Happy St. Patrick’s Day. In celebration here’s our second posting from the Good Time Weekly Calendar of 1963, featuring a net-draped model we can’t identify shot by a photographer named Shulman who we also can’t identify. So there. Calendar text is transcribed below. Boy they sure knew how to get a laugh out of people back then. Or not.
March 17: “Ladies’ evening dresses are getting more daring. The front is now daring the back.”—Leslie Uggams
March 18: “Running into debt isn’t so bad; it’s running into your creditors that’s embarrassing.”—O.G. Zimmerman
March 19: “Would you call a girls’ baseball team ‘swatter girls’?”—Sam Cowling
March 20: Sweater girls are divided into two classes; those who knit them and those who fit them,”—Paul Fogarty
March 21: “Most men lack imagination and that’s why dress designers leave so little to it.”—Peggie Castle
March 22: Two things make women slow… first she must make up her mind and then her face.”—Keith Preston
March 23: Short dresses do not affect women’s appearance much; they just make the men look longer.”—Sam Cowling
So, who were all these people? We found nothing on O.G. Zimmerman, Paul Fogarty, and Keith Preston. We already knew Leslie Uggams and Peggie Castle—singer and actress respectively—and they have Wikipedia entries if you’re curious. So that leaves Sam Cowling. It’s Cowling who gets the lion’s share of quotes in the Good Time Calendar, so we expected him to have been quite famous and he was. He was a member of a vocal group called The Romeos, but later became a regular cast member of a radio variety program called The Breakfast Club. The hourlong program, hosted by Don McNeill, ran from 1933 until 1968, and Cowling (below right) came aboard in ’37, havingby then transformed himself from a singer into an improvisational comedian. Working off the cuff was a good fit for his new gig, since apparently The Breakfast Club was mostly unscripted. The extemporaneous format was a big success, and helped set a mold for morning radio shows that holds even today. It also made the leap to television as a special event in 1948. Wanna hear The Breakfast Club? Go to the bottom of this page. For video check here. We’re off to have a glass or several of green beer.