THE LISTENER'S IMAGINATION

Back in my childhood, I was watching television at Grandpa Portfors’ house one day when suddenly he rushed into the kitchen, slipped onto a chair in the little eating nook, turned on the radio he kept there, and began to listen intently. Now and then he’d chuckle a little. After a while, he turned off the radio and went on his way.

When I told my mother about this incident, she said, “Oh, he likes a program called ‘Fibber McGee and Molly.’” And she mentioned the famous running gag, the hall closet. “Fibber opens the door to the closet and everything falls out,” she said. That was the first I knew that radio programming had ever been more than music interspersed with talking. I was a child of the television age. 

In their tribute to sound effects man Manny Segal, Heavenly Days! authors Stumpf and Price explain the closet as follows: On the show of March 5, 1940, while Fibber was hunting for a dictionary, he foolishly yanked open the door of the hall closet and out tumbled the now famous conglomeration of noisy sound effects. Reportedly, the sound was made by an odd assortment of articles including: Ten empty oil cans, a pair of roller skates, an old snow shoe, a barrelful of broken crockery, a bowling pin, two boxes of old kitchenware, a rake, an egg-beater, three cowbells, and Fibber’s old mandolin!!! These items were piled high on top of a portable staircase and then tumbled noisily upon the proper cue.

“Year after year, Fibber procrastinated about cleaning out the hall closet ‘one of these days.’ Several programs were devoted to just such a task. On October 21, 1941, and again on April 7, 1942, Fibber cleaned out the closet in search of waste materials to aid the war effort. On February 2, 1943, McGee moved all of the junk from the hall closet into the linen closet – temporarily. Then again on June 5, 1945, he tried to straighten out the mess, but to no avail. Faithful listeners of the McGee show were given an unnerving jolt on the program of March 11, 1947, when Doc Gamble accidentally opened the door to the hall closet – to complete silence. After a long pause, Fibber delightfully exclaimed: ‘I cleaned out the hall closet!’”

FM&M was sponsored by the Johnson Wax Company for fifteen years and six weeks, and during those years, the same announcer, Harlow Wilcox, delivered the commercial messages. The commercials were actually incorporated into the story line. Harlow, whom Fibber dubbed “Waxy,” served as announcer, a member of the cast, and sponsor spokesman. 

By 1949, the Johnson Wax Company wanted to move their advertising dollars to television. They spent $10,000 to film a pilot for a proposed television series of their popular radio series, which was actually a filming of the radio presentation. Although I'd love to see it today, it's clear they weren't grasping the vision of how television could be used. Stumpf and Price observe that "Jim and Marian were not at all sure that the new medium would be well-suited to them. They realized that essentially the success of their radio program had depended upon the listener’s imagination, the key elements being the famous closet door gag and the very concept of Wistful Vista as ‘Anywhere Middle America, U.S.A. . . .” KW

[Photo 1 -- C.O. Portfors, my maternal grandfather, 1961.

The remaining photos of FM&M were copied from Heavenly Days! by Charles Stumpf and Tom Price.]