As a sex we were not considered suitable for the onerous duties of announcing that “the next item would be a song by Miss So-and- So,” or that the forecast for the evening was “Fine and Mild.” These called for masculine effort and ability!
What a change has taken place! The increasing number of women announcers at the stations shows the trend. Indeed, it is noticeable that some of the leading stations employ male and female announcers during a session to introduce dialogue and so make their
advertisements more attractive.1
In 1934, eleven years after the introduction of radio to Australia, Muriel Sutch wrote ‘Broadcasting from a Woman’s Viewpoint’ for the annual radio publication Broadcast Year
Book. In the above epigraph, Sutch argued that there had been a shift towards an acceptance
of women’s speaking voices on the airwaves over the past decade and emphasised that announcing was no longer considered to be solely a masculine role. It is also notable that Sutch argued that women’s voices in these roles were needed to make ‘advertisements more attractive,’ thereby indicating that women’s voices had newfound commercial value. This suggests that by the 1930s women played a significant role on Australian radio, and that their voices had complex and changing meanings. This chapter sets up the rest of the thesis by
1 Muriel Sutch, ‘Broadcasting from a Woman’s Viewpoint’, Broadcast Year Book (Sydney: C. C. Faulkner, 1934),
32
tracing the history of women’s roles on Australian radio from the 1920s until the 1950s, and by demonstrating why the medium was a useful one for women’s active citizenship in these years. Until recently, the small literature on the history of women and radio in Australia had largely focused on the extent to which radio constructed and reinforced ideals of traditional
womanhood, particularly through women’s sessions.2 Jeannine Baker’s recent work on
feminist uses of broadcasting has begun to challenge this focus on the domesticity of
women’s broadcasting, however much more work needs to be done.3 While it is true that
women were predominantly heard on women’s sessions, they were by no means exclusively heard on these programs, and there are many notable examples of women speaking during the evening on a wide range of topics. Furthermore, solely focusing on the ways in which women’s programming reinforced domesticity does not fully represent the character of many women’s sessions. While some certainly focused on childrearing, home science, and beauty, there were many others which gave women airtime to speak on a broad range of social, political and intellectual topics. These included the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) women’s sessions and various commercial women’s sessions across Australia.
Further, the debates over radio speech during this period demonstrate that women not only spoke on the airwaves, but that their radio speech was a powerful tool for challenging the gender hierarchy of the public sphere. Placing women’s radio speech within the context of other ways in which women’s voices were broadcast—particularly singing and acting—demonstrates that by using particular forms of radio speech Australian women were able to speak on a wide range of issues with a measure of authority. In doing so, they were able to claim their place as active citizens in the early to mid-twentieth century. This chapter
2 See for example: Rebecca Jones, ‘“Listening-In”: The Constructions of Femininity by Australian Radio in
the 1930’s’ (Honours Thesis, University of Melbourne, 1991); Lesley Johnson, The Unseen Voice: A Cultural
History of Australian Radio (London: Routledge, 1988); Bridget Griffen-Foley, ‘Modernity, Intimacy and Early
Australian Commercial Radio’, in Talking and Listening in the Age of Modernity: Essays on the History of Sound, ed. Joy Damousi and Desley Deacon (Canberra: ANU E Press, 2007), 123–32.
3 Jeannine Baker, ‘Woman to Woman: Australian Feminists’ Embrace of Radio Broadcasting, 1930s-1950s’,
33
adds greater complexity and character to our understanding of Australian radio and suggests that radio provided opportunities for women to speak publicly in new ways and for the public to hear women’s voices on both a much larger scale and in a more intensive way than ever before.
Radio’s Educative Function
Radio had the potential to be used for entertainment, education, and communication, but its primary utility was not immediately apparent upon its introduction to Australian consumers in 1923. It was not until the 1930s that its social purpose as a domestic companion became the dominant way in which the medium was used in Australia. A competing usage in the interwar years was radio’s educative function as a medium that could inform and civilise the
population.4 The educational uses of radio influenced programming across the world.
