''Little Orphan Annie'' is an American radio drama series based on the popularity of the comic strip '' Little Orphan Annie''. It debuted on Chicago's WGN in 1930, then moved to the NBC radio network Blue Network on April 6, 1931. It aired until April 26, 1942. Together with '' Skippy'' (1932–1935) it is seen as the oldest US children's radio program. Radio historian

Jim Harmon James Judson Harmon (21 April 1933 – 16 February 2010), better known as Jim Harmon, was an American short story author and popular culture historian who wrote extensively about the Golden Age of Radio. He sometimes used the pseudonym Judson Grey ...

attributes the show's popularity in ''The Great Radio Heroes'' to the fact that it was the only radio show to deal with and appeal to young children.

Concept

Ovaltine Cup - Little Orphan Annie and her dog Sandy

''Little Orphan Annie'' was based on

Harold Gray Harold Lincoln Gray (January 20, 1894 – May 9, 1968) was an American cartoonist, best known as the creator of the newspaper comic strip ''Little Orphan Annie''. Early life Harold Gray was born in Kankakee, Illinois on January 20, 1894, to Este ...

's eponymous and equally popular comic strip series '' Little Orphan Annie''. The show debuted on WGN/Chicago in 1930, but only became a national hit when it moved to NBC radio's Blue Network in 1931. It was broadcast in the late afternoon and ran for twelve successful years. In 1931, when the show debuted, radio had yet to establish coast-to-coast networks so two separate casts performed—one in San Francisco starring Floy Margaret Hughes and the other in Chicago starring Shirley Bell as Annie, Stanley Andrews as "Daddy", and Allan Baruck (and later Mel Tormé) as Joe Corntassel. When coast to coast networking was established in 1933, the Chicago cast became the permanent one.

Merchandising

The show was initially sponsored by

Ovaltine Ovaltine (also known by its original name Ovomaltine) is a brand of milk flavoring product made with malt extract (except in the blue packaging in the United States), sugar (except in Switzerland), and whey. Some flavors also have cocoa. Ovalt ...

, a flavored milk supplement, and its scripts were written by Ovaltine's Chicago ad agency staff. They shunned the overt political themes of Gray's newspaper strips and concentrated instead on pitching Ovaltine, using almost seven minutes of each broadcast to do so. Fans could redeem Ovaltine proofs of purchase for a secret decoder badge that decoded brief messages airing in the last moments of the show. Contrary to

Jean Shepherd Jean Parker 'Shep' Shepherd Jr. (~July 21, 1921 – October 16, 1999) was an American storyteller, humorist, radio and TV personality, writer, and actor. With a career that spanned decades, Shepherd is known for the film ''A Christmas Story'' ...

's assertions, the messages were never advertisements for Ovaltine, but were usually related to the following episode. In 1940, Quaker

Puffed Wheat Puffed grains are grains that have been expanded ("puffed") through processing. They have been made for centuries with the simplest methods like popping popcorn. Modern puffed grains are often created using high temperature, pressure, or extrusi ...

Sparkies became the show's sponsor and brought fictional aviator Captain Sparks to the show. Sparks eventually became the star, relegating Annie to secondary player. The show featured product placement and exploitation of

premium Premium may refer to: Marketing * Premium (marketing), a promotional item that can be received for a small fee when redeeming proofs of purchase that come with or on retail products * Premium segment, high-price brands or services in marketing, ...

s to retain and attract new listeners. Among those items were secret decoders, shake-up mugs for drinking

(the show's sponsor product) and

secret decoder ring A secret decoder ring (or secret decoder) is a device that allows one to decode a simple substitution cipher—or to encrypt a message by working in the opposite direction. As inexpensive toys, secret decoders have often been used as promotional ...

s for the Little Orphan Annie secret society.CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT AND DECODER RINGS
Stephen A. Kallis, Jr. The 1934 fan club's member's handbook included a simple substitution cipher with a resulting numeric cipher text. This was followed the next year with a membership badge or pin that included a cipher disk - enciphering the letters A-Z to numbers 1-26. Announcer Pierre Andre often talked about the virtues of the shows' products, sometimes stretching towards three minutes in length.

