Cross Talk: Season 3, Episode 11

"On a Christmas Carol on the Radio". From December 13, 2019. Final episode of season three.  By the time the most enduring radio version of A Christmas Carol was on the air, the story was almost 100 years old.  It's a story that still gets new versions made in various media, every year.  One of the most enduring movie versions still played year after year dates back to 1951.  But before that version captured hearts and minds, radio had been broadcasting a production that dates back to 1934; even though the popular recording of that version is from the performance in 1939.  Makes fair dealing use of bits of audio from the 1951 United Artists picture; the 1939 Campbell Soup Playhouse radio production starring Lionel Barrymore, with Orson Welles as the narrator, and from Radio Drama Revival Project. Wellesnet.com and Wikipedia.org were good resources for quick reviews of dates for this episode. For educational purposes. The hardcover "The Books of Christmas" by Charles Dickens, pictured in the photo here was published in 1907.  The Radio is a General Electric TA200A VY, 1960s but hard to date exactly. For previous Christmas-time Radio history please listen to Season 1, Episode 15 - "On the Canadian Christmas Eve broadcast that gave Radio to the World".