Gildy Collecting, How To and Where To

[Lee]

To benefit our Gildy Listening club and for those who want to fortify their Gildy collections. I offer the following. The Gildersleeve Project is good for those who can figure out how to do it, I can't. But for those who want more than just the early shows and want them now, this is for you. For a long time, since the '70's, I was collecting Gildersleeve very sporadically. Whenever I happened to hear a show on the radio I'd tape it. Then the local station here started to play Gildy on a weekly basis, they played the 1947 and 1948 years. But they cut out all the Kraft commercials. But I listened to those shows over at least 3 times a piece. Then I started buying from companies like Radio Spirits & Radio Yesteryear and Adventures In Cassettes. But still the shows I could get were just various shows from here and there, different dates and time periods and it was kind of expensive this way too. I had all the time wished I could find a place to get all the Gildys in a row from beginning to end in a sensible fashion, not the here and there fashion I was forced to do. Well, the first answer came from Radio Yesteryear, they offered "Custom Taping" where they could send you a list of all the Gildys (or any show they have either listed by name of star or by name of program) and you could pick out the shows you wanted, but the catch was it cost $12 an hour. That was even more expensive than the other way of getting Gildy from the various Radio companies. By the way, the good news here, is that if you get a Custom Listing of all the Gildy shows from Radio Yesteryear, and ask for the full description version, not just the list of dates version, you will get every episode they have (they don't have all the episodes, but they do have most) with not just the date of the show but a detailed description of each episode and any interesting things that happened in the show. Such as "this is the first time Birdie particpates in the Kraft ad, or this is the beginning of the Name the Baby contest, etc. This full description Gildy episode guide I find very useful. I think the cost is only $3. It's been a year or so since I got a new version, call them at 1-800-243-0987 and ask about it.

At any rate the point of this whole thing is to tell you I finally did find an excellent place to get all (except for the final '55-'58 years) the Gildy shows. It is called "McCoy's Recording Inc." they're located on the web at the following address: http://www.old-time.com/mccoy.html
Here you can find all the Gildy's for a very affordable price, the cheapest I've found, and the more you buy the cheaper it is. If you get more than 100 episodes you get something like 25 or even 50 free. I forget all the details, I think it's like $5 or $6 an hour and it gets cheaper with the volume you buy. They have all but a few of the episodes. Go to this site and read the pricing details for yourself, I'm only telling you this from memory. This is the best place to get a complete (minus the '55-'58 yrs.) Gildy collection.

I found some of the missing episodes at another site, but this place charged a couple dollars more, it's Haendiges Old Time Radio site at: www.otrsite.com
Jerry Haendiges is a very nice man and very helpful. This was also a very good site and place to get old radio shows, but a little more expensive than McCoy's, but not that much more. It's a bit difficult to find what you want at this 2nd site, but if you click on the radio logs place and then click on "G" for Great Gildersleeve, there you'll find all the Gildy episodes he has. He is missing a few that McCoy's has and he has a few that McCoy's doesn't. Likewise, Radio Yesteryear has a few that neither McCoy's or Haendiges has, but there you pay through the nose at $12 an hour for the "Custom Taping." These episodes I still need to buy from Radio Yesteryear, it's the only place I know where to get them. But all but a few can be bought from McCoy's.

So if you can't wait and want to get a good collection right now (I don't know how to use that Gildersleeve Project site downloads of shows) go to the McCoy's site. This way in the Gilderlseeve Listening Club we can listen to more than just the beginning years of Gildy. (I'm not so thrilled with those starting years anyway.) I took the plunge and bought everything McCoy had (of Gildersleeve) figuring it would be cheaper in the long run. I replaced my non-commercial shows with commercial ones, love those Krafty ads. Then I bought the few missing one's from Haendiges. Now the other missing ones I need to get from Yesteryear.

Good luck to you with your Gildy collecting choices. It is easier now to get a near complete collection than it ever was pre-internet days.