According to David Goodman, American radio’s status as a medium of mass entertainment was hotly contested by those who believed in the potential of radio to educate American citizens. These advocates worked to mould a more engaged audience through on-air talks and debates, which exacerbated the tension between radio’s dual purposes of entertainment and civic education. The presenters of such civic-minded programming reinforced gendered, raced, and classed ideals of authority, as American radio stations often recruited white male college graduates to be announcers in order to impart authority and decorum, due to the belief that their high level of education meant that they spoke correctly. However, as American radio was a commercial industry, they still used a more intimate mode of address
than their counterparts on public broadcasters in other nations.5
Public broadcasters were especially concerned with education over entertainment. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), for instance, was ‘often accused of being
4 Johnson, The Unseen Voice, 1–2, 202–4.
5 David Goodman, Radio’s Civic Ambition: American Broadcasting and Democracy in the 1930s (Oxford: Oxford
34
undemocratic and elitist in its programming policy’ as its aim was to provide the ‘best’ of
everything it put to air.6 This resulted in the ‘best’ reflecting upper and middle-class tastes
and values. The BBC believed that everyone could appreciate high culture if given the opportunity. As such the aim of public broadcasting was, as managing director John Reith
stated in 1924, to ‘give the public what we think they need—and not what they want.’7
Similarly, Patrick Day has argued that the New Zealand national stations were defined by
elitist standards and aimed to educate and cultivate the population.8 In Australia, the ABC
also adopted an educative approach to its programming, in contrast to the more entertainment-focused commercial stations. In its earliest years it was ‘a body setting out to enlighten the nation’ through well-selected music, informative talks, church services and the
occasional play.9 Talks were seen to be an avenue for adult and children’s education, although
they often caused controversy for the conservative ABC administrators due to politically sensitive topics, including the living conditions of Aboriginal people and the Sino-Japanese conflict.10
There has been a perception that listeners associated accurate information and
persuasive opinion with an ‘English or Anglo-Australian and male’ voice.11 While ideals of
authority and the norms of media employment meant that announcers on the ABC were often male, this perspective only interprets radio’s educative function in a very narrow way and neglects the role that female speakers played in educating fellow women to be citizens. That they often did so within the confines of the daytime women’s sessions has led to their work being neglected. However, as I argue in this thesis, women’s programming provided a
6 Andrew Crisell, An Introductory History of British Broadcasting (London: Routledge, 1997), 27. 7 Ibid., 27–30.
8 Patrick Day, The Radio Years: A History of Broadcasting in New Zealand (Auckland: Auckland University Press,
1994), 2.
9 K. S. Inglis, This is the ABC: The Australian Broadcasting Commission, 1932-1983 (Carlton, Vic: Melbourne
University Press, 1983), 25–29.
10 Ibid., 30–33. 11 Ibid., 32.
35
platform from which women could contribute to public discourse in this period and were therefore a key component of their citizenship activity in the interwar years.
In contrast to the ABC, Johnson has argued that Australian commercial radio’s educative function in the interwar years was geared towards fostering a new type of citizen who sought fulfilment in the private realm of domestic consumption. Although radio provided new opportunities for these citizens to learn about politics and high culture, for
Johnson they were still consumers of that culture rather than active participants.12 This was
particularly so in the case of women. Radio addressed women as a united group with common interests, which Johnson argues belatedly contributed to women’s awakened public consciousness in the 1960s, as by that point they had been publicly addressed as a unified group for over thirty years. In the interwar years, however, women’s ability to be more informed about politics through radio reinforced the divisions between the political public sphere and the consumerist private sphere—women could only eavesdrop on political
conversations, but could not take part in them.13 In this thesis I challenge Johnson’s argument
by demonstrating that women were, in fact, active participants in radio’s education of new citizens in the interwar years on both the ABC and the commercial stations. This argument complicates her conclusion that radio reinforced the separation of the public and private spheres and considers radio as a space within which women could expand notions of citizenship. One way in which they did this was through their involvement with classical music programming, which formed a key part in establishing radio’s educative function as well as women’s presence on the air in the earliest days of broadcasting.
