We have some radio commercials around here that spoof those old, melodramatic, cheesy radio soaps from back in The Day. You know what I mean… with the organ music in the background, hyper-emotional characters that would put Scarlett O’Hara to shame, etc.
When did those soaps end? I have vague memories of being in a hair salon when I was a kid, waiting for Mommarasta to get her hair done, and there was one of those soaps on the radio in there. I specifically remember that the employees would sometimes stop what they were doing to listen more closely, or gasp at the developments. This would have been in the mid-70’s.
And while we’re on the subject, when did serial radio programs in general disappear? Let’s discount the Saturday-morning kid-oriented Christian programming (“The Adventurers Club” or something) that’s heard around here.
MY GOD! I bet “Points of View” had a sackful that week.
I don’t listen to it either, but it must have been funny:
“I say, Lady Wilberforce-Courtingham-Smyth, would you mind awfully if I take you roughly from behind?”
“Oh, if you must.”
“Righty-o, then, here we go.”
“Oooh.”
“Aaahh.”
“I say!”
“Whoopsie-daisy, wrong hole.”
“Oooh.”
“Okay, the Thames is flowing.”
“Super job, absolutely spiffing. Let’s have some tea.”
I don’t know how to put those fancy links in a post, but I do know where you can get an answer to your question: A guy named Chuck Schaden is one of the foremost experts on old time radio. He has a store that sells old tapes and a weekly radio show of his own on which he plays the old shows. He now works out of WDCB, a public radio station associated with the College of DuPage, here in the Chicago area. You can no doubt contact him through that station at http://www.cod.edu/wdcb He can probably tell you the last broadcast dates of any show you name. Now - my own recollection of the end of the soaps is earlier than your citation. I think it occurred in the early 60’s. At least the ones I used to listen to stopped about then. Good luck.