The Lives of Great Men Radio Program

Background

''Every experience, however bitter, has its lesson, and to focus one's attention on the lesson helps one overcome the bitterness.'' ~~~ Dr. Edward Howard Griggs

Many of the more predominant--and popular--programming vehicles during the 1930s were educational or documentary programming. Generally packaged, serialized and often syndicated by local or regional affiliates, these were all manner of historical retrospectives, biographical sketches, vignettes on the history of poetry, the arts, literature and popular science of the era. While perhaps not as popular with the wider body of vintage Radio collectors, most of these historical restrospectives not only hold up quite well even 80 years hence, but in many cases offer snippets of history or vignettes often forgotten, overlooked or simply dismissed by contemporary historians or archivists.

Dr. Edward Howard Griggs, a noted lecturer, author, inspirational speaker and historian of the era, had already compiled--and published--scores of biographies and social and moral critiques of history's greatest thinkers, philosophers, religious figures and humanists. This series was a natural progression from his career as a noted lecturer, Chautauqua speaker and critic.

While he was clearly highly opinionated in his narratives of these thirty-nine historic figures, he manages to maintain a consistent and persuasive underlying theme to each of these fascinating historical retrospectives. He presents hundreds of fascinating and accurate facts in support of his critiques of each historical figure, while keeping the narrative both interesting and compelling.

Dr. Griggs begins his series with Socrates, the great classical Greek philosopher. Attaching a sub-theme and text to each narrative, Griggs characterizes Socrates as a 'Teacher and Martyr'. This is the method Griggs employs for the remainder of the thirty-nine programs of the production. Each treatise briefly outlines the high points--or low points--in the historic figure's life, connecting the various junctures in their lives to his treatise.

Even more instructive of Dr. Griggs' story of the growth and development of civilization, are the subtexts, themselves, underscoring Griggs' observations on each of these great historic characters:

• Socrates: Teacher and Martyr
• Aurelius: The Sunset of Ancient Rome
• Theodoric the Great: The Defeated Dream
• Dante: Supreme Interpreter of The Medieval World
• Girolamo Savonarola: Moral Prophet of The Renaissance
• Leonardo da Vinci: Mastermind of The Renaissance
• Erasmus: Humanism and The Reformation
• Giordano Bruno: The Martyr of Science
• Shakespeare: Unifier of the English-Speaking World
• Spinoza: Philospher of The Eternal
• Voltaire: Intellectual Leader of the 18th Century
• Jefferson: Philosopher of Democracy
• Emerson: Spirtual Leaderhip In Democracy
• Lee: The American Warrior
• Lincoln: The Prophetic American
• Browning: The Friend of The Spirit
• Tolstoy: Moral Leadership in Mysterious Russia
• Ibsen: Psychologist and Critic of Modern Society
• Wilson: Democracy In World Relations
• Kipling: Interpreter of The British Empire
• Loti: The Sensitive Dreamer As Child and Man
• Yeats: The Poetry of Ireland
• G.K. Chesterton: A Modern Man of Letters
• Whitman: Poet of Democracy
• Markham: American Ideals

As becomes obvious from the sub-theme of each biography, Dr. Griggs lays the groundwork for the historic characters that follow by underscoring the hyphothesis underlying the entire series: man's progress throughout Civilization has been a process of moral, spiritual and philosophical evolution, as well as physical evolution--not to imply that Dr. Griggs was either an evolutionist or a creationist. Indeed, all of the lectures in this series address the moral, spiritual or philosophical implications of each historic character's teachings or writing in an intellectually honest and dispassionate manner. This leaves it to the listener to infer or inform what he or she chooses from the presentations.

From the March 24th 1939 edition of the Long Island Daily Press:

This series is as informative and fascinating today as it had to have been seventy years ago. If for no other reason than assembling this specific selection of great thinkers, philosphers and leaders, this series remains remarkable. As something akin to a contemporary audio book of the history of great philosphers and thinkers, it's intriguing to imagine committing this series to an .mp3 CD to enjoy on a long car, train or plane ride. The possibilities remain as open-ended today as they must have been seventy years ago. One can only imagine a young man or woman in the late 30s, hearing--for possibly the first time--this collection of some of the greatest lives that preceded their era. This opportunity had to have been a major event in many of their lives. No doubt many young listeners hearing this series for the first time, went on to investigate these great thinkers even more on their own.

What better tribute to the incredible 'gift' that was Radio in the 1930s than to serve such a positive and noble purpose. This, if for no other reason, makes this collection an invaluable window onto early 20th Century sociology and culture.

Series Derivatives:

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