Superman on the radio: the 1940 serial that gave birth to kryptonite, Jimmy Olsen and Perry White

Superman on the radio: a serial launched on February 12, 1940

On February 12, 1940, less than two years after his first appearance in Action Comics #1, Superman moved from the comic book panel to the microphone. The serial started on WOR, a New York station, without belonging to a national network: its episodes were recorded on discs, then shipped to about ten stations that aired them. Each episode ran fifteen minutes, three times a week. The first sponsor sold oatmeal under the Hecker's H-O brand.

The idea came from two men in DC's orbit: Allen Ducovny, its publicist, and Robert Joffe Maxwell, a former writer of pulp stories. They adapted the hero created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster for a young audience that listened to the radio in the late afternoon, after school. The gamble paid off for eleven years. In August 1942, the Mutual network picked up the program and aired it five days a week. Kellogg's Pep cereal then became its regular sponsor. After a switch to a half-hour format in 1949, then a move to the ABC network, the final broadcast aired on March 1, 1951.

Krypton on the far side of the Sun: the origin as told on the radio

The first episode, “The Baby from Krypton,” did not yet let listeners hear the adult hero. It told of the end of Krypton. The scientist Jor-L, as the name was spelled at the time, announced that the planet was doomed, but no one believed him. He only had time to build a small rocket. With his wife, Lara, he placed their baby inside it just before the explosion. In this episode, Lara was voiced by Agnes Moorehead.

Radio then diverged from the comics. In the serial, Krypton lies within our own solar system, on the far side of the Sun, rather than in some distant system. Above all, the child grew up during the journey: in the second episode, he stepped out of his rocket as a grown man. So he was not raised by the Kents. It was the first Earthlings he met who suggested the name Clark Kent to him, before he set off to look for work at a big newspaper.

The serial eventually moved closer to the comic book version. When Mutual relaunched the program on August 31, 1942, it told a new origin in two episodes: “Superman Comes to Earth,” then “Eben Kent Dies in Fire, Clark Goes to Metropolis.” On the radio, then, Clark's adoptive father was named Eben Kent; after his death, Clark left for Metropolis.

Bud Collyer, one voice for Clark Kent and another for Superman

To carry the dual role, the producers chose Clayton “Bud” Collyer, a New York radio actor who was already very busy. On the radio, nothing can be seen: it all comes down to the voice. So Collyer gave Clark Kent a higher-pitched tone and Superman a deep voice. If you listen to an episode, you can hear the switch in the middle of a line that became famous: “This looks like a job… for Superman!” Collyer explained that he pitched Clark's voice a little higher to leave himself some room before launching into the cry that accompanied the hero's takeoff on the air: “Up, up and away!”

For years, his name did not appear in the credits. Collyer only stepped out of anonymity in 1946, when he went to the press to promote a storyline of the serial devoted to tolerance. He remained the hero's voice until January 21, 1950. Starting June 5, 1950, Michael Fitzmaurice replaced him for the final episodes, which aired on ABC.

Collyer's voice soon reached beyond radio. As early as 1941, he also voiced Superman in the Fleischer Studios cartoons, alongside Joan Alexander, the serial's Lois Lane. The two actors reprised their roles in 1966 in the animated series The New Adventures of Superman, launched that year in the United States. Bud Collyer died on September 8, 1969, and his name remains tied to the role, alongside those of the actors who have played Superman on screen.

Perry White, born on the air on February 14, 1940

The second episode, “Clark Kent, Reporter,” broadcast on February 14, 1940, brought in a character absent from the comics: Perry White. Clark came looking for work at the Daily Planet, and the editor-in-chief showed little interest. Yet he eventually gave him a trial assignment on a mysterious “Wolfe” who was threatening the railroads. This was the starting point of the serial's first major storyline. Actor Julian Noa lent his voice to Perry White.

