On August 31, 1903, Arthur Godfrey was born.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

I used to listen to him on the radio.

Arthur Godfrey


Godfrey in 1953

Born: Arthur Morton Leo Godfrey; August 31, 1903; Manhattan, New York, U.S.
Died: March 16, 1983 (aged 79); Manhattan, New York, U.S.
Occupation: Broadcaster and entertainer

Arthur Morton Godfrey (August 31, 1903 – March 16, 1983) was an American radio and television broadcaster and entertainer who was sometimes introduced by his nickname The Old Redhead. At the peak of his success, in the early-to-mid 1950s, Godfrey was heard on radio and seen on television up to six days a week, sometimes for as many as nine separate broadcasts for CBS. His programs included Arthur Godfrey Time (Monday-Friday mornings on radio and television), Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts (Monday evenings on radio and television), Arthur Godfrey and His Friends (Wednesday evenings on television), The Arthur Godfrey Digest (Friday evenings on radio) and King Arthur Godfrey and His Round Table (Sunday afternoons on radio).

The infamous on-air firing of cast member Julius La Rosa in 1953 tainted his down-to-earth, family-man image and resulted in a marked decline in popularity which he was never able to regain. Over the following two years, Godfrey fired over twenty additional cast and crew members, under similar disregard and questionable ethics, for which he was heavily attacked by the press and public alike. A self-made man, he was fiercely competitive; some of his employees were fired for merely speaking with ones he considered to be competitors, like Ed Sullivan, or for signing with agents. By the late 1950s, his presence had been reduced to hosting the occasional television special and his daily network radio show, which ended in 1972.

Godfrey was strongly identified with many of his commercial sponsors, especially Chesterfield cigarettes and Lipton Tea. He advertised Chesterfield for many years, during which he devised the slogan "Buy 'em by the carton", but he terminated his relationship with the company after he quit smoking, five years before he was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1959. He later became a prominent spokesman for the tobacco control movement.

{snip}

Radio Coverage of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Funeral (April 14, 1945)
Added to the National Registry: 2014
Essay by Christopher H. Sterling (guest post)*

After years of wartime news events providing interruptions to scheduled programs, Americans were almost used to the repeated occurrence. But few expected the shocking news reporting the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in April 1945.

FDR’s Death: On Thursday evening, March 29, 1945, FDR had escaped the pressures of Washington, DC, heading south by train to the slower and calmer tempo of his “Little White House” in Warm Springs, Georgia. There, surrounded by a small group of family members and long-term friends, he sought to rebuild his energy for a planned appearance at the San Francisco conference that would found the United Nations.

It was not to be. After about a week of relaxing, including short motor trips nearby, FDR sat for sessions with a portrait painter. Then, just before lunch on Thursday, April 12th, he suffered a fatal stroke, dying a few hours later, at age 63. The first radio news flashes went out that afternoon. The next day, a slow procession by train bore the president’s body back north, first to Washington and then to his funeral at home in Hyde Park, NY. Radio reported its sad way.

Godfrey’s Role: FDR would be in Washington only briefly--about five hours laying in state in the White House’s East Room. What is remembered as his “funeral” was the brief procession from Washington’s Union Station to the White House and his brief laying in state.

Arthur Godfrey (1903-1983) was already a 15-year local radio veteran when, based on his role as the network’s morning man in the nation’s capital, he was added to CBS Radio's team of journalists covering the FDR procession taking place on Saturday, April 14th. Positioned near the White House, overlooking the procession’s route, Godfrey gave a detailed and emotionallywrought description, including of the caisson carrying the President's body. He was providing what in sports events today is often termed “color,” describing for those unable to see them, the people in the procession as well as those watching it go by, the overall scene, and some of the events of FDR’s brief, final stopover in Washington.

But the strain of appearing comfortable in his role was evident. “God give me strength to do this,” he was overheard to say off air. As President Truman’s car drove into sight toward the end of the procession, Godfrey finally choked and then broke down on the air, quickly returning listeners to the studio. His reaction was surely an emotional evocation of what many radio listeners shared.

{snip}

The WallBreakers

Arthur Godfrey Reports from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Funeral—April 14, 1945

Tue Sep 3, 2024: On August 31, 1903, Arthur Godfrey was born.

Fri Sep 1, 2023: On August 31, 1903, Arthur Godfrey was born.

Wed Aug 31, 2022: On this day, August 31, 1903, Arthur Godfrey was born.

