BW - EP139—005: Martin And Lewis With Monroe And Sinatra—Dragnet

The U.S. spent the first ten months of 1949 in a recession. Competition for the advertising dollars was stiffer. There were now over two-thousand-six-hundred AM and FM stations. Television was becoming a serious threat. Over a hundred TV stations were on the air. Only two Network Radio shows had a rating higher than 20. Just two years earlier, there were fifteen. Radio’s average Top 50 ratings dropped 30% to its lowest level since 1937. Suddenly the reality of radio drama’s demise was staring men and women in the face, like the just-heard John Gibson who played Ethelbert on Casey, Crime Photographer. Meanwhile, NBC, ABC, CBS, and the Dumont Network reported a combined TV income of $29.4 Million. But advertisers were learning that TV production costs were much greater than radio’s. The extra money had to come from somewhere and radio budgets were the likely source. Seven of radio’s top nine shows now aired on CBS, but that’s not to say there weren’t NBC radio successes. Jack Webb’s Dragnet premiered coast-to-coast on Friday June 3rd, 1949 at 10PM eastern time over NBC. It featured some of Hollywood radio’s most talented character actors, like the just-heard Virginia Gregg. It wasn’t long before Liggett and Myers tobacco signed on as sponsor. CBS took notice. A month after Dragnet’s premiere, they shifted Broadway is My Beat to Hollywood and put it under Elliott Lewis’ direction. For more information on the launch of Dragnet, tune into Breaking Walls episode 111. For more information on Elliott Lewis, tune into Breaking Walls episode 113.