Camel Caravan
Encyclopedia
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
and CBS Radio
CBS Radio
CBS Radio, Inc., formerly known as Infinity Broadcasting Corporation, is one of the largest owners and operators of radio stations in the United States, third behind main rival Clear Channel Communications and Cumulus Media. CBS Radio owns around 130 radio stations across the country...
from 1933 to 1954. Various vocalists, musicians and comedy acts were heard during the 21 years this show was on the air, including such talents as Benny Goodman
Benny Goodman
Benjamin David “Benny” Goodman was an American jazz and swing musician, clarinetist and bandleader; widely known as the "King of Swing".In the mid-1930s, Benny Goodman led one of the most popular musical groups in America...
, Georgia Gibbs
Georgia Gibbs
Georgia Gibbs was an American popular singer and vocal entertainer rooted in jazz. Already singing publicly in her early teens, Gibbs first achieved acclaim in the mid-1950s interpreting songs originating with the black rhythm and blues community and later as a featured vocalist on a long list of...
, Anita O'Day
Anita O'Day
Anita O'Day was an American jazz singer.Born Anita Belle Colton, O'Day was admired for her sense of rhythm and dynamics, and her early big band appearances shattered the traditional image of the "girl singer"...
and Vaughn Monroe
Vaughn Monroe
Vaughn Wilton Monroe was an American baritone singer, trumpeter and big band leader and actor, most popular in the 1940s and 1950s. He has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for recording and radio.-Biography:...
.
It debuted December 7, 1933, on CBS as a showcase for Glen Gray
Glen Gray
Glen Gray Knoblauch, better known as Glen Gray, was a jazz saxophonist and leader of the Casa Loma Orchestra....
and the Casa Loma Orchestra
Casa Loma Orchestra
The Casa Loma Orchestra was a popular American dance band active from 1927 to 1963. From 1929 until the rapid multiplication in the number of swing bands from 1935 on, the Casa Loma Orchestra was one of the top North American dance bands...
. Deane Janis was the vocalist and Walter O'Keefe supplied the comedy along with Stoopnagle and Budd
Stoopnagle and Budd
Stoopnagle and Budd were a popular radio comedy team of the 1930s, who are sometimes cited as forerunners of the Bob and Ray style of radio comedy...
. Broadcast on Tuesdays and Thursdays, it continued until June 25, 1936.
On June 30, 1936 the show was reformatted, featuring Nathaniel Shilkret
Nathaniel Shilkret
Nathaniel Shilkret was an American composer, conductor, clarinetist, pianist, business executive, and music director born in New York City, New York to an Austrian immigrant family.-Early career:...
and his orchestra and Benny Goodman
Benny Goodman
Benjamin David “Benny” Goodman was an American jazz and swing musician, clarinetist and bandleader; widely known as the "King of Swing".In the mid-1930s, Benny Goodman led one of the most popular musical groups in America...
and his swing band, with novelist Ruppert Hughes as Master of Ceremonies and vocalists Martha Tilton
Martha Tilton
Martha Tilton was an American popular singer, best-known for her 1939 recording of "And the Angels Sing" with Benny Goodman. She was sometimes introduced as The Liltin' Miss Tilton.Tilton and her family lived in Texas and Kansas, relocating to Los Angeles when she was seven years old...
and Johnny Mercer
Johnny Mercer
John Herndon "Johnny" Mercer was an American lyricist, songwriter and singer. He is best known as a lyricist, but he also composed music. He was also a popular singer who recorded his own songs as well as those written by others...
. A Los Angeles Times picture caption notes that Gladys Swarthout
Gladys Swarthout
Gladys Swarthout was an American mezzo-soprano opera singer.-Career:...
was the guest artist on the initial broadcast. Shilkret left the show on September 22, 1936.
Jack Oakie's College was added to the hour on December 29, 1936. While this aired on Tuesdays on CBS until June 20, 1939, another Benny Goodman Camel Caravan (often subtitled The Camel Hot Club) was heard Saturdays on NBC during 1939. Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor was an American "illustrated song" performer, comedian, dancer, singer, actor and songwriter...
starred in another CBS Camel Caravan broadcast from March 28, 1938 to June 26, 1939.
The NBC show was taken over by Bob Crosby
Bob Crosby
George Robert "Bob" Crosby was an American dixieland bandleader and vocalist, best known for his group the Bob-Cats.-Family:...
on June 27, 1939.
Others who starred on this series during the years were Xavier Cugat
Xavier Cugat
Xavier Cugat was a Spanish-American bandleader who spent his formative years in Havana, Cuba. A trained violinist and arranger, he was a key personality in the spread of Latin music in United States popular music. He was also a cartoonist and a successful businessman...
and his Orchestra, comedian Herb Shriner
Herb Shriner
Herbert Arthur "Herb" Shriner was an American humorist, radio personality and television host. Shriner was known for his homespun monologues, usually about his home state of Indiana...
, Abbott and Costello
Abbott and Costello
William "Bud" Abbott and Lou Costello performed together as Abbott and Costello, an American comedy duo whose work on stage, radio, film and television made them the most popular comedy team during the 1940s and 1950s...
, Jimmy Durante
Jimmy Durante
James Francis "Jimmy" Durante was an American singer, pianist, comedian and actor. His distinctive clipped gravelly speech, comic language butchery, jazz-influenced songs, and large nose helped make him one of America's most familiar and popular personalities of the 1920s through the 1970s...
and Garry Moore
Garry Moore
Garry Moore was an American entertainer, game show host and comedian best known for his work in television...
(when it was known as Camel Comedy Caravan), Jack Carson
Jack Carson
John Elmer "Jack" Carson was a Canadian-born U.S.-based film actor.Jack Carson was one of the most popular character actors during the 'golden age of Hollywood', with a film career spanning the 1930s, '40s and '50s...
, Mel Blanc
Mel Blanc
Melvin Jerome "Mel" Blanc was an American voice actor and comedian. Although he began his nearly six-decade-long career performing in radio commercials, Blanc is best remembered for his work with Warner Bros...
, and Bob Hawk (emcee of the quiz program Thanks to the Yanks, later known as The Bob Hawk Show).