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television. On radio, Emery invited the children who listened to become members of his "club": those who did so received a membership card and a pin. Members were expected to do good deeds: the club's slogan was "Be someone's big brother or sister every day," and to be a member in good standing, children were asked to write Emery a letter each week describing the good deed they had done that week. By 1929, 47,000 children were members of the Big
Brother Club.
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things kids might find exciting. The Big
Brother Club had membership cards and an official button (in the shape of a WEEI microphone). Emery also wrote a newspaper column about club activities. WEEI would also sponsor events that Big Brother Club members could attend, including a day at the zoo or a picnic. And while the show had sponsors, Emery was known for caring about kids and not doing an excessive amount of hype.
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Emery ran a show that was both entertaining and educational, with segments about current events, literature, travel, music, and ethics (good manners, being respectful to others, etc.). He sang and played the ukulele or the banjo and had guest performers, as well as interesting speakers who were doing
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common in early commercial radio) there. In 1924, he created a children's program called the "Big
Brother Club." It was a time when nearly every radio station had a man or woman who told bed-time stories to the kids, and Boston radio had several. Bob Emery would become the best known, going on to a
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Emery was born on August 12, 1897, in
Abington, Massachusetts. Some sources say his birth name was recorded as Clair Robins Emery. Years later, his name was referred to in print sources as "Clair Robert Emery." His father James was a farmer, and he was sent to the Farm and Trade School on Thompson's
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aired from March 11, 1947, to June 15, 1951. It originally aired weekly, but soon expanded to five days a week, airing Monday through Friday at 7pm ET. According to television historians Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh, the show was possibly the first television series to air five days per week.
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which lent a sinister cast to the term "Big
Brother"; the meaning then was just an affectionate older mentor). He used as his theme song a hit from that era, "The Grass is Always Greener in the Other Fella's Yard." He continued to use that theme song for decades, first on radio and later on
255:) "The Grass is Always Greener in the Other Fellow's Yard", about being satisfied with what you have and not being envious. He opened his show with this, as well as with a singing jingle about WEEI. His closing song was "So Long Small Fry", written by Bill Wirges
146:, Massachusetts, which had been one of the first American radio stations to broadcast regular programming (in 1919, under the callsign 1XE). Emery was a singer and announcer (identifying himself on the air by his initials "CRE", a holdover from
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career in both radio and TV that lasted from the early 1920s till he retired in the late 1960s. When Emery first put the show on the air, it was known as the "Big
Brother Club" (this was long before the 1949 publication of the novel
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Emery began performing on radio as part of the all-male
Gilchrist Quartet, made up of department store employees. He was so well-received on the air that he was hired as an announcer at radio station
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Island, from which he graduated in 1912. He then attended North
Abington High School, but did not graduate. He found employment at Gilchrist's department store, selling shoes.
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and then working at several local stations in New York, most notably WOR, where he began on radio and then migrated to television, hosting a program called "Video
Varieties."
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This weekday series was one of the few successful series on DuMont, and aired in the evenings for more than four seasons before it was cancelled in 1951.
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WGI was undergoing financial difficulties (it folded in 1925), so in late
September 1924 Emery moved to a new Boston station,
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was cancelled, Emery returned to Boston and continued to do versions of the show on
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on DuMont. The teenage show was based on a radio program that Emery had on
442:"Membership of Big Brother Club Grows to 47,000 in Less Than Five Years."
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Joseph Dinneen. "How Bob Emery Became Big Brother to 12,000 Youngsters."
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Joseph Dinneen. "How Bob Emery Became Big Brother to 12,000 Youngsters."
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Virginia Bright. "Bob Emery's Hair White After 40 years on the Air."
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The Forgotten Network: DuMont and the Birth of American Television
342:"The Small Fry Club (children, hosted by "Big Brother" Bob Emery)"
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Emery had several theme songs, one of which was the 1924 song (by
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Beginning on January 18, 1948, Emery also hosted a new program,
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A recording of part of one episode is known to exist at the
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List of programs broadcast by the DuMont Television Network
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628:. Massachusetts Broadcaster's Hall of Fame. Archived from
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116:(August 12, 1897–July 18, 1982), known professionally as
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List of surviving DuMont Television Network broadcasts
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The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network TV Shows
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Radio and television pioneer and children's show host
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Grass Is Always Greener (In the Other Fellow's Yard)
381:"Children's Programming Pioneer Clair Emery Dies."
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626:"Claire Robert ("Big Brother Bob") Emery"
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260:Newton, Massachusetts
130:Early life and career
118:Big Brother Bob Emery
77:Newton, Massachusetts
23:Big Brother Bob Emery
186:Movies for Small Fry
154:Nineteen Eighty-Four
35:Emery at WGI in 1924
703:Television pioneers
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567:. Open Road Media.
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45:Clair Robert Emery
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95:Broadcaster
84:Nationality
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325:References
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51:1897-08-12
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Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Additional terms may apply.