In the comics, Clark first had a different boss. Since 1938, he had worked at the Daily Star, run by George Taylor. The name Daily Planet appeared in Action Comics #23, cover-dated April 1940, while Taylor was still running the paper. Perry White only arrived in DC's pages with Superman #7, cover-dated November-December 1940, written by Jerry Siegel, and there he took George Taylor's place at the head of the newsroom.

The serial also established Lois Lane, who had been in the comics since 1938. On the radio, she appeared in the seventh episode, on February 26, 1940, and gave her new colleague a cold welcome. Several actresses followed one another in the role: Rolly Bester and Helen Choate in the first months, then Joan Alexander, who kept it until the end.

Jimmy Olsen: on April 15, 1940, radio gives him a name

On April 15, 1940, the serial launched a new storyline, “Donelli's Protection Racket.” A copy boy at the Daily Planet came to ask Clark Kent for help, because his mother's candy store was being targeted by a racket. That boy's name was Jimmy Olsen, and it was the first time the name had ever been heard, on the radio or anywhere else. Jackie Kelk voiced him for years, then Jack Grimes took over, at a date that varies by source, somewhere between 1947 and the 1950 relaunch.

Radio did not start from scratch, though. In the comics, an unnamed office boy appeared as early as Action Comics #6, cover-dated November 1938, in a story where a swindler claimed to be Superman's manager. DC later considered this young employee to be Jimmy's first appearance, even though he has no name there and some authors see him as a different character. So it was radio that gave him an identity. The comics did not give him his first name, Jimmy, until Superman #13, cover-dated November-December 1941, in “Superman versus the Archer,” or his surname, Olsen, until Superman #15, cover-dated March-April 1942.

The character then gained depth on the air. In 1946, he even managed a neighborhood baseball team, the Unity House team, at the heart of the radio arc against the “Clan of the Fiery Cross.”

Kryptonite appears on the radio in June 1943

Superman's great weakness did not arrive with the serial, but three years later. On June 3, 1943, the show began a seven-episode arc, “The Meteor from Krypton.” As the title indicates, a meteor from the hero's home planet fell to Earth. The ore bore a name with a bright future ahead of it: kryptonite. In the comics, the stone would later come in green, red or gold, with different effects depending on the color.

Yet the idea of an ore from Krypton had existed at DC since 1940. That year, Jerry Siegel wrote an untitled story, since known as “The K-Metal from Krypton,” in which a metal from his home planet robs Superman of his strength, and in which Lois discovers that Clark and Superman are one and the same. DC did not publish it, and the story remained unpublished at the time. For 1940s audiences, then, kryptonite really was born on the radio.

The comics waited six more years. Kryptonite entered their pages with Superman #61, cover-dated November-December 1949, in “Superman Returns to Krypton!” by writer Bill Finger and artist Al Plastino. The radio's stone then became a recurring weapon for Superman's enemies, in print and on screen alike.

Kryptonite, invented so Bud Collyer could take a vacation?

One anecdote comes up often: kryptonite was supposedly dreamed up to let Bud Collyer take a vacation. Editor Julius Schwartz told the story in his memoir. The explanation seems logical, because the serial offered no reruns: every day on the air required a new episode. Superman, laid low by the stone and reduced to groaning, could then leave the spotlight to the other characters, and a stand-in was enough for the moans.

Historian Michael J. Hayde, author of Flights of Fantasy (2009), a book devoted to Superman on radio and television, disputes this version. In his view, the 1943 arc served first and foremost to let Superman discover his origins. What is established is the use the serial made of the stone afterward: when Collyer had to be away, Superman stayed out of action while others carried the story. From 1945 on, Batman and Robin often filled that role.

In any case, the stone inspired the radio writers for years. From September 1945 to January 1946, a string of storylines revolved around a stolen piece of kryptonite, later divided among several of the hero's enemies. In 1947, the arc “Superman vs. Kryptonite” alone stretched over 33 episodes.

