrs Lamb and Faulkner knew this was going to cause the biggest radio revolution since Australian radio started.
That morning, I was instructed to attend a managers meeting after my breakfast program shift. During that meeting I was asked to give up my early shift and produce a new afternoon program called .. Soundabout. This was the next move up for me so I did, back working weekdays, 9-5pm. From my collection, here is the newspaper adv. for the new program, Soundabout.
At all costs Stewart Lamb wanted to be first in Australia with this new 'talkback radio' programming and our 'Soundabout' was the forerunner of this new revolutionary format.
During that meeting I was asked to consider producing Soundabout and give up working on the breakfast session. This was the next move up for me so I did, back working weekdays, 9-5pm. Soundabout hosted by staff announcer Geoff Marshall went like this, at 12.30pm at the start of the program, Geoff asked the listeners a 'Soundabout question of the day' and invited everyone to phone in to record their comments. Today 7 seconds digital voice delay equipment is used in case the on air announcer wants to instantly delete the phone in caller from his program, for whatever reason, but in 1961 that equipment wasn’t available. So they could call a new 2UE phone number patched to a special switchboard with a switch girl, set up in sales manager Bruce Rogersons office, at the rear of the 4th floor.
I was set up in Studio C booth with a telephone and 2 Byer tape recorders, and our switch girl put each caller through to me. I had 5" rolls of tape each cut to exactly 2mins. in length. I would ask for the callers name and suburb, tell them what was going to happen, start the recorder and tell them to start their comments. I didn't interrupt them but if the caller was still talking 2 mins later, the tape ran into the white leader tape and the recording finished. I'd thank the caller, hang up, look for suitable closing remarks at the end of the tape, and erase it from there to the leader.
After filling out numbered cue sheets for Geoff and his operator, I'd record one more caller and race the tapes to B booth for broadcast between the blocks of 4 ads. Geoff repeated the 'question' then b/cast the callers comments, while I recorded more, and this went on for the duration of the program.
Before things settled down, various incidents happened. First of all, for the 'question of the day', we quickly learned to avoid politics like the plague. Some listeners would get angry at a caller they heard and phone in wanting to talk to 'that person' I had to explain what was happening, but a few really angry ones said they were going to come into the studio, have it out with that 'insane idiot' and bust me for letting them get on the wireless. So we stopped taking any political subjects altogether, and considered employing a security guard on the ground floor to vet people going up to our studios on the 4th floor.
But we could all tell Soundabout was going to be big. Another problem was, if 6 callers rang in together, the last one would have to wait about 15 minutes before they were attended to, and some either forgot what they were going to say, or had just hung up. So the 'question' had to be a good one.
And when our Soundabout program first started we weren’t always sure we had the ‘Subject of the Day’ interesting or controversial enough to encourage our listeners to ring in with their comments. One afternoon this happened and after 2 calls, they dried up. So Geoff Marshall repeated the Subject on air and I got one other call. This woman in Katoomba wasn’t happy, I realised she just wanted to talk with someone, but I followed procedure, cued her to start her comment and started the tape recorder.
But shortly after she started, she drifted off to tell me she was very unhappy and she was so depressed she was seriously thinking of ending it all. She was serious I was stunned, but still following procedure I didn’t say anything, and this encouraged her to keep talking. When her 2 minute recording tape ran out, I spent a couple of minutes trying to placate her then said I had to go and hung up.
What to do. There was no more calls but I had one ‘comment’ so I filled out the cue sheet, raced the tape to the air booth then told Geoff that this was going to be unusual and the 2 minute tape went to air. When it finished Geoff was brilliant, he said he and all our listeners commiserated with her, repeated the Lifeline phone number and went to recorded commercials.
But amazingly the woman’s sister was listening in, she recognised her sisters voice and rang us asking for Geoff, she identified herself and gave him her sisters Katoomba address. We rang the police, they immediately sent a team with an ambulance and the woman rang us back a few days later to say her sister was being cared for .. and thank you all very much. Next morning at the Soundabout production meeting with Geoff, program manager Ken Stone and I, assistant 2UE manager Des Foster came down from the 5th floor. He’d been contacted by a Sydney newspaper that wanted to do a story on Soundabout, featuring details of the woman who wanted to kill herself. This was the only time I ever talked with Des Foster and he thanked me for handling her phone call and was there anything else I could tell him about the call, that might be of interest in the newspaper story.
“Well” I said, “As her call went on I just sat there stunned, hoping she wasn’t going to pull a gun out and shoot herself on my 2 minute tape.” Geoff had a hard time stopping from laughing and Des and Ken just looked at each other and decided it’d be better if I didn’t talk with any reporters. So I didn’t.
Gradually Soundabout settled into a routine, our listeners were getting the idea and we had regular callers whom we got to know. I would ask how they were before recording them, and I learned how to settle the nervous callers down. Judy N. our clever switch girl was very busy, keeping callers on the line by telling them 'not long now'.
But one afternoon, 2UE suddenly went off the air, nothing, dead air, silence with thousands of pounds worth of advertising disappearing. And nobody knew why, the engineers flew around in a flap. Then music was played from the transmitter, and all the following day with no announcements. The announcers sat around then went home at the end of their shifts. Johnny N. and I took a little battery radio and earpiece to tech, tuned to 2UE in case programs suddenly resumed.
But nothing, just album music. Then they found out why, the audio cable to the transmitter ran from the 2UE studios in Bligh St. underground to Phillip St, where it joined 2GBs cable buried underground, and out to the transmitters at Homebush Bay. There was a new building being built next to 2GB and a bulldozer down in the vacant lot, chopped through our cable. Panic, the engineers set to repair it, but it was going to take some time.
Then the 2UE management decided we had to try doing the programs from the transmitter with an announcer, and only 2 turntables. So to produce Soundabout, Geoff Marshall and I drove out to Homebush Bay with a bunch of records in a large box, knowing we had no callers for a while.
Then the fun started. For my eulogy at program manager Ken Stones funeral service in 2013, I told the congregation what happened next ...
Ken Stone was a man for all seasons. When we got to the transmitter at Homebush Bay, the studio setup was in a small hut under the tall aerial mast in a large field. In this field there were some sheep there to keep the grass down. The hut must have been built about 1930, it was tiny, with no air conditioning and one window. After Geoff and I had been in there for a short while, it got very hot. I opened the window while a Top 40 disc was on air.
The music played out into the field and the sheep really liked it, they came and gathered around the window, bleating to the sound coming from our speaker. When the record was finishing I closed the window for Geoffs announcements. But after a while this old window frame started to fall apart, so I left it open, with the result that the sheep 'bleating' went out on air together with Geoffs stuff. During the next disc the phone rang and Ken says, "What's going on out there Black?" I says "Well Ken we've got these sheep" He says, "Yes I can hear them, the whole of Sydney can hear them, what are you going to do about it" I said "Well not much, it's very hot in here, there's no aircon, the old window frame is going to fall out and the gear is overheating as well."
Ken was a man for all seasons as I discovered many times, when he knew you were doing the best you could, he let you get on with it. He said something like "The listeners think we're broadcasting from New Zealand" and hung up. Many of our listeners rang in with funny comments, they recorded some at the studios and we broadcast them later when we resumed normal programs.
In my eulogy for Ken, at his service I suggested to the congregation that Mr. Stone was the secret of 2UEs top Sydney radio ratings. It went like this, Ken managed the programs and his record library girls did a superb job with their music programming. The announcers had great programs to work with so they were happy. The 2UE listeners were happy and bought the sponsors products, the sponsors were happy and told the 2UE management, they were happy and told Ken who told the staff. And around it went, starting each day with the breakfast program.
During that meeting I was asked to consider producing Soundabout and give up working on the breakfast session. This was the next move up for me so I did, back working weekdays, 9-5pm. Soundabout hosted by staff announcer Geoff Marshall went like this, at 12.30pm at the start of the program, Geoff asked the listeners a 'Soundabout question of the day' and invited everyone to phone in to record their comments. Today 7 seconds digital voice delay equipment is used in case the on air announcer wants to instantly delete the phone in caller from his program, for whatever reason, but in 1961 that equipment wasn’t available. So they could call a new 2UE phone number patched to a special switchboard with a switch girl, set up in sales manager Bruce Rogersons office, at the rear of the 4th floor.
I was set up in Studio C booth with a telephone and 2 Byer tape recorders, and our switch girl put each caller through to me. I had 5" rolls of tape each cut to exactly 2mins. in length. I would ask for the callers name and suburb, tell them what was going to happen, start the recorder and tell them to start their comments. I didn't interrupt them but if the caller was still talking 2 mins later, the tape ran into the white leader tape and the recording finished. I'd thank the caller, hang up, look for suitable closing remarks at the end of the tape, and erase it from there to the leader.
