"I Am So Wonderful"

By Frank Absher

Recently I’ve been immersed in research of radio during the 1930s, a time when most of the emphasis was placed on network programming. It has helped me figure out why I am put off by some of today’s so-called “personalities.”

Research such as this is made even more interesting by the fact that we have the benefit of hindsight. Reading articles about the new stars of the 1930s is fun because of the knowledge of what eventually happened to these people. There are people like Joe Penner, for example, a one-joke comedian who was voted the medium’s top comedian in 1935 but was dead of a heart attack six years later at the age of 37.

The publicity generated about these radio people by their respective networks is often full of so much puffery that you’d think these folks personified the second coming.

One can only assume the “stars” didn’t believe all the stuff that was written about them. I’m guessing most of them saw such publicity as an aspect of their jobs which had to be accepted.

Still, it’s interesting to read about a great, new, promising star who amounted to nothing.

Yes, these people whose success ultimately depended on cultivation of a national audience probably needed some puffing up, especially if their talent was relatively shallow.

But what about media people today?

First, those who are here in St. Louis have a very limited audience, and if Arbitron, Nielsen and RADAR are to be believed, the audience is shrinking.

Second, a convincing argument can be made that many of them lack any depth to their so-called talent.
Third, they are working for employers who, in the name of fiscal conservatism, make little effort to promote their media or their people.

Often you will find local media people promoting themselves, and sometimes their efforts are pretty sad. They’re very quick to tell you how great they are, even when their professional positions or employment status may indicate otherwise. It’s almost as if they have this desperate need to communicate their greatness just so they can convince themselves how great they are.

It’s always been my feeling that blatant self promotion telegraphs a personal insecurity. If a person is really good, it’s not necessary to tell everyone. If a person is confident of his or her talents, there’s no need to stand on a figurative soapbox and proclaim this greatness to peers. We who have “been there” are not swayed by this fiction of self-flattery. Those who engage in it seem to think it’s necessary to convince the world of their superiority, but it’s not.

Talent, skill, even greatness, soon become self-evident.

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