The Ford Show Radio Program

Background

1945 - 1950 promised to be banner years for America's automotive companies. G.I.s were returning to the workforce, many were completing college and trade school programs under the G.I. Bill, working wives were returning to raising families full-time, and America was rapidly expanding into hundreds, then thousands of tract communities in the suburbs. These facts were not lost on America's automobile companies.

Advertisements for all manner of vehicles were saturating America's print publications. They were airing in a glut of Radio commercials and over early Television as well. Even movie theatres were inundated with all manner of both automobile ads and tract home ads with the coming attractions prior to the screening of features.

This was the backdrop to Ford Motor Company's full-court press during the entire four to six year design to production cycle that resumed full-tilt as their Wartime production facilities re-tooled for domestic production once again. Ford had much to offer, as well as great confidence that they could once again compete head-to-head with General Motors and Chrysler Corporation, not to mention the hundreds of European and Japanese models that G.I.s had been exposed to first-hand while overseas.

The full-court press had to be promoted as agressively as possible to get the jump on the equally aggressive competition. The motor companies weren't exactly sitting on the sidelines during America's massive industrial re-tooling efforts throughout the War Production years. They knew the War would end, and the closer that likelihood approached, America's motor companies expended as much effort as practical on that eventuality. They had every expectation that the extraordinary demand for their post-War products would more than merit a hefty Advertising and Marketing budget.

Their post-War model lines had met with mixed success following V-E Day on May 8, 1945. But V-J Day on August 14, 1945 provided the final boost America's manufacturers needed to secure funding for domestic retooling, advertising and revised infrastructure.

During the post-War years, Ford was sponsoring:

• The Ford Sunday Evening Hour for 1945 and 1946
• Festival of American Music in 1946
• The Ford Show [NBC] with Bob Crosby for1946
• The Ford Show with Dinah Shore [CBS] from 1946 to 1947
• Meredith Wilson's Ford Showroom in 1947
• Ford Theater from 1947 to 1948
• RFD America in 1948
• The Fred Allen Show from 1947 to 1949
• Can You Top This? in 1948
• Lum and Abner from 1949 to 1950
• Young Love from 1949 to 1950
• The Adventures of Philip Marlowe in 1950
• The Saint in 1950
• A Date With Judy in 1950

This mix of predominantly Variety, Comedy, Drama and Detective Mystery programming served Ford well in expanding their message during the post-War recovery years.

Dinah Shore's popularity continues to rise

An instant hit over Radio, Dinah Shore quickly rose to prominence in Television and Film as well. Beginning her singing career shortly after graduating from Vanderbilt University in 1938, her first exposure to a large Radio audience came over New York station WNEW, in a series of weekly, 15-minute features between 1938 and 1940.

While steadily increasing in popularity with one hit record after another, Dinah Shore got her first major boost from Eddie Cantor and his It's Time To Smile program between 1940 and 1942 and with frequent appearances on the long-running Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street with Paul LaValle during the same period. She'd also appeared over The Revuers during the same period while getting yet another boost from Xavier Cugat during 1940.

By 1941 Dinah Shore embarked on a long-running series of her own programs over three different networks and for six different major sponsors:

• 1941 Songs By Dinah Shore for Bristol Myers' Sal Hepatica and Minit-Rub
• 1942 In Person: Dinah Shore for Bristol Myers' Mum Deodorant
• 1943 The Dinah Shore Program for Birds Eye Frosted Foods (CBS)
• 1944 Birds Eye Open House Starring Dinah Shore (NBC)
• 1946 The Ford Show for Ford Motor Corporation
• 1948 Call For Music for Philip Morris
• 1954 The Dinah Shore Show for Chevrolet

Throughout a fifteen year period of headlining her own starring vehicles over both Radio and Television, Dinah Shore continued to make hundreds of guest appearances on other programs as well as performing in hundreds of AFRS and AFRTS programs of the 1940s and 1950s. And indeed her frequent appearances before military audiences both stateside and overseas endeared her to a generation of G.I.s and their families. Dinah Shore continued to be a favorite of G.I.s. for the remainder of her life.

Coming off of a successful three years with Birds Eye Frosted Foods over both CBS and NBC, Dinah Shore found yet another well-heeled benefactor in the Ford Motor Company for CBS-Radio's Fall Season of 1946.

CBS puts a Ford in Dinah Shore's future

CBS's The Ford Show premiered on September 18th 1946 as a 30-minute Wednesday evening variety feature. Dinah Shore's first guest star of the new series was hubby George Montgomery. Dinah was supported by longtime announcer Harry Von Zell, Robert Emmett Dolan and his orchestra and versatile funnyman Peter Lind Hayes.

From the October 14th 1946 edition of the Oakland Tribune:

Series Derivatives:

Notes on Provenances:

The most helpful provenances were the log of the RadioGOLDINdex and newspaper listings.

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