Tue Aug 31, 2021, 09:42 AM: Aug. 31: Arthur Godfrey's birthday (1903) and the first airline crash investigated by the CAB (1940)

Tue Aug 31, 2021, 07:55 AM: On this day, August 31, 1903, Arthur Godfrey was born.

Wed Apr 14, 2021: April 14, 1945: Franklin D. Roosevelt's funeral procession on the streets of Washington, DC

Tue Apr 14, 2020: April 14, 1945: Franklin D. Roosevelt's funeral procession on the streets of Washington, DC

Fri Aug 31, 2018: Today's aeronautical anniversaries: Arthur Godfrey's birthday, and the first CAB crash investigation

{snip}

Low-power FM station WERA, in Arlington, Virginia, ran a show yesterday afternoon about the death of President Roosevelt. It consisted of radio broadcasts from the days following his death.

https://www.facebook.com/939941119429678/photos/a.942268432530280/2843874072369697/

Local radio personality Arthur Godfrey was covering the funeral from his vantage point on top of the Riggs Bank building at the northwest corner of 15th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue. He had been sent there by WJSV, which became today's WTOP. He was quite knowledgeable and detailed in his narrative. I urge you to give the podcast a listen.

{snip}

[mahatmakanejeeves]

1. Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)

20:38: time for a Chesterfield.

#AIRBOYD #AvGeek
Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)
286,177 views Jul 20, 2009

AIRBOYD
450K subscribers

Click to subscribe! http://bit.ly/subAIRBOYD

This is the full length movie and I did my best to fix the sound sync. An Eastern Air Lines promo piece with the Lockheed Super Constellation.

The most viewed aviation channel on YouTube

#AIRBOYD #AvGeek[

JAMES STEWART / ARTHUR GODFREY AT INTERNATIONAL AEROCLASSIC AIR SHOW PALM SPRINGS CALIFORNIA 51074
25,941 views Jan 9, 2017

PeriscopeFilm
344K subscribers

Support Our Channel : https://www.patreon.com/PeriscopeFilm

Featuring actor / pilot James Stewart and beloved newsman and entertainer Arthur Godfrey, this film promotes the International AeroClassic, an air show that took place only once — in November of 1965 at Palm Springs, California. Unfortunately for Palm Springs and event organizers, the event took place in inclement weather. The AeroClassic racked up considerable debts and put the organization behind it into bankruptcy.

{snip}

Tue Sep 3, 2024: Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)

Fri Sep 1, 2023: Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)

Wed Aug 31, 2022: Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)

Tue Aug 31, 2021: Flying With Arthur Godfrey (1953)

[marybourg]

3. Also well know for his active antisemitism.

[rog]

4. Dick Cavett emphatically says this is not true (link below).

Dick Cavett is below, but first a small bit about Godfrey's upbringing, from his wiki article.

Godfrey's father was something of a "free thinker" by the standards of the era. He did not disdain organized religion but insisted that his children explore all faiths before deciding for themselves which to embrace. Their childhood included friends of Catholic, Jewish and various Protestant faiths. ... In the book Genius in the Family, written about their mother by Godfrey's youngest sister, Dorothy Gene, with the help of their sister, Kathy, it was reported that the angriest they ever saw their father was when a man on the ferry declared the Ku Klux Klan a civic organization vital to the good of the community. They rode the ferry back and forth three times, with their father arguing with the man that the Klan was a bunch of "Blasted, bigoted fools, led 'round by the nose!"

More of Our Man Godfrey, by Dick Cavett

https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/16/more-of-our-man-godfrey/

Then there’s the anti-Semitism matter. At its most fulsome, it goes, “Don’t you know Godfrey owned a hotel in Florida with a sign out front that read, ‘No Dogs or Jews’?” Although purest nonsense, you can still hear it resurrected by seniors from that era.

Unreported was the fact that although he did patronize that hotel, he made a point of checking in with Jewish friends and cast members.

He later bought into the place and abolished the odious policy. Being labeled an anti-Semite was a bum rap that those who knew the man say he emphatically did not deserve. The hotel in question, The Kenilworth, became nationally famous at the time. (I don’t know if it still exists — renamed, perhaps, The Mel Gibson?)

The attacks on Arthur — and on other media giants over time — bring to mind that dreary cliché about how “the press likes to build you way up, just so they can later tear you down.”

This dumbbell notion has been around since I learned to read and has the durability of the great pyramid at Giza. Sure there’s plenty of schadenfreude (all four syllables please) around, but it’s not evil press monsters who, like those envying Greek gods, like to see the mighty tumble; it’s us. Envious us.

