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The old Silvertone and 'Renfro Valley'By Gary Carden |
Gary Carden |
The most valued possession in my grandparents' home was the Silvertone radio. A big floor model with a dozen knobs, a huge circular dial that had a lot of mysterious inscriptions like "overseas," "ship-to-air" and "short wave," nobody ever tuned them in except me. The only thing I remember hearing on them now was a huge metronome tick-tock that my Uncle Albert said was "the Greenwich clock," which according to him kept eternal time. If all the clocks in the world were mysteriously destroyed, we would still know what time it was. I was glad to know that, but found it a bit boring to listen to.
Generally, we stayed in the great golden band at the top of the dial, listening to WNOX in Knoxville. Due mainly to my devotion, the radio was rarely off. There was "The Mid-Day Merry-Go-Round," which, for reasons beyond my understanding, opened with a thundering piano concerto by Tchaikovsky and then announced the farm news: Things like what corn was bringing a bushel and what the pork prices were in Chicago. I listened with care and would later quote this information to my grandfather. Later on, when I was 12 or so, I listened to "The Lanny Ross Show" and learned to sing "Moonlight and Roses." I don't know why. I also listened to an Asheville DJ named Reed Wilson, who would play requests. I was stricken with mindless joy when Reed would announce, "Our next request is going out to Gary Carden in Sylva, North Carolina. Here it is, Gary! 'Smoke Gets in Your Eyes.' Better put out that cigar, Gary! Ha, ha, ha." It was magic! I had written a letter and a man in Asheville had said my name on the radio. I did it again and again. I guess Reed got pretty sick of me. |
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At night, I made myself half-crazy with a steady diet of everything from "The Inner Sanctum" to "Suspense," Mr. Keene, "Lux Radio Theatre," "The Whistler" and "The Shadow." In the afternoon, before Jack Armstrong came on, I listened to the soap operas and memorized the introduction to everything from "Helen Trent" to "Our Gal Sunday" ("Can a poor girl from a little mining town called Silver Creek, Colorado, find true happiness.......")
All of this, augmented by a daily dose of comic books, a weekly Saturday matinee and an occasional "Lassie," "Thunderhead" or "Black Stallion" from the local library, blended together to make me a strange child who sometimes sat in front of the big Silvertone and talked back to Sergeant Preston and the Lone Ranger and sneaked off to the barn to talk to the Shadow. Out of all of these programs, the one I remember the most vividly is a Sunday morning program "Renfro Valley." I guess it was a musical program, but it was carefully set up to complement Sunday morning. You could listen to it before you went to church! The master of ceremonies of the program had one of those warm, folksy voices and he always opened the program by telling you that he was sitting on the front porch in Renfro Valley, watching people pass. Most of them were on their way to church, and he would call out to them - things like, "'Morning, Mrs. Percy. How is Bobbie Jean?" Then, he would confide to his radio listeners that Bobbie Jean was just recovering from the flu. As time went on, listeners got to know most of the population of Renfro Valley, much the way that listeners to NPR now know Lake Woebegon. My grandfather loved Renfro Valley and would sit on the porch with a tuning fork and a fiddle, eager to join in the music. Old favorites were songs like "Listen to the Mockingbird," in which a fiddle string twittered and sang; then there was "The Grandfather Clock" that had a wonderful syncopated rhythm - "Ninety years without slumbering... tick-tock, tick-tock..." There was usually at least one tear-jerking hymn like "I Come to the Garden Alone" and a few sad love songs. One of the most commonly requested was "They Cut Down the Old Pine Tree." Does anybody remember why they cut it down? Due to pine blight or clear-cutting? No, it was to "make a coffin of pine for that sweetheart of mine." My grandpa would strike his kneecap with the tuning fork, get the pitch and sing along, "But she's not alone in her grave tonight, for its there my heart will always be..." At the end of Renfro Valley, you could hear the church bells ringing and the narrator would tell you that time had run out and that "each precious minute had 60 golden seconds and this lapsed hour had 60 diamond minutes... until next Sunday, folks!" And you could hear a spirited church choir somewhere nearby. Grandpa would rise and shuffle off to the church at Love's Dell (Lovedale now). Recently, after I had lamented the passing of Renfro Valley in an elderhostel class, a spunky little lady approached me with a cassette. I was amazed to learn that nostalgia freaks like me can order tapes of the old show. She assured me that Renfro Valley is a real place and anyone can write to "Renfro Valley Gatherin'." I put in a special request for one of the segments that had "They Cut Down the Old Pine Tree." I just played it. Of course Grandpa wasn't there with the tuning fork, but I sang along anyway. "No, she's not alone in her grave tonight, for its there my heart will always be..." I'm glad the neighbors can't see me make a fool of myself again. |
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