''Cavalcade of America'' is an

anthology drama An anthology series is a radio, television, video game or film series that spans different genres and presents a different story and a different set of characters in each different episode, season, segment, or short. These usually have a diffe ...

series that was sponsored by the

DuPont Company DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...

, although it occasionally presented musicals, such as an adaptation of ''

Show Boat ''Show Boat'' is a musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Edna Ferber's best-selling 1926 novel of the same name. The musical follows the lives of the performers, stagehands and dock worke ...

'', and condensed biographies of popular composers. It was initially broadcast on radio from

1935 Events January * January 7 – Italian premier Benito Mussolini and French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval conclude an agreement, in which each power agrees not to oppose the other's colonial claims. * January 12 – Amelia Earhart ...

1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito is chosen President of Yugosl ...

, and on television from

1952 Events January–February * January 26 – Black Saturday in Egypt: Rioters burn Cairo's central business district, targeting British and upper-class Egyptian businesses. * February 6 ** Princess Elizabeth, Duchess of Edinburgh, becomes m ...

1957 1957 ( MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1957th year of the Common Era (CE) and ''Anno Domini'' (AD) designations, the 957th year of the 2nd millennium, the 57th year of the 20th century, and the 8th year ...

. Originally on CBS, the series pioneered the use of anthology drama for company audio advertising. ''Cavalcade of America'' documented historical events using stories of individual courage, initiative and achievement, often with feel-good dramatizations of the human spirit's triumph against all odds. The series was intended to improve DuPont's public image after

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

. The company's motto, "Maker of better things for better living through chemistry," was read at the beginning of each program, and the dramas emphasized humanitarian progress, particularly improvements in the lives of women, often through technological innovation.

Background

The show started as part of a successful campaign to reinvigorate DuPont. In the early 1930s, the

Nye Committee The Nye Committee, officially known as the Special Committee on Investigation of the Munitions Industry, was a United States Senate committee (April 12, 1934 – February 24, 1936), chaired by U.S. Senator Gerald Nye (R-ND). The committee investig ...

investigations concluded that DuPont had made a fortune profiteering in

. The company stood accused of encouraging an

arms race An arms race occurs when two or more groups compete in military superiority. It consists of a competition between two or more states to have superior armed forces; a competition concerning production of weapons, the growth of a military, and ...

between World War I enemies, after being heavily subsidized by the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

to increase

black powder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). T ...

production. The negative effects of the investigation left the company demoralized, directionless and with a tarnished corporate image in the middle of the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

. DuPont's products were primarily not for public consumption, so there was no purpose in promoting them through advertising. As a solution to DuPont's troubles, Roy S. Durstine, then creative director of Batten, Barton, Durstine & Osborn, proposed the creation of ''Cavalcade of America'' using the company motto. This was to be an important element in the successful re-branding of DuPont as an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

legacy engaged in making products for the well-being of Americans and humanity in general.

Content

DuPont's image problems led the company to promote some

pacifist Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campai ...

and

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...

ideals. DuPont stipulated several topics would be taboo on the show, such as gunfire of any kind, which attracted writers such as Norman Rosten and

Arthur Miller Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are ''All My Sons'' (1947), '' Death of a Salesman'' (1 ...

, who had signed the

Oxford Pledge The King and Country Debate was a debate on 9 February 1933 at the Oxford Union Society. The motion presented, "This House will under no circumstances fight for its King and country", passed at 275 votes for the motion and 153 against it. The mo ...

while at

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

. For scripts, the program was also able to attract such prominent writers as

Maxwell Anderson James Maxwell Anderson (December 15, 1888 – February 28, 1959) was an American playwright, author, poet, journalist, and lyricist. Background Anderson was born on December 15, 1888, in Atlantic, Pennsylvania, the second of eight children to ...

