Entertainment in the 1940s

Popular Entertainment

Music and Radio

Culturally, this was the era of big band music, and swing was still popular. Radio was a popular form of media, and radio shows came in great variety. Many of them included references to the war or messages urging people to buy war bonds and support the war effort. Radio shows were transmitted overseas for the entertainment of the troops as well.

Some of the most famous singers from the 1940s were Glenn Miller, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, and Bing Crosby (who was also a movie actor and sang in movies). George Formby was a popular singer in Britain and a favorite of the royal family, although the lyrics to some of his comedic songs wouldn't be appropriate for children for innuendo and racial themes. Among the popular songs of the 1940s:

Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, c. 1938 to 1945
From Wikipedia (Considered public domain in the US)

The 1940s were part of the Golden Age of Radio. Aside from music, radio programs during the 1940s were plays and stories, much like programs that would later air on television. In fact, some of the early television shows started as radio programs and transitioned over to the new medium. Radio shows came in great variety with dramas, westerns, comedies, mysteries, horror, and game shows.

Among the programs that people listened to during the war were were:

Girl listening to old fashioned radio
Girl Listening to Radio, c. 1938 to 1945
From Wikipedia (Considered public domain in the US because it was produced by a government employee)
  • Little Orphan Annie (1931-1942) - A drama show for kids about the popular comic strip character.
  • The Lone Ranger (1933-1954) - A popular western show that later became a television show.
  • Lights Out (1934-1947) - Horror and supernatural stories. This program became a television show later.
  • Dick Tracy (1934-1948) - A detective show based on a newspaper comic strip, popular with kids.
  • Fibber McGee and Molly (1935-1956) - A comedy program that many people remember for the running gag where everything falls out of the hall closet.
  • The Green Hornet (1938-1952) - A crime-fighting hero show. The Green Hornet didn't have any super powers, but he did have a sidekick named Kato and a high-tech car called "Black Beauty." The character of The Green Hornet was supposed to be the grand-nephew of The Lone Ranger.
  • The Adventures of Ellery Queen (1939-1948) - A mystery detective show. It was a little unusual in its format. As part of the show, a panel of guests and the listeners at home were invited to review the clues and try to solve the mystery before the detective, Ellery Queen, revealed the final solution.
  • The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939-1950) - A mystery detective show with the classic characters of Sherlock Holmes and Watson played by the same actors who portrayed the characters in movies during the same period, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. This radio show was broadcast overseas for the benefit of the troops. In 1946, Basil Rathbone left the show and was replaced by another actor. Later, Nigel Bruce left the show as well and was also replaced.
  • The Abbott and Costello Show (1940-1949) - A comedy show.
  • The Cisco Kid (1942-1956) - A western show.
  • Chick Carter, Boy Detective (1943-1945) - A mystery show for kids.
  • The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (1944-1954) - A family-based situation comedy that later became a tv show.

Programs that aired after the war:

For a more extensive list of 1940s radio programs, see Wikipedia's list of 1940s American Radio Programs.

You can listen to old radio programs for free online at Old World Radio, OTR.Network Library, and Old Time Radio on Internet Archive. Old World Radio also has recordings of President Franklin Roosevelt's Fireside Chats in which he discussed recent events with the American public, and some historic news broadcasts and speeches. There is a specific collection of World War II News Broadcasts.

Radio stations and their programs made their money through advertising, much like television shows would later. Radio shows were sponsored by different companies, which provided funding for the shows and used them for advertising purposes. The host of the show would tell listeners who their sponsor was at the beginning and end of the show, talk about the quality of the sponsor's products, and give their slogan or advertising jingle. Shows also had intermissions, where the sponsor's product would be advertised again. Usually, there would be no advertisements for any other type of product besides the show's sponsor. As television became more popular, and radio was losing popularity, more programs used mulitple sponsors (Multi Sponsors Signal Beginning Of End Of Radio’s Golden Age).

Movies and Television

People could go to movie theaters to see not only the latest films (still mostly in black-and-white, although color film was gradually taking hold), but also news reels and cartoons. Movies often featured patriotic and war themes and announcements for people to buy war bonds. If you went to a theater in the 1940s, you might see a war-themed cartoon, sometimes starring cartoon characters that are still known today, like Bugs Bunny or Donald Duck. This one that makes fun of the concept of "gremlins" (little creatures that engineers would blame for things that would go wrong with their machinery) also has a joke about fuel rationing at the very end.

