Jubliee, Armed Forces Radio, 837 Old Time Radio Shows, Country Music OTR

Don't be fooled by other collections that claim to contain more episodes.  Many of these shows were aired on multiple dates in reruns, so you have plenty of sellers out there padding their collections with reruns!  We feature all known episodes in existence and do not add "fluff" to our collections to increase our claimed episode count like many others. 

NOTICE: This collection is all in MP3 format supplied on DVD.  You play this in your computer and then can copy all the MP3 files to your MP3 player of choice.  This DVD will NOT play in a regular CD player in your car, or your TV's DVD player, it is intended for your computer only which will allow you to transfer the MP3 files to any device that can play MP3's.  This collection remains the largest most original collection on ebay.

The National Barn Dance:

National Barn Dance, broadcast by WLS-AM in Chicago, Illinois starting in 1924, was one of the first American country music radio programs and a direct precursor of the Grand Ole Opry.

National Barn Dance also set the stage for other similar programs, in part because the clear-channel signal of WLS could be received throughout most of the Midwest and even beyond in the late evening and nighttime hours, making much of the United States (and Canada) a potential audience. The program was well received and thus widely imitated. National Barn Dance ended its broadcast in 1968.

National Barn Dance was founded by Edgar L. Bill. To him goes the credit for arranging to have a program of "down-home" tunes broadcast from radio station WLS, of which Bill was then director. Having lived on a farm, he knew how people loved the familiar sound and informal spirit of old-fashioned barn dance music. The first broadcast was an impromptu sustaining program. An avalanche of telephone calls and letters indicated a definite demand from the public for this type of broadcast, and National Barn Dance was born. It first aired on WLS on April 19, 1924 and originated from the Eighth Street Theater starting in 1931. The show was picked up by NBC Radio in 1933. NBC expanded the program's coverage in 1942, adding it to the schedules of international shortwave stations. In 1946 it switched to the ABC Radio network and aired until 1952 on Saturday nights from 6:30 p.m. to midnight.

George D. Hay (a.k.a. The Solemn Ole Judge) has always claimed that he started the WLS Barn Dance when he worked for them as an announcer, but research is showing that this was a falsehood of documented history and that his claim was to help him get a job as the first director of WSM Radio c. 1925 Nashville, Tennessee.

The show regularly featured Gene Autry, Red Foley, The Three Little Maids, Jenny Lou Carson, Eddie Dean, Lulu Belle and Scotty, Pat Buttram, George Gobel, The Williams Brothers (featuring future crooner Andy Williams), Arkansas Woodchopper, The DeZurik Sisters and the Hoosier Hot Shots. Other guests included Smiley Burnette, Eddie Peabody and Joe Kelly, best remembered today as the host and moderator of NBC's Quiz Kids. The announcer was Jack Holden and it was once sponsored by Alka-Seltzer.

ABC made two moves that ultimately led to National Barn Dance's slow demise. The first was the cancellation of the network broadcast in 1952. After a few years, audiences finally began to wane, and the program ceased live performances after 1957. The show continued to air on WLS until 1959 when ABC bought the station and changed the format to Top 40 rock and roll, canceling National Barn Dance outright. The show moved to Chicago's WGN-AM until it finally left the air in 1968.

Jubilee:

Jubilee is an AFRS radio program that featured African-American musicians and singers. It was broadcast to servicemen via AFRS from 1942 to 1953.

Jubilee was conceived at least in part as a morale-building service for African-American troops overseas. The wartime host was Ernie "Bubbles" Whitman.

Most of the shows were recorded before live audiences in Los Angeles. The series emerged as an important piece of black heritage. Its War Department status exempted the performing artists from the union-mandated recording bans of 1942-43 and 1947–48 and many of the shows contain unique performances.

And more Bonus Radio Shows:

As a sampler of our old time radio library, we are including these classic old time radio shows on this DVD-ROM at no extra charge: