Editing Mutual Broadcasting System (section)

====Programming: World War II and ''Superman''====
[[File:FDR-December-24-1943.jpg|thumb|right|300px| President Franklin D. Roosevelt at his home in [[Hyde Park, New York]], December 24, 1943, delivering one of his nationwide radio '[[Fireside chats]]' on the [[Tehran Conference]] and [[Cairo Conference]]<ref>{{cite web |url=http://millercenter.org/president/fdroosevelt/speeches/speech-3333 |title=—Miller Center |access-date=September 14, 2015  |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150709061003/http://millercenter.org/president/fdroosevelt/speeches/speech-3333 |archive-date=July 9, 2015 }} Roosevelt, Franklin D. "Fireside Chat 27: On the Tehran and Cairo Conferences (December 24, 1943)". Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia. Retrieved July 6, 2016.</ref>]]
Offscreen, Mutual remained an enterprising broadcaster. In 1940, a program featuring Cedric Foster joined Mutual's respected schedule of news and opinion shows. Foster's claim to fame was as the first daytime commentator to be heard nationally on a daily basis.<ref>Bliss (1991), p. 65.</ref> The network aired that year's [[NFL Championship Game, 1940|NFL Championship Game]] on December 8, the first national broadcast of the annual event.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.profootballhof.com/history/general/chronology/1940-1959.aspx|access-date=March 1, 2010|title=History: Chronology (1940 to 1959)|publisher=Pro Football Hall of Fame|archive-date=April 8, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100408021426/http://www.profootballhof.com/history/general/chronology/1940-1959.aspx}}</ref> Over the following half-decade, Mutual's war coverage held its own with that of the wealthier networks, featuring field correspondents such as Henry Shapiro and Piet Van T Veer and commentators such as [[Cecil Brown (journalist)|Cecil Brown]], formerly of CBS.<ref>Brown (1998), pp. 183, 190.</ref> At 2:26&nbsp;p.m. Eastern time, on Sunday, December 7, 1941, Mutual flagship station WOR interrupted a football game broadcast with a news flash reporting the [[Attack on Pearl Harbor|Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor]]. It was the first public announcement of the attack heard on the U.S. mainland. The first bombs had dropped 63 minutes earlier.<ref>Bliss (1991), p. 135; {{cite web|url=http://www.authentichistory.com/1939-1945/1-war/2-PH/19411207_1426_WOR-PH_Attack_Interrupt.html|date=December 7, 1941|access-date=March 1, 2010|title=WOR: Interruption of Giants-Dodgers Football Game|publisher=Authentic History Center|archive-date=May 10, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130510033817/http://www.authentichistory.com/1939-1945/1-war/2-PH/19411207_1426_WOR-PH_Attack_Interrupt.html|url-status=live}}</ref> In May 1945, Sigrid Schultz reported from one of the last [[Nazi concentration camps]] to be discovered, [[Ravensbrück concentration camp|Ravensbrück]].<ref>{{harvp|Crook|1998|pp=206–207}}.</ref> The following month, ''[[Meet the Press]]'' premiered with [[Martha Rountree]] as moderator.<ref>{{harvp|Nimmo|Newsome|1997|p=311}}.</ref> For a year and a half in the late 1940s, [[William Shirer]] came over from CBS to do current events commentary after his famous falling out with [[Edward Murrow]].<ref>{{harvp|Bliss|1991|pp=202–203}}.</ref> In 1948, Mutual's four-part series ''To Secure These Rights'', dramatizing the findings of [[Harry S. Truman|President Truman]]'s [[President's Committee on Civil Rights|Committee on Civil Rights]], outraged many politicians and the network's own affiliates in the [[segregated South]].<ref>Savage (1999), p. 345 n. 123.</ref>
[[File:MStrangerSession.jpg|thumb|right|300px|alt=Seven suited men holding scripts and an eighth man operating a bank of turntables.|A recording session for ''[[The Mysterious Traveler]]'', with the entire cast clustered around one microphone. Host [[Maurice Tarplin]] is directly behind the mic, third from the right. To the rear, a sound-effect artist and three phonographs (at least) provide music and effects.]]