[Richard Giblin]

Thanks for all the great info, Lee. You really went to considerable effort to acquire your collection. I kind of feel guilty now with my 21st-Century ways of getting them so easily in mp3. I owe you a big thanks becuase it is likely that without fellas like you carefully archiving OTR for years, many of these shows might not have survived to the computer age.
You make a very good case for the Radio Yesteryear Custom listing. I'm ordering mine tomorrow!
I also agree with your fondness for the Kraft commercials, they are really quite enjoyable. I have a question though: is the advertised product, KRAFT DINNNER the old name for what we now call KRAFT MACARONI AND CHEESE DINNER? If so, was the old version different in some way? (maybe this is getting a little "off-topic", sorry, but I am paying attention to the commercials, you see)
I'm sorry to hear you had problems working the files at Mike's Gildersleeve Project. If you would like help, please let me know!

[Lee]

Thanks for the kind words, Richard. Well, I actually looked up my information, last night, something I probably should have done before writing my message yesterday. The good news is that McCoy's Recording costs are a lot less expensive than I reported. They actually charge $3.95 an hour, BUT if you buy at least 50 cassettes, you pay $2.50 each plus shipping. If you buy 100 or more cassettes, it's $2.50 each and the shipping is free! If you're buying under 50 cassettes, here's what they do, "For each single purchase of 5 cssettes, you chose one cassette free of charge. For each single order of 10 cassettes, choose 3 free, order 20, choose 6 free, etc." So as you can see, what I realized when I was going to take the Gildersleeve plunge, that buying in bulk (100 or more) is the cheapest way. Many, if not most, of his cassettes are actually 90" long, but they cost the same as the 60" ones. So you're getting 3 for the price of 2 in many of the cases.

Now as for price details of Jerry Haendiges Radio shows, here it's more expensive. He charges $6 an hour and you get one free after you buy 10, but I don't believe he gives one free for every 10 you buy, only for the 1st 10 after that you keep paying $6.00 an hour. You may go to his site to figure it out for yourself if you want. But it sounds like you only will get one free tape, period. So that's why McCoy's is still the best place for getting a massive collection. I've talked with Mr. Haendiges and he's very helpful and you can get a couple tapes from him that you can't get from McCoys. To save you all the time consuming effort it takes to compare the listings of McCoy, Haendiges, & Radio Yesteryear, I'll let you know what I discovered after comparing each of their episode listings. There are only a few Haendiges has that McCoy doesn't, they are the 5/16/41, 12/7/41, and the 4/1/45 episodes. But McCoys has a whole lot that Haendiges doesn't have. So bottom line, start out with McCoys, then fill in with Haendiges, then fill in those missing still with Radio Yesteryear.

Assuming you buy all from McCoy and the 3 missing ones from Haendiges, you will then need to get the following episodes from Radio Yesteryear (these are the one's I still need too), they are episodes from:
12/3/44, 1/28/45, 10/21/46, 3/20/49, 4/1/49, 1/3/53, and the 10/20/55 episode. I haven't ordered these yet myself, they cost $12 an hour with Radio Yesteryear's "Custom Taping". You tell them exactly what you want and they tape it for you at this cost. If anyone has these episodes and would be willing to make me a copy for their costs, or at least less than $12 an hour, I'd be glad to hear from you. These are the ones that are left on my own "Most Wanted" list of Gildy shows.

As to the Kraft dinner question, I'm sorry I can't answer it. I wasn't born till the same time as Gildy was going off the air in 1958. I used to watch the Kraft Music Hall on TV with Eddy Arnold as host, and I remember those mouth watering Kraft ads that Ed Herloughie (not sure of his last name spelling) used to narrate and those delicious recipes they'd show. I always buy Kraft Cream Cheese now, even though the store brand is probably just as good. I believe he used to say, "If it's from Kraft, it's delicous" as the tag line to each commercial.

Happy Gildy Hunting To One & All