There was great variety among the types of movies available at theaters even during the war. Film noir, crime movies with dark themes and images, became popular. There were also children's films, including Disney films now regarded as classics. Among the popular movies during the war:

Casablanca movie poster
Casablanca Poster
From Wikimedia Commons
(Considered public domain in the United States)
  • The Great Dictator (1940) - With Charlie Chaplin and Paulette Goddard
  • Rebecca (1940)
  • The Ghost Breakers (1940) - A comedy/mystery movie with Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard.
  • The Shop Around the Corner (1940) - A romantic comedy later remade as You've Got Mail (1998). The original movie had people writing letters as pen pals who had never met, only to discover that they've actually been working in the same shop. Both movies were based on an earlier play.
  • Fantasia (1940) - Disney
  • Pinocchio (1940) - Disney
  • Citizen Kane (1941)
  • The Maltese Falcon (1941)
  • The Wolf Man (1941)
  • Dumbo (1941) - Disney
  • Casablanca (1942)
  • Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
  • Bambi (1942) - Disney
  • Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
  • Gaslight (1944) - The mystery movie that coined the term "gaslighting" for trying to convince someone that they are crazy through psychological tricks, especially when it's done to cover up for someone else's wrong-doing. In the movie, a woman's husband tries to make her think that she is crazy in order to cover up for his own crimes. Their house is lit with gas lighting, and the lights keep flickering when the woman is supposedly alone in the house, indicating that someone else has turned on a gas light somewhere in the house, but the woman can't find where, not knowing that her husband is secretly searching the attic for something. To make sure that she will not investigate further and that no one else will listen to his wife, he isolates her from other people, plays tricks on her to make her think that her memory is unreliable, and spreads stories about her to other people to make them think that she is crazy, which are all techniques used by real-life abusers. The truth is discovered when a Scotland Yard detective takes an interest in the case of the woman's deceased aunt, who was murdered in their house years ago, and visits the woman, witnessing some of the events that the woman's husband had tried to convince her were not really happening, exposing the husband's guilty secrets and proving to the woman that she really is sane. This movie gave a young Angela Lansbury her first role as the household maid.
  • Double Indemnity (1944) - Based on the novel of the same name.
  • Laura (1944) - A murder mystery with mistaken identity.
  • Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) - Musical with Judy Garland.
  • Sherlock Holmes movies with Basil Rathbone - These Sherlock Holmes movies were set in the 1940s instead of Victorian England, like the original stories, and included events that were directly related WWII, helping to promote patriotic feelings during the war. Sherlock Holmes and his friend, Dr. Watson, sometimes investigated German spies and people who were after government technological secrets. The series includes (among others):
    Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942)
    Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1943)
    Sherlock Holmes in Washington (1943)
    Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943)
    Sherlock Holmes and the Spider Woman (1944)
    Sherlock Holmes and the Scarlet Claw (1944)

Some prominent entertainers, like Bob Hope, also dedicated their time to entertaining the troops and raising their morale.

Among the popular movies after the war:

  • It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
  • Notorious (1946)
  • Song of the South (1946) - Disney live-action movie, now considered controversial for its portrayal of slaves. This movie provided the animal characters in the ride Big Thunder Mountain at Disneyland.
  • Miracle on 34th Street (1947)
  • The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
  • The Third Man (1949)

Television broadcasting in the United States began in the early 1940s, although most families did not purchase televisions right away. At first, all programs were black-and-white, but color television became popular in later decades (TV Turns On).

Books

Among the books published for adults in the 1940s:

  • Over My Dead Body (1940) - Another book in the Nero Wolfe mystery novel series. This particular book explains more about Nero Wolfe's mysterious youth in Montenegro. It doesn't answer all of the questions about his previous life, but his past comes back to haunt him when his adopted daughter, who has been missing for many years, suddenly shows up. Other Nero Wolfe books were also written and were popular in the 1940s. By Rex Stout.
  • Meet Me in St. Louis (1942) - The basis for the movie of the same name. By Sally Benson.
  • Double Indemnity (1943) - A crime novel involving murder and insurance fraud that was turned into a movie of the same name. By James M. Cain.
  • Laura (1942, 1943) - A mystery novel involving murder and mistaken identity, also made into a movie of the same name. By Vera Caspary.
  • Forever Amber (1944) - A romantic historical novel. By Kathleen Winsor.
  • Anna and the King of Siam (1944) - The basis for the movie and play The King and I. By Margaret Landon.
  • Cannery Row (1945) - Set during the Great Depression. By John Steinbeck.
  • Mr. Blandings Builds his Dream House (1946) - The adventures of a family buying a farmhouse in Connecticut that needs to be torn down and completely rebuilt. The joys of first-time home ownership and the complications of family life mingle humorously with the difficulty of hiring and dealing with workmen, the chaos of construction, paying bills, and coping with new neighbors. Made into a movie of the same name in 1948 with Cary Grant and Myrna Loy. By Eric Hodgins.
  • Shane (1949) - A western novel featuring a mysterious stranger called Shane. Later made into a movie. By Jack Schaefer.