12 Johnson, The Unseen Voice, 203–05. 13 Ibid., 204-05.
36 ‘Bell-Like Notes’: Women Singers on the Air
Music has been a mainstay of radio programming since its inception, even though the type of music played over the air was often subject to intense debates. Many stations, both A- and B-Class, believed that the duty of radio was to provide culturally uplifting classical music, and thus to teach the Australian people to appreciate highbrow culture. Other commercial stations, however, were more inclined to play popular hits, including jazz, crooners, and later
rock ‘n’ roll.14 Musical programming provided an early opportunity for women to be heard
on radio. They frequently performed on the air as live musicians and were also musical directors from the earliest years of radio; in 1925, for example, Jess Prideaux and Ruth
Phillips arranged evening concerts on Melbourne station 3AR.15 Female singers were also
present, as sopranos, mezzo-sopranos, and contraltos performed in early radio concerts.16
Singing continued to be a popular feature of radio programming for decades, and listeners regularly tuned in to their favourite songstresses. The popularity of women singers was demonstrated in 1935 when the Listener In, in conjunction with Melbourne commercial station 3UZ, ran a ‘Golden Voice of the Air’ competition in which listeners could vote for their favourite singers. The winner was soprano Irene Bennet, who beat out both male and
female competition.17 By the 1940s, talent shows such as Australia’s Amateur Hour and Radio
Auditions became popular evening entertainment, reflecting a wartime desire for light
entertainment. Once again women singers formed a large proportion of the talent on these shows.18
The language used to describe women’s singing voices in the radio press was detailed and developed, and from the mid-1920s radio magazines contained numerous references to
14 Bridget Griffen-Foley, Changing Stations: The Story of Australian Commercial Radio (Sydney: UNSW Press,
2009), 245–48.
15 ‘Next Week’s Programs’, Listener In, 17 January 1925, 30.
16 See for example: ‘People in the Programs’, Listener In, 17 January 1925, 21. 17 ‘Golden Voice Winner’, Listener In, 28 September 1935, 22.
37
women singers with ideal voices. These descriptions referenced clarity, enunciation and tone to evoke the quality of their performances. For example, in January 1925 the Listener In described contralto Jessie Shmith as having ‘a perfect radio voice, and a clear, bell-like enunciation which makes her items very attractive,’ while soprano Veronica Cox’s ‘bell-like
notes and perfect enunciation have given much pleasure to listeners.’19 In 1935 soprano
Molly Byrne’s voice was praised ‘almost as much for its wayward grace as its pure tone and very fine balance.’20
Amy Lawrence has argued that, in the United States, singing was connected to an established tradition of theatrical performance in which women were entrenched, which thus made it acceptable for women singers to be heard over the air. Singing had also long been considered part of the accomplishments of a genteel young lady, which made it a respectable
activity for women.21 It is clear from radio magazines such as the Listener In that the presence
of women singers on Australian radio were also seen as acceptable. Women singers were popular entertainers. The acceptability, and even desirability, of women’s singing voices on the air the undermines the commonly repeated argument that the natural pitch of women’s voices was distorted by radio technology; if a high-pitched voice did not ‘carry’ as well over the air, then how was it possible for a soprano’s ‘bell-like notes and perfect enunciation’ to be heard?22
‘Everything Depends on Your Voice’: Actresses on the Air
The stage career of Australian actress, writer, and future broadcaster Mary Marlowe represented the ‘steady rise to respectability’ of acting as a job for middle-class young women during the 1910s. At the beginning of her career, the stage ‘was still tainted with the Victorian
19 ‘Jessie Shmith’, Listener In, 17 January 1925, 21; ‘Won Over Forty Prizes’, Listener In, 10 January 1925, 11. 20 Georgia Rivers, ‘Sings with Her Brain’, Listener In, 30 March 1935, 15.
21 Amy Lawrence, Echo and Narcissus: Women’s Voices in Classical Hollywood Cinema (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1991), 18.