Cast

* Annie -

Shirley Bell Cole Shirley Adrienne Bell Cole (February 21, 1920 (another source says 1921DeLong, Thomas A. (1996). ''Radio Stars: An Illustrated Biographical Dictionary of 953 Performers, 1920 through 1960''. McFarland & Company, Inc. . P. 28.) – January 12, 20 ...

( Bobbe Deane briefly played the part between 1934 and 1935 during a contract dispute involving Shirley Bell. Between 1940 and 1942 Janice Gilbert performed the role.) * Mr. Silo - Jerry O'Mera * Mrs. sfx - Henriette Tedro * Joe Corntassel - Allan Baruck (later Mel Tormé) *

Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks is a fictional character from the comic strip '' Little Orphan Annie''. He made his first appearance in the New York ''Daily News'' in the ''Annie'' strip on September 27, 1924. In the series he is said to be around 52 ye ...

Henry Saxe Henry Saxe (born September 24, 1937) is a Canadian artist who creates sculpture, painting and drawing. Career Born in Montreal, Quebec, Saxe attended Sir George Williams University (1955-1956) and the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal (1956-1 ...

Boris Aplon Boris may refer to: People * Boris (given name), a male given name *:''See'': List of people with given name Boris * Boris (surname) * Boris I of Bulgaria (died 907), the first Christian ruler of the First Bulgarian Empire, canonized after his ...

Stanley Andrews Stanley Andrews (born Stanley Martin Andrzejewski; August 28, 1891 – June 23, 1969) was an American actor perhaps best known as the voice of Daddy Warbucks on the radio program ''Little Orphan Annie'' and later as "The Old Ranger", the first ...

* Punjab - Quentin Young * Sandy the dog - Brad Barker

Theme song

The theme song was sung by announcer Pierre Andre, as "Uncle Andy". Leonard Salvo was the show's organist. ''Who's that little chatter box?'' ''The one with pretty auburn locks?'' ''Whom do you see?'' ''It's Little Orphan Annie.'' ''She and Sandy make a pair,'' ''They never seem to have a care!'' ''Cute little she,'' ''This Little Orphan Annie.'' ''Bright eyes cheeks a rosy glow,'' ''There's a store of healthiness handy.'' ''Mite-size, always on the go,'' ''If you want to know - "Arf", says Sandy.'' ''Always wears a sunny smile,'' ''Now, wouldn't it be worth the while,'' ''If you could be,'' ''Like Little Orphan Annie?''

In popular culture

used the show as the basis for his short story "The Counterfeit Secret Circle Member Gets the Message, or The Asp Strikes Again." In the story,

first-person narrator A first-person narrative is a mode of storytelling in which a storyteller recounts events from their own point of view using the first person It may be narrated by a first-person protagonist (or other focal character), first-person re-teller ...

Ralphie Parker is an avid listener of the program and eagerly awaits the arrival of his decoder ring to find out the secret messages in each episode. When the ring arrives, he anxiously decodes the secret message in that day's episode, only to be disappointed when it turns out to be an

commercial. The short story was included in Shepherd's compilation book '' In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash'', and the story was also included as one of the scenes in Shepherd's 1983 film '' A Christmas Story''.

Legacy

As with most daily radio serials, very few recordings of the series' thousands of episodes survive. The

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

has 38 15-minute recordings in its Old-Time Radio collection. In 1990 the show was inducted in the

National Radio Hall of Fame The Radio Hall of Fame, formerly the National Radio Hall of Fame, is an American organization created by the Emerson Radio Corporation in 1988. Three years later, Bruce DuMont, founder, president, and CEO of the Museum of Broadcast Communicati ...

. In 1995, Shirley Bell Cole was heard in a reenactment of ''Little Orphan Annie'' on Chuck Schaden's ''Those Were the Days'' radio show.

Sources

{{Reflist

External links

Radio Hall of Fame page

Some scripts of the radio show
American children's radio programs American radio dramas 1931 radio programme debuts 1942 radio programme endings Radio programs based on comic strips NBC Blue Network radio programs NBC radio programs Mutual Broadcasting System programs 1930s American radio programs 1940s American radio programs