Anne Hummert (née Schumacher) (January 19, 1905 – July 5, 1996) was the leading co-creator of daytime radio serials or
soap opera
A soap opera (also called a daytime drama or soap) is a genre of a long-running radio or television Serial (radio and television), serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term ''soap opera'' originat ...
dramas during the 1930s and 1940s, responsible for more than three dozen series.
Biography
She was born in
Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the List of United States ...
, one of four children. Little is known about her parents or her childhood: some sources say her father Frederick was a police lieutenant; census documents say he was a steamfitter and contractor, and still other sources say he was an engineer.
["We Pay Our Respects". '']Broadcasting Magazine
''Broadcasting & Cable'' (''B&C'', or ''Broadcasting+Cable'') was a telecommunications industry monthly trade magazine and, later, news website published by Future US. Founded in 1931 as ''Broadcasting'', subsequent mergers, acquisitions and in ...
'', April 1, 1935, p. 31. After attending
Towson High School, she attended
Goucher College
Goucher College ( ') is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Towson, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1885 as a Nonsectarian, nonsecterian Women's colleges in the United States, ...
, where she majored in history, graduating
Phi Beta Kappa
The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States. It was founded in 1776 at the College of William & Mary in Virginia. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal arts and sciences, ...
and ''
magna cum laude
Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sout ...
'' in 1925. While at Goucher she also worked as a college correspondent for ''
The Baltimore Sun
''The Baltimore Sun'' is the largest general-circulation daily newspaper based in the U.S. state of Maryland and provides coverage of local, regional, national, and international news.
Founded in 1837, the newspaper was owned by Tribune Publi ...
''.
She then took a job with the Paris precursor of the ''
International Herald Tribune
The ''International Herald Tribune'' (''IHT'') was a daily English-language newspaper published in Paris, France, for international English-speaking readers. It published under the name ''International Herald Tribune'' starting in 1967, but its ...
''. It was in France that she married reporter John Ashenhurst, a former member of ''The Baltimore Sun''s editorial staff, in July 1926. The couple had one son, but the marriage was troubled. They moved back to the United States, and ultimately divorced. Anne Ashenhurst moved to Chicago, where she sought work as a journalist, but was unable to find a job. She was told of an opening at an advertising agency, and in 1930, she was hired as a copywriter and assistant to advertising executive
E. Frank Hummert. At the
Blackett-Sample-Hummert
Dancer Fitzgerald Sample (DFS and later DFS-Dorland) was a Madison Avenue advertising agency during the 20th century. It was founded in Chicago in 1923, and was acquired and merged into the Saatchi & Saatchi network in the 1980s.
History
The age ...
agency, she rose in the ranks and became a full partner in 1933, earning $100,000 a year. Radio historian
Jim Cox noted that when the two teamed to create daytime radio serials, they:
After their first major success, ''
Just Plain Bill
''Just Plain Bill'' was a 1931-1955 15-minute American radio drama program heard on CBS Radio and NBC Radio. It was "a story of people just like people we all know."
The program began on CBS on September 19, 1932. It was originally broadcast at ...
'', they followed with ''
Ma Perkins
''Ma Perkins'' (sometimes called ''Oxydol's Own Ma Perkins'') is an American radio soap opera that was heard on NBC from 1933 to 1949 and on CBS from 1942 to 1960. It was also broadcast in Canada, and Radio Luxembourg carried it in Europe.
T ...
'', ''
Skippy'', ''
Backstage Wife
''Backstage Wife'' is an American soap opera radio program that details the travails of Mary Noble, a girl from a small town in Iowa who came to New York seeking her future.
Personnel
Vivian Fridell had the title role from 1935 until the early ...
'' and ''
Young Widder Brown
''Young Widder Brown'' was a daytime radio drama series broadcast on NBC from 1938 to 1956.Terrace, Vincent (1999). ''Radio Programs, 1924-1984: A Catalog of More Than 1800 Shows''. McFarland & Company, Inc. . P. 361. Sponsored by Sterling Drugs ...
