NPR Morning Edition
Nov. 15, 1993
BOB EDWARDS, Host: It's 11 minutes before the hour.
[music]
EDWARDS: Vintage radio makes a comeback -- a report from Richardson, Texas.
[news headlines]
[music]
EDWARDS: Bill and Ruth Bragg's house in Richardson, Texas, has
a general store, a soda fountain and an old-fashioned post office.
It also contains the studio and control room of a radio superstation
called Yesterday USA, which broadcasts old-time radio shows and
music, 24 hours a day. Listeners pick it up on satellite dishes or
local-access cable channels. YUSA, as it's called, started out as
a sideline. Because of it, the Braggs now have an extended family
from Hawaii to Greenland. Glen Mitchell prepared this report.
[Yesterday USA radio promotion]
PROMO: [sung] Yesterday USA Superstation.
BILL BRAGG, Yesterday USA: Ruthie, push the button over there and
put John on the air. I know who that is. [on phone] What do you
want, Connoley?
CONNOLEY: You think you're smart, don't you?
Mr. BRAGG: Yeah, I know I'm smart, Connoley. First off, last night,
you turn yourself off, and then tonight you miss your bus. Yes,
you better never make that mistake again.
CONNOLEY: [laughs]
GLEN MITCHELL, Reporter: It's Sunday night. Bill Bragg is settled
behind the microphone in his den. Ruth Bragg sits at another mike
in an easy chair. Their three-hour call-in show is the only break
in YUSA's old-time radio and music format, when the audience can talk
with the Braggs. But Bill Bragg thinks of himself as more than just
a talk show host.
Mr. BRAGG: I wanted to be an accessible disc jockey. Pick up the
phone sometime and try to call David Letterman or anybody you can
name in show business. You can't get them. You dial me, you're going
to get me on the second or the third ring. I hate that when you're
in communications and- you say you're in the communications business,
but yet no one can communicate with you. So, we're doing it the
way it used to be.
MITCHELL: Even Bragg's guests get into the easy-going act. This
Sunday night, actress June Foray, the voice of Rocky the Squirrel,
helps a caller program his answering machine.
JUNE FORAY, as Rocky the Squirrel: Hokey-smoke, hi! This is Rick
and Sheila's house. They aren't home right now. This is Rocky the
Flying Squirrel but I'll tell them you called. Just leave your name
and number. They'll call you back.
Mr. BRAGG: That'll be $50, sir. [laughs]
MITCHELL: Bragg started his over-the-back-fence network to publicize
the National Broadcast Museum in Dallas. He's on their board of directors.
And he drew from the museum's collection of old-time radio shows,
such as The Shadow, The Lone Ranger and Allen's Alley.
Bragg believes that while nostalgia may play a part in the network'
s appeal, the shows themselves have an attraction that's timeless.
Mr. BRAGG: I don't care. You got an old road, you see a Mercedes -- zing. You see a Cadillac
-- zing. You see a Model A coming down
the road, and everybody, "Hold it. Stop. Look, look, look." So,
people live for that kind of thing, and there's always that saying, "Well, you know, there's nothing that's perfect for
everyone." I'
ll tell you, old-time radio and vintage music is the closest thing
to being the perfect thing for every age, every interest.
MITCHELL: When YUSA went on the air eight years ago, only Bragg introduced
the shows. Now, more than 20 listeners have become what he calls "disc
jockeys." Some actually do play music from the 1890s through
the 1940s; others, including Larry Gassman and his twin brother,
John, introduce their favorite old-time radio shows. Though they'
re in their late 30s and came along after the heyday of network radio,
Larry Gassman says they've become avid fans and collectors.
LARRY GASSMAN, Disc Jockey: Most of radio, in terms of what we remember,
would be suspense, Johnny Dollar and Gunsmoke in the early
1960s. And then, in the early 1970s, I heard somebody on FM playing
radio shows and the thought was, gee, this would be fun to share with
friends. And so John and I began to tape the shows in 1971. Now,
we've got a collection that's close to 20,000 shows.
[excerpts from old-time radio shows]
RADIO ANNOUNCER: We offer you escape, designed to free you from the four walls of today to a half hour of high adventure.
RADIO ANNOUNCER: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, starring Basil
Rathbone and Nigel Bruce.
RADIO ANNOUNCER: The Columbia Broadcasting System presents a new
comedy.
CHILD: My Friend Eddie.
[sound of train]
MITCHELL: That isn't the Chattanooga Choo-choo. It's the electric
train that runs through the Bragg's house. Bill Bragg has collected
things since he was eight. Now, the house is overflowing because
listeners send him things, too. When Ruth Bragg started dating Bill,
she helped him organize the chaos; then, soon, was on Yesterday USA.
And when they married in 1990, they did it on the air.
RUTH BRAGG, Yesterday USA: We didn't really have a long-standing -- either of us
-- group of friends left, so we invited all of our new
friends who were our listeners that we'd talked to on Sunday nights
on the air. A lot of these people we had never met, but we felt like
we knew them, and I would not hesitate to call any of these people
and stop by and visit them when we're on a vacation. It's like we'
re all friends. It's fun.
MITCHELL: It's also expensive. Bill Bragg talked Shop at Home --
a TV shopping network - into giving him one of its audio channels,
worth $90,000 a month, to put YUSA's signal on three satellites.
He takes $15 contributions from listeners, but says that barely pays
for the quarterly schedules and newsletters he mails out. He makes
up the rest himself, though a recent bout with cancer has made it
difficult for him to work steadily at his job as a TV engineer. His
illness did have one beneficial side effect, he says -- it brought
him even closer to his listeners.
Mr. BRAGG: These people are special to me because -- it's not like
turning on the car radio. You have to put up a satellite dish, you
have to beg your cable company to carry us. And so when you have
people like that that do for you and help you keep on keeping on,
I just don't see how any human being with any kind of a heart at all
could not help but fall in love with them. I have a million friends.
MITCHELL: A million is probably hyperbole, but, then, the Braggs
only know when people are listening if they get calls or postcards.
In fact, unless they hear from fans, they don't even know if a cable
system has picked up Yesterday USA. So, they continue to get listeners
the way they do friends - one at a time. For National Public Radio,
this is Glen Mitchell in Dallas.
[music]
EDWARDS: This is NPR's Morning Edition. I'm Bob Edwards.
Copyright 2000 National Public Radio