“When Radio Was” is a show produced a company called Radio Spirits Inc.  Each show highlights several episodes from OTR shows.  In a single sitting you could here episode from such shows as “The Saint”, “The Lone Ranger”, “The Green Hornet”, “The Shadow”, “Jack Benny”,”Burns and Allen”, “The Twilight Zone”, “Boston Blackie” and many others from “The Golden Age” of radio.

Radio’s “Golden Age” generally took place between the 1930′s and the early 1950′s.  This was a time before the television, when actors had nothing more then their voice and sound effects and the listener had little more then their imagination.  As television creeped into homes a lot of these shows began to transition to the screen.

“The Lone Ranger” and “The Twilight Zone” are probably two of the more obvious transitions but others, such as “The Green Hornet” which debuted Bruce Lee as Kato and “The Saint” with Roger Moore.

With the recent holidays one might have seen a prime reference to and OTR.  Fans of “A Christmas Story” will probably remember the character Ralphie listening to “Little Orphan Annie” and deciphering with his decoder ring, “Drink More Ovaltine”.

These shows are fun to listen to and with Internet media, such as podcasting, you can now listen to a lot of these shows online. Most of the shows are now out of copyright and in the public domain and are widely available online. From time to time I may post a specific article about a specific show recommendation to listen to.