After filling out numbered cue sheets for Geoff and his operator, I'd record one more caller and race the tapes to B booth for broadcast between the blocks of 4 ads. Geoff repeated the 'question' then b/cast the callers comments, while I recorded more, and this went on for the duration of the program.
Before things settled down, various incidents happened. First of all, for the 'question of the day', we quickly learned to avoid politics like the plague. Some listeners would get angry at a caller they heard and phone in wanting to talk to 'that person' I had to explain what was happening, but a few really angry ones said they were going to come into the studio, have it out with that 'insane idiot' and bust me for letting them get on the wireless. So we stopped taking any political subjects altogether, and considered employing a security guard on the ground floor to vet people going up to our studios on the 4th floor.
But we could all tell Soundabout was going to be big. Another problem was, if 6 callers rang in together, the last one would have to wait about 15 minutes before they were attended to, and some either forgot what they were going to say, or had just hung up. So the 'question' had to be a good one.
And when our Soundabout program first started we weren’t always sure we had the ‘Subject of the Day’ interesting or controversial enough to encourage our listeners to ring in with their comments. One afternoon this happened and after 2 calls, they dried up. So Geoff Marshall repeated the Subject on air and I got one other call. This woman in Katoomba wasn’t happy, I realised she just wanted to talk with someone, but I followed procedure, cued her to start her comment and started the tape recorder.
But shortly after she started, she drifted off to tell me she was very unhappy and she was so depressed she was seriously thinking of ending it all. She was serious I was stunned, but still following procedure I didn’t say anything, and this encouraged her to keep talking. When her 2 minute recording tape ran out, I spent a couple of minutes trying to placate her then said I had to go and hung up.
What to do. There was no more calls but I had one ‘comment’ so I filled out the cue sheet, raced the tape to the air booth then told Geoff that this was going to be unusual and the 2 minute tape went to air. When it finished Geoff was brilliant, he said he and all our listeners commiserated with her, repeated the Lifeline phone number and went to recorded commercials.
But amazingly the woman’s sister was listening in, she recognised her sisters voice and rang us asking for Geoff, she identified herself and gave him her sisters Katoomba address. We rang the police, they immediately sent a team with an ambulance and the woman rang us back a few days later to say her sister was being cared for .. and thank you all very much. Next morning at the Soundabout production meeting with Geoff, program manager Ken Stone and I, assistant 2UE manager Des Foster came down from the 5th floor. He’d been contacted by a Sydney newspaper that wanted to do a story on Soundabout, featuring details of the woman who wanted to kill herself. This was the only time I ever talked with Des Foster and he thanked me for handling her phone call and was there anything else I could tell him about the call, that might be of interest in the newspaper story.
“Well” I said, “As her call went on I just sat there stunned, hoping she wasn’t going to pull a gun out and shoot herself on my 2 minute tape.” Geoff had a hard time stopping from laughing and Des and Ken just looked at each other and decided it’d be better if I didn’t talk with any reporters. So I didn’t.
Gradually Soundabout settled into a routine, our listeners were getting the idea and we had regular callers whom we got to know. I would ask how they were before recording them, and I learned how to settle the nervous callers down. Judy N. our clever switch girl was very busy, keeping callers on the line by telling them 'not long now'.
But one afternoon, 2UE suddenly went off the air, nothing, dead air, silence with thousands of pounds worth of advertising disappearing. And nobody knew why, the engineers flew around in a flap. Then music was played from the transmitter, and all the following day with no announcements. The announcers sat around then went home at the end of their shifts. Johnny N. and I took a little battery radio and earpiece to tech, tuned to 2UE in case programs suddenly resumed.
But nothing, just album music. Then they found out why, the audio cable to the transmitter ran from the 2UE studios in Bligh St. underground to Phillip St, where it joined 2GBs cable buried underground, and out to the transmitters at Homebush Bay. There was a new building being built next to 2GB and a bulldozer down in the vacant lot, chopped through our cable. Panic, the engineers set to repair it, but it was going to take some time.
Then the 2UE management decided we had to try doing the programs from the transmitter with an announcer, and only 2 turntables. So to produce Soundabout, Geoff Marshall and I drove out to Homebush Bay with a bunch of records in a large box, knowing we had no callers for a while.