Stephen Vincent Benét Stephen Vincent Benét (; July 22, 1898 – March 13, 1943) was an American poet, short story writer, and novelist. He is best known for his book-length narrative poem of the American Civil War, '' John Brown's Body'' (1928), for which he receiv ...

Carl Sandburg Carl August Sandburg (January 6, 1878 – July 22, 1967) was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor. He won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of Abraham Lincoln. During his lifetime, Sandburg ...

and Robert Sherwood. Although

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the w ...

historian Frank Monaghan signed on as an advisor to ensure historically accuracy of the scripts, listeners were quick to point out

anachronism An anachronism (from the Greek , 'against' and , 'time') is a chronological inconsistency in some arrangement, especially a juxtaposition of people, events, objects, language terms and customs from different time periods. The most common ty ...

s; trains did not use air brakes in 1860 and Washington's troops could not have sung "Tannenbaum" while crossing the Delaware since it was written two months after that event.

Notable cast

This is the cast listing according to ''The Concise Encyclopedia of American Radio''. Narrator

Walter Huston Walter Thomas Huston ( ;According to the Province of Ontario. ''Ontario, C ...

Actors: *

Walter Brennan Walter Andrew Brennan (July 25, 1894 – September 21, 1974) was an American actor and singer. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performances in '' Come and Get It'' (1936), ''Kentucky'' (1938), and '' The Westerner ...

* Ray Collins * Ted de Corsia *

Kenny Delmar Kenneth Howard Delmar (born Kenneth Frederick Fay Howard,
''

Ross Elliott Ross Elliott (born Elliott Blum, June 18, 1917 – August 12, 1999) was an American television and film character actor. He began his acting career in the Mercury Theatre, where he performed in '' The War of the Worlds'', Orson Welles' f ...

Cary Grant Cary Grant (born Archibald Alec Leach; January 18, 1904November 29, 1986) was an English-American actor. He was known for his Mid-Atlantic accent, debonair demeanor, light-hearted approach to acting, and sense of comic timing. He was one of ...

* Gary Gray *

Ted Jewett Edward K. Jewett (1904–1961) was an American character actor. Jewett voiced characters, and served as an announcer on NBC Radio, CBS Radio, and Mutual Broadcasting during the Golden Age of Radio. Early life and education Jewett was born in ...

Raymond Edward Johnson Raymond Edward Johnson (July 24, 1911 – August 15, 2001) was an American radio and stage actor best remembered for his work on ''Inner Sanctum Mysteries''. Early years Born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, Johnson started out as a bank teller, and la ...

* Bill Johnstone *

John McIntire John Herrick McIntire (June 27, 1907 – January 30, 1991) was an American character actor who appeared in 65 theatrical films and many television series. McIntire is well known for having replaced Ward Bond, upon Bond's sudden death in Novem ...

Agnes Moorehead Agnes Robertson Moorehead (December 6, 1900April 30, 1974) was an American actress. In a career spanning four decades, her credits included work in radio, stage, film, and television.Obituary ''Variety'', May 8, 1974, page 286. Moorehead was th ...

Dennis Morgan Dennis Morgan (born Earl Stanley Morner, December 20, 1908 – September 7, 1994) was an American actor-singer. He used the acting pseudonym Richard Stanley before adopting the name under which he gained his greatest fame. According to one obi ...

Jeanette Nolan Jeanette Nolan (December 30, 1911 – June 5, 1998) was an American actress. Nominated for four Emmy Awards, she had roles in the television series '' The Virginian'' (1962–1971) and ''Dirty Sally'' (1974), and in films such as ''Macbeth'' ...

Tyrone Power Tyrone Edmund Power III (May 5, 1914 – November 15, 1958) was an American actor. From the 1930s to the 1950s, Power appeared in dozens of films, often in swashbuckler roles or romantic leads. His better-known films include ''Jesse James (193 ...

* Frank Readick *

Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...

Stafford Repp Stafford Alois Repp (April 26, 1918November 5, 1974) was an American actor best known for his role as Police Chief Miles Clancy O'Hara on ABC's ''Batman'' television series. Career Soon after the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, he ser ...

