We tend to forget what a crucial role railroads played in our society during the 20th century. It was the main source of transportation over long distances for passengers (or medium distances for commuters) and for freight and raw materials. Air travel was still considered a luxury and our highway system was still evolving.

In 1946 the country was crippled from a strike by Railroad workers. Essentially, the entire nation was stranded, and the strike quickly escalated to crisis stage where President Truman addressed the country to declare a national emergency in an effort to bring the warring parties back to the bargaining table.

On May 24th he made a radio address and on May 25th he addressed an emergency session of Congress.

Here is that May 24th address by President Truman from the White House as broadcast over all networks.

Ironically, the strike was settled the next day as Truman addressed Congress. But until then, it was a nail-biter.

Continuing our occasional series of broadcast transcriptions of American Music, circa 1930's and 1940's with music by Douglas Moore. Moore is probably best known for his folk opera The Ballad Of Baby Doe. This recording was part of a series of broadcast concert excerpts featuring strictly American Classicl music, put together for The State Department and issued only overseas

Moore's Farm Journal is probably one of his lesser known pieces and this performance, recorded circa 1946 features the CBS (Radio) Symphony conducted by Alfredo Antonini.

As I'm sure you've noticed by now, there's no shortage of American composers from the early 20th century onward. It's just a question of hearing their work that's the problem from time to time.

More rarities next week. Stick around.

On this day in 1946 if you were listening to the radio you would probably be hearing an address by former Treasury Secretary under FDR Henry Morgenthau on the state of housing in Post-War America and where the returning Veteran stood in all of it.

Then as now, Real Estate prices were grossly inflated and there seemed to be little in the way of a remedy for it. Measures were introduced such as the Veteran's Emergency Housing Bill to provide a ceiling for prices in an attempt to curb runaway prices. But, as always, lobbies in Washington were powerful and belligerent and the crisis only deepened.

Henry Morgenthau: “Wyatt’s (Wilson Wyatt, author of Veteran's Emergency House Bill) proposal was simply this; suppose a man owns a house, he would be permitted to sell it once at any price he could get for it. But if the house is again put up for sale after that, that same price would be considered the ceiling so long as the emergency lasts. In other words, if he got $10,000 dollars for the house, $10,000 would thereafter be considered the ceiling price. This would have done nothing, of course to roll the real estate prices back from their present dangerously inflated levels. Mr. Wyatt was just trying to work out a compromise. But the Real Estate lobbies wouldn’t hold still, even for that. They know perfectly well that millions of dollars of Black Market money, a lot of it in the form of $1,000 bills is being poured into real estate speculation. Evidently they are unwilling to put an end to it. As far as the Real Estate lobbies are concerned, Real Estate prices can go on rising till kingdom come. Even if the average American and the Veteran are reduced to living in cellers.”

In trying to remedy a situation that had spiraled out of control, Morgenthau, on behalf of the Truman administration sought to ease the anxieties and express some sort of solution to the problem. This radio address, given on May 16th 1946 was part of a weekly series of addresses Morgenthau gave on Post-War problems.

. . .and I left in the Gallo Wine commercial as a reminder.

James M. Mead is a name virtually forgotten. He was a New Deal Senator who represented New York from 1938 until 1947. During those years Herbert Lehman was Governor of New York, and in 1946 Mead switched with Lehman who in turn ran for Mead's Senate seat. Lehman won but Mead lost out to Thomas Dewey. By all appearances it was a gamble that lost.

But on September 9, 1946, Mead was riding high and delivered a high-energy acceptance speech at the State Democratic Convention to kick off the campaign.

James M. Mead: “I accept this heavy responsibility because I am convinced that the time has come in this state when the people must choose between the principles for which those three great men stood (FDR, Alfred Smith, Herbert Lehman), and the unsound principles that have been advanced, financed and fostered by a group of faithless and visionless reactionaries. Men who look backward and not forward. Men who seek to befuddle the public in order to obtain their own selfish end. They make bold to speak for the many, while they act for the few.”

After his defeat, Mead served on the Federal Trade Commission from 1949-1955 before quietly fading from politics

(Bernard Baruch - also coined the term "Cold War")

When President Truman appointed Industrialist and financial adviser Bernard Baruch to represent the U.S. at the first United Nations Conference on Atomic Energy in 1946, it raised a few eyebrows.

Baruch had advised Presidents Wilson and Roosevelt (FDR) on the financial well-being of the country, but many felt he had no business advising the world on the state of Nuclear Energy, for either making war or peace. He had been instrumental in implementing many of the wartime austerity measures adopted during the War, and early on was a member of the celebrated "Brain Trust" during the formative days of the New Deal.

But Atomic Energy? Maybe some of it had to do with Baruch having been around the block a few times (he was born in 1870), knew the utter devastation world wars like the First and Second were capable of, and knew this new weapon would pale those wars by comparison. Or he saw Atomic Energy as a potential good thing and, as someone who spent his life making money, knew a good thing when he saw it.