[marybourg]

5. Every Jewish person in N.Y in the 50's, including those who

wintered in Miami Beach yearly, believed this to be true (not the sign, but the polite, but forceful exclusion).If it wasn’t true, Godfrey had a big megaphone through which to deny it.

Nobody accused his father of anything, and Arthur wouldn’t have been the first son to follow the money and not his dad.

[rog]

6. He bought into the hotel and eliminated the policy.

Edited to add that Eddie Fisher was an entertainer who perpetuated this story. In his autobiography, Fisher said (notice he said 'supposedly' about the sign) ...

One of the best-known anti-Semites in show business was Arthur Godfrey, the host of radio's most important amateur talent contest. Godfrey owned the Kenilworth Hotel in Florida, which supposedly (sic) had a sign in front that read NO DOGS OR JEWS ALLOWED. But when I got the opportunity to appear on Talent Scouts, I leaped at it. I didn't care that Godfrey wouldn't let me in his hotel as long as he let me sing on his radio show.

However author Arthur Singer points out that Godfrey had no financial stake in the Kenilworth at the time Fisher appeared on Talent Scouts.

Arthur J. Singer, author of Arthur Godfrey: The Adventures of an American Broadcaster (2000), rejects this accusation, citing Godfrey's good personal relations with a number of Jews in the entertainment industry, including his longtime announcer Tony Marvin. As for Godfrey's association with the Kenilworth, the hotel did establish a "No Jews" policy in the 1920s, but abandoned it when Godfrey acquired a stake in the hotel in the early 1950s. In the eyes of the public, the increasingly negative, and largely self-inflicted publicity Godfrey, despite his ongoing popularity, had generated since 1953 no doubt added credence to the accusations. In fact Godfrey was only a part-owner of the hotel and insisted that when he took that stake, he ended any discriminatory policies that existed. Further undermining Fisher's account, he appeared on Talent Scouts years before Godfrey purchased a part interest in the Kenilworth.

[rog]

7. I thought I'd share some info I just read about the Kenilworth.

First of all, it appears that Arthur Singer's bio of Godfrey contains a fairly notable error. Bal Harbour was not even incorporated until 1946, which is when the Kenilworth-By-The-Sea Hotel was built, so obviously his statement about hotel policy in the 1920s is not true. It may be that Singer confused the Bal Harbour hotel with the Kenilworth Lodge in Sebring, which operated from 1916-2016, but it's about 3 hours from Bal Harbour, in the middle of the state. At any rate, his research appears to be more than a little sloppy. Whether that error impacts the accusations against Godfrey, I don't know. It seems to be very difficult to get a detailed and accurate history of the Kenilworth, and I'm not obsessed enough to keep digging.

But in doing this reading about Bal Harbour, I found this very interesting history of that part of the world (from the Totally Jewish Travel website), re: publicly displayed 'Gentiles Only' signs outside of businesses.

https://www.totallyjewishtravel.com/Kosher_Tours-TL7776-bal_harbour_miami-Vacations.html

Jewish History, POI & Kosher Establishments in Bal Harbour

Until Spain traded Florida to Britain in exchange for Havana in 1763, Florida was subject to the laws of the Spanish Inquisition and Jewish residents were forbidden. When Jews began settling in the area in the 19th century, landlords and business owners routinely posted “Gentiles Only” signs on their properties. Such discrimination persisted into the 1950s. Today Surfside and Bal Harbour are becoming very popular for Jewish people of all types and practices.

I can't verify irrefutably that Godfrey ended this policy when he bought into the Kenilworth, but I'm reluctant to brand someone a racist or an anti-semite based on rumors, no matter how pervasive. I'll put a lot of value on Dick Cavett's position on this. He is a smart, fair, and honest guy who has a lot of insight into the business.

I do think that history is fascinating.

Edited to add that I would really like to see a photo of the alleged 'No Jews or Dogs' sign in front of the Kenilworth. You'd think that someone would have documented that, especially in front of such a modern and ritzy venue. Per the article above, it seems (unfortunately) that a 'Gentiles Only' sign would just have been part of the landscape at the time. I'm not doubting whether that policy was in place, or making excuses for this dark part of American history.

[3catwoman3]

2. My mom watched his tv show when I was a toddler...

…so of course I did, too, and she told me I pronounced his name as “Arffrey Garffrey.”