Mickey Rooney Mickey Rooney (born Joseph Yule Jr.; other pseudonym Mickey Maguire; September 23, 1920 – April 6, 2014) was an American actor. In a career spanning nine decades, he appeared in more than 300 films and was among the last surviving stars of the ...

* Luis van Rooten *

Everett Sloane Everett H. Sloane (October 1, 1909 – August 6, 1965) was an American character actor who worked in radio, theatre, films, and television. Early life Sloane was born in Manhattan on October 1, 1909, to Nathaniel I. Sloane and Rose (Gerst ...

* Jack Smart * Paul Stewart * Karl Swenson *

Orson Welles George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter, known for his innovative work in film, radio and theatre. He is considered to be among the greatest and most influential f ...

Advertising

''Cavalcade of America'' made a major impact in radio advertising during its run on the air. DuPont, a chemical corporation that did not sell public goods, sponsored ''Cavalcade of America'' and integrated their company slogan and agenda into the inspirational and pro-American achievement themes of each episode. After DuPont's war profits were revealed to be in the billions and the company's stock nearly quadrupled, the American public saw DuPont negatively as one of the “merchants of death” after World War I. This forced ''Cavalcade of America'' to fall in line with avoiding the use of many radio cliches of the day, including gunfire and depicting blacks on the radio. The writers of Cavalcade of America supported this move by DuPont, as the staff was made up of mainly young academics that were either pacifists or signed an anti-war pledge in college. With new writers and a world-class PR firm, DuPont was able to shake the “merchant of death” label and remained a sponsor for a top radio program. ''Cavalcade of America'' was an early exercise in corporate image-building. DuPont promoted itself as a hero for America. This type of propaganda was shrewd but effective; it put a corporate image behind the real-life heroes that lived a century before. One way DuPont was able to emphasize its own products in episodes of ''Cavalcade of America'' was by having health-related episodes that promoted the use of chemical-compound products manufactured by DuPont. This was not necessarily advertising, since individuals could not go to the store and purchase these chemical items.Cavalcade of America. Newspaper Heroes on the Air.
/ref> According to DuPont public relations executives, the goal was not to directly sell their products, but rather to explain the company's goals and foster the confidence, respect and goodwill of the public. By recreating little-known events in the lives of historically-respected Americans through dramatizations, ''Cavalcade of America'' caused listeners to associate DuPont's products with patriotism and self-reliance. The series also gave history and chemistry more prestige than it would have otherwise had. By making the show thrilling, but not over-sensationalized, DuPont was able to better its own branding and get away from being perceived as a military-only company.Marchand, R. (2001). Creating the Corporate Soul: The Rise of Public Relations and Corporate Imagery in Big Business. pp. 220–223.

Nylon show

On May 15, 1940 DuPont made

nylon Nylon is a generic designation for a family of synthetic polymers composed of polyamides ( repeating units linked by amide links).The polyamides may be aliphatic or semi-aromatic. Nylon is a silk-like thermoplastic, generally made from pet ...

women's

hosiery Hosiery, also referred to as legwear, describes garments worn directly on the feet and legs. The term originated as the collective term for products of which a maker or seller is termed a hosier; and those products are also known generically as ...

available to the public and began an advertising blitz. The day was designated "N-day" by DuPont's marketeers, and an entire episode of ''Cavalcade of America'' was markedly different: DuPont selected a "typical" housewife to interview G.P. Hoff, Director of Research of DuPont's Nylon Division. In the rigged interview, Hoff expounded at length on the virtues of nylon. Eager to purchase nylon hose, thousands of women waited in lines for department stores to open the following morning. 750,000 nylons had been manufactured for N-Day, but all were sold on the first day they went on sale.