But I tend to doubt the later and would like to believe the former. Baruch was deeply involved in the welfare and common good of the people. He never sought public office but rather stayed on the sidelines and advised from the point of view of experience.

And perhaps it was this experience that led Truman to appoint him to the UNAEC. In any event, he delivered his famous "The Quick and The Dead" address to the first meeting of the Commission on June 14, 1946. He laid out what became known as The Baruch Plan for the elimination of nuclear weapons after implementation of a system of international inspections and controls and punishment for violators. The Soviet Union strenuously objected.

Bernard Baruch: “We are here to make a choice, between the quick and the dead.”

Those ominous opening lines reflected the general fear brought about by this new weapon. The fear would only grow over the coming years.

(Sec. of State James F. Byrnes at The Paris Peace Conference of 1946 - not at all that much different from herding cats.)

A voice probably not heard very much the past fifty or so years. James F. Byrnes was Secretary of State at the end of World War 2 and had the somewhat onerous task of rebuilding the peace in a war shattered world. The initial Peace Conferences, held in Paris were not successful. The world was undergoing changes not encountered at the end of World War 1. Former colonies were seeking independence and the Soviet Union was actively engaged in a land grab. Only a few months earlier, in March former Prime Minister Winston Churchill warned of an impending "iron curtain" which would fall over Easter Europe and the prospects of a Cold War loomed dangerously close in the future.

But Byrnes was optimistic.

Sec. of State James Byrnes: “Building the foundations of a people’s peace in a war shattered world is a long, hard process. A People’s peace cannot be won by flashing diplomatic triumphs. It requires patience and firmness, tolerance and understanding. We must not try to impose our will on others, but we must make sure that others do not get the impression they can impose their will on us.”

Byrnes would resign by the end of 1946 and be replaced by George C. Marshall. And a whole new era would begin.

Mid-Century Americana this week in the form of music from a composer I am completely unfamiliar with and whose information seems to be missing from just about everywhere. Stanley Finn is a name new to me and I have searched extensively to find out anything I can about him. This week's Gramophone features the only work I have of Stanley Finn - his Prelude and Dance for Orchestra.

Suffice to say the work was noteworthy enough in that it got the attention and admiration of fellow composers, most notably Roy Harris who leads the ABC Radio Symphony in a recording made roughly around 1946. Listening to the style, I would venture to guess he was either a pupil or colleague of Roy Harris' - but that's speculation.

If anyone has any information on this composer, please let me know and I will post an update.

Further evidence there is a lot that needs to be discovered out there - and probably even more that needs to be identified.

Something different tonight and going along with the Holiday spirit, but still doing sessions. Tonight it's a live performance from 1946 featuring one of the most popular black vocal groups from the 1930's to the 1950's. The Delta Rhythm Boys, like The Ink Spots, The Charioteers and many others, were prototypes for what became the Doo-Wop genre of the late 1940's through the 1950's and beyond. Elegantly structured vocal harmonies and cool arrangements of Standards were the signature of many of these groups. And the Delta Rhythm Boys were one of the best examples of that style.

Very popular in the U.S., they were phenomenons in Europe. So in the early 1950's they relocated and eventually took up residence in Paris where they stayed until the late 1980's by which time all the original founding members had passed away and the group was no more.

They did leave behind a rich legacy of studio recordings and numerous live recordings, of which tonight's Roundtable features two of them - Dry Bones and On The Sunny Side Of The Street, performed live on the Carnation Contented Hour from July 29, 1946.

Change of pace. Something maybe unfamiliar. Give it a shot and see if it appeals.

If it does, there's more to go with your Thanksgiving weekend.

Staying in Brazil for now. Here's a track by Linda Baptista, a very popular singer in Brazil and throughout South America in the 1940's and 1950's. Dubbed The Queen Of Radio in the 1940's, Baptista had a large following and an impressive catalog of recordings dating back to the early 1940's and going all the way into the 1960's.

Tonight it's the A-side of a single released by RCA-Victor in Brazil in 1946. Bonde do Caju doesn't fit the Samba mold, but rather another Brazilian music genre, Marcha, which was quite popular for much of the 20th Century in South America.

Very few of these recordings have actually been played on this side of the border, and it's highly doubtful most people will actually know who Linda Baptista was. But during her time she made a big impression on South American record buyers and she was one of a string of popular vocalists coming out of Brazil in the 1940's.

Jumping back into Post War Jazz tonight via the inimitable Slim Gaillard. The undisputed crown Prince of hipsters and scat singers, Gaillard crossed over so many musical boundaries it was almost impossible to categorize him. But it was never impossible to recognize him as one of the true originals and one of the most innovative artists to come along and blossom during that complete musical free-for-all known as the Post War Jazz period.

Like many artists of the time, he recorded for a whole host of record companies, many of them independent labels around the West Coast. One of those was the small L.A. based Jazz/R&B/Jump blues label Mel-o-Disc where Gaillard recorded this classic, Laguna, in 1946.

In a word, wowtee.