Then the fun started. For my eulogy at program manager Ken Stones funeral service in 2013, I told the congregation what happened next ...
Ken Stone was a man for all seasons. When we got to the transmitter at Homebush Bay, the studio setup was in a small hut under the tall aerial mast in a large field. In this field there were some sheep there to keep the grass down. The hut must have been built about 1930, it was tiny, with no air conditioning and one window. After Geoff and I had been in there for a short while, it got very hot. I opened the window while a Top 40 disc was on air.
The music played out into the field and the sheep really liked it, they came and gathered around the window, bleating to the sound coming from our speaker. When the record was finishing I closed the window for Geoffs announcements. But after a while this old window frame started to fall apart, so I left it open, with the result that the sheep 'bleating' went out on air together with Geoffs stuff. During the next disc the phone rang and Ken says, "What's going on out there Black?" I says "Well Ken we've got these sheep" He says, "Yes I can hear them, the whole of Sydney can hear them, what are you going to do about it" I said "Well not much, it's very hot in here, there's no aircon, the old window frame is going to fall out and the gear is overheating as well."
Ken was a man for all seasons as I discovered many times, when he knew you were doing the best you could, he let you get on with it. He said something like "The listeners think we're broadcasting from New Zealand" and hung up. Many of our listeners rang in with funny comments, they recorded some at the studios and we broadcast them later when we resumed normal programs.
In my eulogy for Ken, at his service I suggested to the congregation that Mr. Stone was the secret of 2UEs top Sydney radio ratings. It went like this, Ken managed the programs and his record library girls did a superb job with their music programming. The announcers had great programs to work with so they were happy. The 2UE listeners were happy and bought the sponsors products, the sponsors were happy and told the 2UE management, they were happy and told Ken who told the staff. And around it went, starting each day with the breakfast program.
Part 14
Thanks to everyone who's enjoying reading these parts, and taken the trouble to contact us with their recollections.
Recently while attending a country wedding, my wife and I stayed in an old guesthouse in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney. In the corner of the lounge room there was an old valve radio set, and for many of our elderly readers, this is still referred to as the 'the wireless.' It bought back memories for me, as this was very similar to the set I listened to as a boy in Wollongong, south of Sydney.
This old valve wireless set was made in Sydney and I looked up the history of the company who made it. Lekmek (1931-1940) was based in William St. Sydney and produced a number of sets and equipment for sale. They had Bakelite fittings, octagonal knobs and frames for the dial using this early type of plastic, which was made from dangerous substances.
Back to the story. Our Soundabout program was becoming increasingly popular with 2UE afternoon listeners. The attraction was, without too much trouble they could hear themselves on radio, recorded on their telephone from their living room. And some callers became very good at it, concise, interesting and above all, entertaining.
One interesting point was, there was not much music played in our program, no Top 40 being played on Sydneys top Top 40 station. The Soundabout newspaper adv. in Part 13 says 'The worlds best loved music' but we didn't plan to play any, an indication that even in the early 1960s radio program formats could change daily. Television was here.
We'd broadcast 2 to 4 listeners comments then up to 4 x 30sec. ads, then more comments. If you heard music, that meant we'd run out of people phoning in, and late in the afternoon this did happen.
So we modified the format, to announce a new 'topic' or 'question' every 2 hours, just after the hourly news, so busy listeners knew when to tune in. Then we changed it again because with some topics, which might be less popular, we'd soon run out of callers. So host Geoff Marshall and I developed a system where I could signal him from Studio C, when I realised we needed more callers, he'd then introduce a new topic.
And this worked, we were developing today's 'talkback radio' format where people can call in with any comments on anything, and the on air personality and his team decide if it's going to be popular with their listeners. Today, listeners call from their mobile phones, cars, boats, from anywhere.
And in 1961, 2UEs Soundabout developed in other areas, introducing community related subjects.
Recently while attending a country wedding, my wife and I stayed in an old guesthouse in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney. In the corner of the lounge room there was an old valve radio set, and for many of our elderly readers, this is still referred to as the 'the wireless.' It bought back memories for me, as this was very similar to the set I listened to as a boy in Wollongong, south of Sydney.