1945: Batman, Robin and the Atom Man join the serial

In 1945, the serial brought Superman together with the Gotham duo. The meeting took place in “The Mystery of the Waxmen,” broadcast from February 28 to March 15, 1945: in early March, Superman first crossed paths with Robin, then with Batman. Only two episodes of this arc have survived. Some older histories date the first team-up to September 10, 1945, but episode logs clearly place the meeting at the beginning of March.

Over the years, Batman was voiced in turn by Stacy Harris, Matt Crowley and Gary Merrill, while Ronald Liss always played Robin. In “Looking for Kryptonite,” broadcast from December 1945 to January 1946, Clark even revealed his identity to Bruce Wayne. The comics would take years to make the two heroes a true team: their alliance first took shape on the radio.

That same year, the serial invented an adversary tailor-made for kryptonite: the Atom Man. In the arc broadcast in the fall of 1945, a young Nazi received injections of liquid kryptonite to take on Superman. Mason Adams provided his voice. The name resurfaced in 1950 in American movie theaters, with the serial Atom Man vs. Superman, but there the Atom Man was Luthor, facing Kirk Alyn.

Superman on the radio against the Clan of the Fiery Cross, in 1946

After the war, the serial openly embraced a message. In the spring of 1946, the arc “The Hate Mongers' Organization” took on racial and religious intolerance. Then, starting June 10, 1946, sixteen episodes pitted Superman against the “Clan of the Fiery Cross,” an organization modeled on the Ku Klux Klan. The story followed a family of Chinese descent, the Lees. Young Tommy Lee became the pitcher for the Unity House baseball team, managed by Jimmy Olsen, and the boy he replaced, Chuck Riggs, was the nephew of the Clan's leader. The threats against the Lee family forced Superman to step in.

A much-repeated story has grown up around this arc. Activist Stetson Kennedy, who had infiltrated the Klan, claimed he had given the producers the idea and passed secrets on to them, including passwords. According to journalist Rick Bowers, the writers had, for their part, consulted the Anti-Defamation League, an organization that fights antisemitism, to find new adversaries for Superman. Bowers, who went back to the recordings, did not hear the secret passwords described by the legend, and historian Michael J. Hayde found only one sequence that could pass as specific to the Klan. Superman's fight against the Clan, on the other hand, really did air.

The arc found a second life in comics. From October 2019 to February 2020, Gene Luen Yang, as writer, and Gurihiru, as artist, turned it into a loose three-issue adaptation, Superman Smashes the Klan, published in France under the title Superman écrase le Klan.

From cartoons to George Reeves: the serial's legacy

The serial quickly fed into other media. The Fleischer cartoons, released in the United States from 1941 onward, reused the voices of Bud Collyer and Joan Alexander. The Columbia serials, released in the United States in 1948 and 1950, with Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill, were billed as adapted from the radio program. In 1952, the television series Adventures of Superman, starring George Reeves, premiered in the United States under the guidance of Robert Maxwell, one of the radio serial's producers. Perry White, Jimmy Olsen and Inspector Henderson held a place of honor in it.

Inspector Henderson illustrates the lag between media. Born on the radio, this police ally of Superman had to wait until 1974 to enter the comics. The serial also left behind sounds. Jackson Beck became its narrator in 1943; around September 1945, its opening began with “Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive!” before the cries of “It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Superman!” A version of these cries can be heard as early as the first episode, in February 1940, and already appears on the 1939 demonstration discs, even though another account credits their origin to the Fleischer cartoons. As for the whoosh of Superman's flight, it was reportedly created by blending the sound of an artillery shell with that of a wind tunnel.

Conclusion

In eleven years on the air, from February 1940 to March 1951, the serial gave Superman a voice, Bud Collyer's, and a whole supporting cast. Perry White was born on the show on February 14, 1940, Jimmy Olsen got his name on April 15, 1940, and kryptonite made its debut in June 1943, before moving into the comics.

After radio, cartoons, serials and television took over. If you want to follow the Man of Steel from one screen to the next, the Superman TV shows carry the story on to this day.