In the field of entertainment, Mutual built on the incomparable success of ''The Shadow''. WGN's ''[[Chicago Theater of the Air]]'', featuring hour-long opera and musical theater productions before a live audience, was broadcast for the first time in May 1940. By 1943, the weekly show was being recorded in front of houses 4,000 strong, gathered to see performances featuring a full orchestra and chorus. ''Chicago Theater of the Air'' would run on Mutual through March 1955.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://wgngold.com/timeline/1940s1950s.htm|access-date=March 1, 2010|title=WGN Radio Timeline: 1940s–1950s|publisher=WGN Gold|archive-date=July 18, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110718035648/http://www.wgngold.com/timeline/1940s1950s.htm|url-status=live}} {{cite web|url=http://www.otrsite.com/logs/logc1053.htm|title=''Chicago Theater of the Air'' Episode Log|date=April 15, 2008|access-date=March 1, 2010|publisher=Jerry Haendiges' Vintage Radio Logs|archive-date=March 6, 2005|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050306014405/http://otrsite.com/logs/logc1053.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> Mutual provided an early national outlet for the influential, iconoclastic satirist [[Henry Morgan (humorist)|Henry Morgan]], whose show ''Here's Morgan'' began its network run in October 1940. Though ''The Lone Ranger'' moved over to NBC Blue in May 1942, within a few months Mutual had another reliable, and no less famous, action hero. ''[[The Adventures of Superman (radio)|The Adventures of Superman]]'', picked up from WOR, would run on the network from August 1942 to June 1949. In April 1943, Mutual launched what would turn into one of its longest-lasting shows. Debuting as ''[[Nick Carter (literary character)|The Return of Nick Carter]]'' and later retitled ''Nick Carter, Master Detective'', it would be a network staple through September 1955. From May 1943 through May 1946, Mutual aired ''[[The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes]]'' starring [[Basil Rathbone]] and [[Nigel Bruce]], reprising their roles from the [[Universal Pictures|Universal]] film series. An earlier incarnation of the show had run briefly on the network in 1936; a less starry version would return to Mutual from September 1947 through June 1949.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.otrsite.com/logs/logs1041.htm|title=''Sherlock Holmes'' Episode Log|date=July 6, 2008|access-date=March 1, 2010|publisher=Jerry Haendiges' Vintage Radio Logs|archive-date=April 3, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120403115331/http://www.otrsite.com/logs/logs1041.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> ''[[The Mysterious Traveler]]'', a proto–''[[The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)|Twilight Zone]]'' anthology series, aired every week on Mutual from December 1943 until September 1952.

In February 1946, Mutual introduced a quiz show, ''[[Twenty Questions]]'', that would run for more than seven years. In October, the detective series ''[[Let George Do It (radio)|Let George Do It]]'', starring Bob Bailey, launched as a Mutual/Don Lee presentation; it would also run into the mid-1950s. For two years, starting in 1946 as well, [[Steve Allen]] got his first network exposure on the Mutual/Don Lee morning show ''Smile Time'', out of Los Angeles's [[KHJ (AM)|KHJ]]. In February 1947, the religiously oriented ''[[Family Theater]]'' premiered; with frequent appearances by major Hollywood stars, the series aired on Mutual for ten and a half years. That March, [[Kate Smith]], a major star on CBS since 1931, moved over to Mutual. During most of her initial run at the network, which lasted until September 1951, she had two distinct weekday shows, each 15 minutes long: ''Kate Smith Speaks'', at noon, and ''Kate Smith Sings'', later in the hour.<ref name="Dunning-1998">{{harvp|Dunning|1998|p=382}}.</ref> The network gave an outlet to radio dramatist [[Wyllis Cooper]] and his highly regarded suspense anthology ''[[Quiet, Please]]'', which ran on Mutual from June 1947 to September 1948. It also aired actor [[Alan Ladd]]'s similarly lauded drama about a crime-solving mystery novelist, ''[[Box 13]]'', which ran for precisely a year. Mayfair Productions, Ladd's own business, produced its 52 episodes, which began airing every Sunday on August 22, 1948.