This old valve wireless set was made in Sydney and I looked up the history of the company who made it. Lekmek (1931-1940) was based in William St. Sydney and produced a number of sets and equipment for sale. They had Bakelite fittings, octagonal knobs and frames for the dial using this early type of plastic, which was made from dangerous substances.
Back to the story. Our Soundabout program was becoming increasingly popular with 2UE afternoon listeners. The attraction was, without too much trouble they could hear themselves on radio, recorded on their telephone from their living room. And some callers became very good at it, concise, interesting and above all, entertaining.
One interesting point was, there was not much music played in our program, no Top 40 being played on Sydneys top Top 40 station. The Soundabout newspaper adv. in Part 13 says 'The worlds best loved music' but we didn't plan to play any, an indication that even in the early 1960s radio program formats could change daily. Television was here.
We'd broadcast 2 to 4 listeners comments then up to 4 x 30sec. ads, then more comments. If you heard music, that meant we'd run out of people phoning in, and late in the afternoon this did happen.
So we modified the format, to announce a new 'topic' or 'question' every 2 hours, just after the hourly news, so busy listeners knew when to tune in. Then we changed it again because with some topics, which might be less popular, we'd soon run out of callers. So host Geoff Marshall and I developed a system where I could signal him from Studio C, when I realised we needed more callers, he'd then introduce a new topic.
And this worked, we were developing today's 'talkback radio' format where people can call in with any comments on anything, and the on air personality and his team decide if it's going to be popular with their listeners. Today, listeners call from their mobile phones, cars, boats, from anywhere.
And in 1961, 2UEs Soundabout developed in other areas, introducing community related subjects.
From my collection, here is a memo from our busy Operations Manager, Syd Emerton. The advertised personality or specialist arrived in the studio to introduce his or her subject, I took callers, we broadcast their taped comments and questions, which were then answered live. I learned to ask each caller what their comment or question was before I recorded it, so we didn't repeat questions. It was hard work, I had to remember what questions were already asked before each caller started recording. We considered employing a secretary as some callers who'd waited for some time to be recorded, were then told their question had been answered earlier, they weren't listening to their radio while they waited.
Then it all started to change again. In May 1961, 2UE program manager Ken Stone resigned, to relocate his family to Newcastle, 160kms, (100 miles) north of Sydney. Ken had joined NBN Channel 3, which was then in the process of building their new television station there, before commencing regular transmission.
The Lamb family who owned 2UE and 2KO in Newcastle, was granted the licence for NBN, which is the first regional television station in Australia. Ken had taken up the position of Operations Manager, and at 2UE, we were all sad to see him go.
Then it all started to change again. In May 1961, 2UE program manager Ken Stone resigned, to relocate his family to Newcastle, 160kms, (100 miles) north of Sydney. Ken had joined NBN Channel 3, which was then in the process of building their new television station there, before commencing regular transmission.
The Lamb family who owned 2UE and 2KO in Newcastle, was granted the licence for NBN, which is the first regional television station in Australia. Ken had taken up the position of Operations Manager, and at 2UE, we were all sad to see him go.
Part 15
The new program manager arrived from Newcastle and Ron Hurst took up duties, settling in to Kens office.
I continued to work 9-5, coping with the Sydney peak hour traffic which even 55yrs ago was awful. I did miss my early morning cab ride to do the breakfast program, especially when it was paid for by the company, and the early afternoon bus ride home to Bondi, riding on the sunny top deck while chatting to the ticket conductress.
From 9-12 noon, I did production and preparation for Soundabout, which I looked forward to.
It was teaching me, what new 'talkback' programming appealed to a radio listening audience, when to change the direction of a program, when to follow up with a new subject based on the number of calls, and how to do it fast as possible. In that respect it was similar to the breakfast program, be prepared, make quick decisions and get it right every time.
The adrenaline generated by the brekkie program was still there, the next Soundabout listener phone call could be someone in need of help.
All the while Johnny N. and I continued with our after hours Film and TV course at the North Sydney Tech. One night in early October 1961, before the lectures started, the class was addressed by an American, Joe Clark. He was with the new WIN 4 television station based in Wollongong south of Sydney where I was born.
Joe was looking for production staff to be trained before their new station went on air, next March 18. He cleverly painted the idea of an exciting career in television while passing out job applications to the class.
The brand new industry of Australian regional television was starting up and we were being invited to step in on the ground floor, all of us in the course, starting to learn the practical steps in production, for an analogue valve, black and white television station with monaural sound.
Then shortly after that, at 2UE I got a phone call from Ken Stone in Newcastle. Ken was offering similar positions to Joe Clark, at the new NBN Channel 3. He didn't say much, just an invitation to drive up and see the new studios being built and talk about a job there. Of course the big difference from WIN 4 was, Channel 3 was owned by the Lamb family who owned 2UE. I don't know whether Ken had heard about Joe Clarks proposal but it didn't matter, Ch.3 also wanted production staff and Ken knew where to get his audio operators, and hedging his bets he invited three of us from 2UE.
So early one Sunday morning in late 1961, Johnny N. Robert D. and myself drove in Johns old Morris Minor, the 4 hour drive up the old highway to Newcastle. It was a slow trip and although I had my licence John drove, he was stuffed when we got there, and forgot most of the questions we'd agreed to ask Ken, except ... how much.
First we met Reg Davis from 2KO in his Simca, at our agreed meeting place, the Broadmeadows fire station and followed him to see the progress of the NBN studios being built. It was a surprise because only the big steel frame of the building was up, and we were told the official opening date was March 4, 1962, just a few months away. We all had lunch at the Delany hotel with Ken, he explained the situation then we drove back to Sydney on Sunday night in the weekend traffic, each of us with our own thoughts.
One thing was clear, NBN3 was going to be bigger than WIN4, and with a larger main studio probably more live studio programming.
The following week at 2UE there wasn't much discussion, the other 2 guys had decided to stay in Sydney, but I called Ken and we talked about the job, who the staff might be and, living in Newcastle. For me it would mean leaving my family, friends and my girlfriend at the time. While a couple of my mates had gone to live and work in Europe, my big jump would be, 100 miles up the New South Wales coast.
I continued to work 9-5, coping with the Sydney peak hour traffic which even 55yrs ago was awful. I did miss my early morning cab ride to do the breakfast program, especially when it was paid for by the company, and the early afternoon bus ride home to Bondi, riding on the sunny top deck while chatting to the ticket conductress.
From 9-12 noon, I did production and preparation for Soundabout, which I looked forward to.
It was teaching me, what new 'talkback' programming appealed to a radio listening audience, when to change the direction of a program, when to follow up with a new subject based on the number of calls, and how to do it fast as possible. In that respect it was similar to the breakfast program, be prepared, make quick decisions and get it right every time.
The adrenaline generated by the brekkie program was still there, the next Soundabout listener phone call could be someone in need of help.
All the while Johnny N. and I continued with our after hours Film and TV course at the North Sydney Tech. One night in early October 1961, before the lectures started, the class was addressed by an American, Joe Clark. He was with the new WIN 4 television station based in Wollongong south of Sydney where I was born.
Joe was looking for production staff to be trained before their new station went on air, next March 18. He cleverly painted the idea of an exciting career in television while passing out job applications to the class.
The brand new industry of Australian regional television was starting up and we were being invited to step in on the ground floor, all of us in the course, starting to learn the practical steps in production, for an analogue valve, black and white television station with monaural sound.
Then shortly after that, at 2UE I got a phone call from Ken Stone in Newcastle. Ken was offering similar positions to Joe Clark, at the new NBN Channel 3. He didn't say much, just an invitation to drive up and see the new studios being built and talk about a job there. Of course the big difference from WIN 4 was, Channel 3 was owned by the Lamb family who owned 2UE. I don't know whether Ken had heard about Joe Clarks proposal but it didn't matter, Ch.3 also wanted production staff and Ken knew where to get his audio operators, and hedging his bets he invited three of us from 2UE.
So early one Sunday morning in late 1961, Johnny N. Robert D. and myself drove in Johns old Morris Minor, the 4 hour drive up the old highway to Newcastle. It was a slow trip and although I had my licence John drove, he was stuffed when we got there, and forgot most of the questions we'd agreed to ask Ken, except ... how much.
First we met Reg Davis from 2KO in his Simca, at our agreed meeting place, the Broadmeadows fire station and followed him to see the progress of the NBN studios being built. It was a surprise because only the big steel frame of the building was up, and we were told the official opening date was March 4, 1962, just a few months away. We all had lunch at the Delany hotel with Ken, he explained the situation then we drove back to Sydney on Sunday night in the weekend traffic, each of us with our own thoughts.