38
stigma of questionable propriety and was connected with the scandal and vice of the popular
imagination.’23 Recognising this, Marlowe worked to present herself as a woman of
impeccable personal morality who performed public charity work, which worked to associate acting with genteel femininity. Marlowe began broadcasting on Sydney commercial radio in 1934 and carried this moral mindset into her interviews with notable stage actors and actresses. Through these dialogues she continued to promote her passion for the theatre while also emphasising respectable femininity through her discussion of homemaking with
female interview subjects. 24 In an interview with South African-born actress Marjorie
Gordon in 1939, Gordon’s career was clearly shown not to impede her role as a good wife: Marlowe: Now did you play here in “Rose Marie”. You slipped away
after the Melbourne season and Violet Carlson replaced you here. Gordon: I slipped away for good wifely reasons. I came to Australia believing that my husband, Paul Vernon, would be able to get leave from the B.B.C. in London, and come out for six months’ visit to Australia. Then he found he could not be released and so I shortened
my own engagement and went home.25
By the 1930s, when a number of women were performing in various forms of radio theatre, live theatre was seen as compatible with a middle-class ideal of femininity. Most radio actresses in mid-twentieth century Australia were also involved in live theatre, with a number having successful careers in both. Lyndall Barbour, for example, won the Sydney Theatre Critics’ Circle award for best actress in 1955-56 for The Rose Tattoo, at a time when she was
23 Deborah Campbell, ‘From Theatre to Radio: The Popular Career of Mary Marlowe’, in Australian Popular
Culture, ed. Peter Spearitt and David Walker (Sydney: George Allen & Unwin Australia Pty Ltd, 1979), 86.
24 Ibid.
25 Mary Marlowe, Interview with Marjorie Gordon, Script, 1939, MLMSS 735, Mary Marlowe Papers and
39
also recording dozens of episodes of radio serials each week, including the popular and long-
running soap opera Portia Faces Life.26
Silent film acting also predated radio, and was recognised as a new professional
opportunity for the ‘modern girl’ in the 1910s.27 The advent of talking pictures in the late
1920s, however, proved a significant threat to the film actress, as production companies
turned to stage actresses who had competence in speaking dialogue.28 The arrival of sound
films also sparked anxieties about the quality of the voices they presented, and this was a particular concern in Australia. American accents were heard as a form of obscenity which would corrupt young people’s speech. This moral panic was particularly aimed at actresses, whose voices were deemed by the Illustrated Tasmanian Mail to be ‘for the most part, not so
good,’ compared with the more consistently acceptable speech of their male counterparts.29
This demonstrates that modern technology brought with it new anxieties over the place of women’s speech, and that the increasing audibility of women became a focus of criticism. However, these anxieties manifested differently in the example of radio, which unlike film has always been based on the sound of the voice. Women’s dramatic performances on radio were understood to be closer to live theatre, and as such the presence of their voices in these programs was more acceptable than in in film.
The earliest years of Australian radio contained a paucity of radio drama, with only a
small number of radio sketches broadcast.30 However, women were present even from these
early days, as they acted in and even wrote some of these programs. In January 1930, for example, the Listener In reported that two women, Ivy Davis and Courtney Ford, were to
26 Martha Rutledge, ‘Barbour, Lyndall Harvey (1916–1986)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography (National Centre
of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 2007),
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/barbour-lyndall-harvey-12172/text21813, accessed 26 February 2018.
27 Christine Gledhill, ‘The Screen Actress from Silence to Sound’, in The Cambridge Companion to the Actress, ed.
Maggie B. Gale and John Stokes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 193.
28 Ibid., 205.
29 Quoted in Joy Damousi, Colonial Voices: A Cultural History of English in Australia 1840-1940 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2010), 265–6.
30 Richard Lane, The Golden Age of Australian Radio Drama, 1923-1960: A History Through Biography (Melbourne:
40
perform their ‘bright and breezy’ sketch called Romance and Typewriting.31 Ford was described
as ‘one of our most popular radio artists’ and Davis ‘a character actress of much ability.’32 By
1931 groups of radio players were broadcasting in Sydney and Melbourne on the fledgling