Television

Francis Sullivan Richard Avonde Cavalcade of America 1954

In the 1950s, DuPont switched its advertising strategy from radio to television, and ''Cavalcade of America'' became a television series mainly produced by

Jack Chertok Jack Chertok (July 13, 1906 – June 14, 1995) was an American film and television producer perhaps best known to modern viewers as producer for the 182 black and white episodes of ''The Lone Ranger''. Career Born in Atlanta, Georgia, to Russi ...

. One hundred and thirty-three episodes were aired over five seasons between 1952 and 1957. During a six-month period, the television and radio series overlapped. The show was telecast on both NBC (1952–53) and ABC (1953–57). It was renamed ''DuPont Cavalcade Theater'' in August 1955, and it was known as ''DuPont Theater'' during its last year. In the 1957 fall season, it was replaced by ''

The DuPont Show of the Month ''DuPont Show of the Month'' was a 90-minute television anthology series that aired monthly on CBS from 1957 to 1961. The DuPont Company also sponsored a weekly half-hour dramatic anthology series hosted by June Allyson, ''The DuPont Show with Ju ...

,'' a 90-minute live dramatization of popular novels and short stories or abridged versions of films and plays. That series ran until 1961. Many

kinescopes Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program on motion picture film, directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s ...

of ''Cavalcade of America'' survive at the

UCLA Film and Television Archive The UCLA Film & Television Archive is a visual arts organization focused on the preservation, study, and appreciation of film and television, based at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Also a nonprofit exhibition venue, the a ...

Season 1 (1952–53)

Season 2 (1953–54)

Season 3 (1954–55)

Season 4 (1955–56)

Season 5 (1956–57)

Books

During the late 1930s, Dixon Ryan Fox and Arthur Meier Schlesinger edited a series of books based on the series published by Milton Bradley. In 1956, the series was adapted into a book, ''Cavalcade of America: The Deeds and Achievements of the Men and Women Who Made Our Country Great'', published by Crown. Chapters covered such historical figures as Abraham Lincoln, telegraph organizer Hiram Sibley, engineer James Eads, John Quincy Adams fighting the gag rule and Clara Barton's career that led her to head the American Red Cross.

Martin Grams, Jr. Martin Grams Jr. (born April 19, 1977) is an American popular culture historian who wrote and co-wrote over thirty books about network broadcasting and motion-pictures. Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Grams is the son of a magician, Martin Grams Sr. ...

's ''The History of the Cavalcade of America'' (Morris Publishing, 1998) features episode guides for both the radio and TV series.

Notes

References

* Blue, Howard (2002). ''Words at War: World War II Era Radio and the Postwar Broadcasting Industry Blacklist. ''Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. * * * * *

External links

''Cavalcade of America''
– Jerry Haendiges Vintage Radio Logs

at CVTA
''Cavalcade of America''
clips at the

Hagley Library Hagley is a large village and civil parish in Worcestershire, England. It is on the boundary of the West Midlands and Worcestershire counties between the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley and Kidderminster. Its estimated population was 7,162 in ...

*
''Cavalcade of America''
at

Museum of Broadcast Communications The Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC) is an American museum, the stated mission of which is "to collect, preserve, and present historic and contemporary radio and television content as well as educate, inform and entertain through our arc ...

''Company Voice Advertising''
at

''Cavalcade of America''
in ''American Studies'' at the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United States, with highly selective ad ...

Cavalcade of America scripts
Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library

Listen to

*
''Cavalcade of America''
at OTR.Network Library

Watch

Public domain TV episode ''A Chain of Hearts'' on Internet Archive, with original commercials
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cavalcade Of America 1952 American television series debuts 1957 American television series endings 1935 radio programme debuts 1953 radio programme endings 1930s American radio programs 1940s American radio programs 1950s American radio programs 1950s American anthology television series American Broadcasting Company original programming 1950s American drama television series Black-and-white American television shows CBS Radio programs English-language television shows NBC original programming Peabody Award-winning radio programs NBC radio programs Anthology radio series