One thing was clear, NBN3 was going to be bigger than WIN4, and with a larger main studio probably more live studio programming.
The following week at 2UE there wasn't much discussion, the other 2 guys had decided to stay in Sydney, but I called Ken and we talked about the job, who the staff might be and, living in Newcastle. For me it would mean leaving my family, friends and my girlfriend at the time. While a couple of my mates had gone to live and work in Europe, my big jump would be, 100 miles up the New South Wales coast.
But I knew one thing, if Ken Stone thought it would be a good move it would be. So here is my resignation from 2UE. And a feature of joining NBN which would prove invaluable later, this was like a transfer to a different department of the same company.
So after posting a reply to Joe Clark, on Friday afternoon, Dec. 29th 1961, I said farewell to my friends at 2UE. I remember one young lady from schedules cried, her friend took me aside and said she had a crush and I never realised, how naive. How does the saying go, 'Youth, what a pity it's wasted on the young.'
That afternoon, a few of us had a drink across at the Wentworth Hotel and to my surprise, operations manager Syd. Emerton joined us. Serious Syd. was about 50 and had joined 2UE from a country station. The 'Operations Manager' was a newly created position and Syd. shook up the 4th floor with some of his changes. But I thought I recognised that he was a nice guy at heart, I respected him, he understood the job I was doing and we got on well. Again to my surprise, that afternoon he told us all a very funny off colour joke, I still remember it, but sorry, this is a general exhibition site and I can't tell it here.
So on Jan. 5th, after a sad goodbye to my girlfriend at Central Railway station, with a suitcase full of clothes, I boarded the Newcastle Flyer for the journey I was to take a few times over the coming year.
So after posting a reply to Joe Clark, on Friday afternoon, Dec. 29th 1961, I said farewell to my friends at 2UE. I remember one young lady from schedules cried, her friend took me aside and said she had a crush and I never realised, how naive. How does the saying go, 'Youth, what a pity it's wasted on the young.'
That afternoon, a few of us had a drink across at the Wentworth Hotel and to my surprise, operations manager Syd. Emerton joined us. Serious Syd. was about 50 and had joined 2UE from a country station. The 'Operations Manager' was a newly created position and Syd. shook up the 4th floor with some of his changes. But I thought I recognised that he was a nice guy at heart, I respected him, he understood the job I was doing and we got on well. Again to my surprise, that afternoon he told us all a very funny off colour joke, I still remember it, but sorry, this is a general exhibition site and I can't tell it here.
So on Jan. 5th, after a sad goodbye to my girlfriend at Central Railway station, with a suitcase full of clothes, I boarded the Newcastle Flyer for the journey I was to take a few times over the coming year.
Part 16, Life at NBN Channel 3 commences.
IMPORTANT NOTE
[ I would like to thank Australian author Johanna Nicholls, the copyright holder of all her father Fred Parsons's material, for her kind permission to include photographs from his definitive biography of Roy Rene, A MAN CALLED MO. Johanna is in the process of publishing an updated edition of this book with additional material that her father asked her to include in future editions - including her perspective as a child of his celebrated career.]
[ I would like to thank Australian author Johanna Nicholls, the copyright holder of all her father Fred Parsons's material, for her kind permission to include photographs from his definitive biography of Roy Rene, A MAN CALLED MO. Johanna is in the process of publishing an updated edition of this book with additional material that her father asked her to include in future editions - including her perspective as a child of his celebrated career.]
Readers Questions
Allan Black has agreed to answer readers questions and I will be including them at the bottom of the page in this section That way you can read the various parts together as a single article without the interruption of the questions posed by others.
The first question is mine. I find the idea of community singing to be unusual, so I asked Allan for more detail and this is his reply.
Australian community singing started in early variety theatres and gained popularity in WW1. In country towns people would gather in town centres to keep local morale up. It carried over in WW2, was broadcast by local radio stations, and it's still popular in some areas, if you do a search on the web.
For the Stamina Show, compere Alan Coad had community hall audiences sing 3 or 4 songs, before recording commenced. He led the singing and could judge how the mostly women, were responding. If it was a very cold winters day, people wore big coats and these soaked up the sound in the hall. Alan had a good routine for this, Eg: "C'mon ladies, take your hats off, turn down your collars and let's hear you!" And to get their enthusiastic loud applause, "C'mon take your gloves off and try it once again!" encouraging them to sound louder each time.