''. Their professional collaboration led to a personal relationship that neither had expected: Frank Hummert was a widower, after the death of his wife, Adeline Eleanor Woodlock, in 1934. He was twenty years older than his assistant, who was still recovering from her divorce from her husband John and was not expecting to remarry. That changed in 1935, when she married Frank Hummert. Friends and radio colleagues would later describe their marriage as "one of the great love matches".
[Robert McG. Thomas Jr. "Anne Hummert, 91, Dies". ''The New York Times'', July 21, 1996, p. 27.] Following their marriage, Frank and Anne Hummert moved to New York where they launched their company, Air Features, a radio production house. The Hummerts produced many radio drama series, including ''
Amanda of Honeymoon Hill'', ''
Front Page Farrell'', ''
John's Other Wife'', ''
Little Orphan Annie
''Little Orphan Annie'' was a daily American comic strip created by Harold Gray and print syndication#Comic strip syndication, syndicated by the Tribune Media Services. The strip took its name from the 1885 poem "Little Orphant Annie" by James ...
'', ''
Judy and Jane'', ''
Mr. Chameleon'', ''
Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons'' and ''
Our Gal Sunday
''Our Gal Sunday'' is an American soap opera produced by Frank and Anne Hummert, network broadcast via CBS from March 29, 1937, to January 2, 1959, starring Dorothy Lowell and, after Lowell's 1944 death, Vivian Smolen in the title role.
Th ...
''. They soon had as many as 18 separate 15-minute serials airing for a total of 90 episodes a week. They also produced ''
The American Album of Familiar Music
''The American Album of Familiar Music'' is a radio program of popular music broadcast from October 11, 1931, to June 20, 1954, first on NBC, then on American Broadcasting Company, ABC and finally on local stations. Directed by James Haupt, the s ...
'' the longest-running of 17
musical programs Air Features produced.
From their estate in
Greenwich, Connecticut
Greenwich ( ) is a New England town, town in southwestern Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it had a population of 63,518. It is the largest town on Gold Coast (Connecticut), Connectic ...
, Anne Hummert delivered a large weekly word count, outlining all of the plot twists for all of her programs. The Hummerts farmed out the writing to scripters, known as "dialoguers", who embellished her synopses into complete scripts for ''
Stella Dallas'', ''Young Widder Brown'' and other soap operas.
Actress
Mary Jane Higby observed, "Unquestionably, they had a profound influence on the whole literature of soap opera. They, more than anyone else, determined the shape it took." According to Jim Cox, by the 1940s the Hummerts controlled 46% of the national weekday broadcast schedule. Their programs brought in more than five million letters a year. By 1939, the Hummerts' programs were responsible for more than half the advertising revenues generated by daytime radio.
The Hummerts each had an annual income of $100,000 from their Air Features Corporation, but were considerably wealthier due to Frank Hummert's commercial real-estate holdings in his native St. Louis. Both were frugal and intensely private, preferring work to an active social life. Frank Hummert died at 76 in 1966. Anne Hummert was a multimillionaire recluse when she died on July 5, 1996, in her
Fifth Avenue
Fifth Avenue is a major thoroughfare in the borough (New York City), borough of Manhattan in New York City. The avenue runs south from 143rd Street (Manhattan), West 143rd Street in Harlem to Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village. The se ...
apartment at the age of 91.
See also
*
List of radio soaps
Radio daytime drama serials were broadcast for decades, and some expanded to television. These dramas are often referred to as "soaps", a shortening from "soap opera". That term stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that h ...
References
*Cox, Jim (2003). ''Frank and Anne Hummert's Radio Factory: The Programs and Personalities of Broadcasting's Most Prolific Producers''. McFarland Publishing.
*Taves, Isabella (1943).
Successful Women and How They Attained Success'. New York: P. Dutton & Co.
External links
The Paley Center for Media: Anne Hummert*Meyers, Cynthia Barbara (2005)
''Admen and the Shaping of American Commercial Broadcasting, 1926-50''Anne and Frank Hummert Scriptsat the
American Heritage Center
The American Heritage Center is the University of Wyoming's repository of manuscripts, rare books, and the university archives. Its collections focus on Wyoming and the Rocky Mountain West (including politics, settlement, Native Americans, and W ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hummert, Anne
American soap opera writers
1905 births
1996 deaths
Goucher College alumni
20th-century American screenwriters