Jim Tregonning would stand alongside Alan to whoop the ladies up and get them excited for the show. Once Alan and Jim were happy, the days recording started.
Mr CN asked what Actor Ken Wayne was like, and Allan replied:
The actor Ken Wayne, 1925-1993, despite his gruff voice was a real gentleman, early radio actors all were. I remember Mr. Wayne wore a custom sports coat and bow tie, taking his coat off to work at the microphone. In those days radio acting was a very prestigious industry and early actors were always well dressed, they never knew when a publicity photo opportunity might present itself.
A few years later when I was at 2UE, the evening announcers mostly wore a dress suit and black tie to work.
18yr old Grahame from Sydney asks, "How did actors get their start in radio drama acting?
Allan replies: 'Back in the early days, radio really took off in Australia, many broadcasting licences were granted and local personalities appeared regularly. Local theatre companies performed short plays on radio, and in major cities stage plays were adapted for national radio. These attracted stage actors and as their voice became recognised, some started private acting and voice production schools, a regular income when they weren't performing. I remember when NIDA started voice classes for their acting students, aimed at getting work reading commercials, also bringing them in an income. Before he became famous, actor Russell Crowe regularly came to our Sydney studios, booked to read radio and TV commercial scripts.'
Mr. Cooper of Sydney asks, "Hello Allan, you seem to be able to recall a lot of memories, times and dates from your career. How are you able to do this?"
Allan replies: Mr. Cooper, it's not as easy as it seems, but I have a lot of written material from those days, including many staff memos from 2UE management. I'm fortunate in having contacts from the 60s-70s, and as this series has progressed, many have come on board to assist. Even so, each Part takes about 4-5 weeks from first draft, through additions and revisions to final.
One thing leads to another and gradually things fall into place. If anyone reading this has any info and photographs, we'd be pleased to hear from you. Thanks.
Australian community singing started in early variety theatres and gained popularity in WW1. In country towns people would gather in town centres to keep local morale up. It carried over in WW2, was broadcast by local radio stations, and it's still popular in some areas, if you do a search on the web.
For the Stamina Show, compere Alan Coad had community hall audiences sing 3 or 4 songs, before recording commenced. He led the singing and could judge how the mostly women, were responding. If it was a very cold winters day, people wore big coats and these soaked up the sound in the hall. Alan had a good routine for this, Eg: "C'mon ladies, take your hats off, turn down your collars and let's hear you!" And to get their enthusiastic loud applause, "C'mon take your gloves off and try it once again!" encouraging them to sound louder each time.
Jim Tregonning would stand alongside Alan to whoop the ladies up and get them excited for the show. Once Alan and Jim were happy, the days recording started.
Mr CN asked what Actor Ken Wayne was like, and Allan replied:
The actor Ken Wayne, 1925-1993, despite his gruff voice was a real gentleman, early radio actors all were. I remember Mr. Wayne wore a custom sports coat and bow tie, taking his coat off to work at the microphone. In those days radio acting was a very prestigious industry and early actors were always well dressed, they never knew when a publicity photo opportunity might present itself.
A few years later when I was at 2UE, the evening announcers mostly wore a dress suit and black tie to work.
18yr old Grahame from Sydney asks, "How did actors get their start in radio drama acting?
Allan replies: 'Back in the early days, radio really took off in Australia, many broadcasting licences were granted and local personalities appeared regularly. Local theatre companies performed short plays on radio, and in major cities stage plays were adapted for national radio. These attracted stage actors and as their voice became recognised, some started private acting and voice production schools, a regular income when they weren't performing. I remember when NIDA started voice classes for their acting students, aimed at getting work reading commercials, also bringing them in an income. Before he became famous, actor Russell Crowe regularly came to our Sydney studios, booked to read radio and TV commercial scripts.'
Mr. Cooper of Sydney asks, "Hello Allan, you seem to be able to recall a lot of memories, times and dates from your career. How are you able to do this?"
Allan replies: Mr. Cooper, it's not as easy as it seems, but I have a lot of written material from those days, including many staff memos from 2UE management. I'm fortunate in having contacts from the 60s-70s, and as this series has progressed, many have come on board to assist. Even so, each Part takes about 4-5 weeks from first draft, through additions and revisions to final.
One thing leads to another and gradually things fall into place. If anyone reading this has any info and photographs, we'd be pleased to hear from you. Thanks.