Recordings from Corwin’s CBS radio series (One World Flight, This is Radio, Radio is Here to Stay, Columbia Presents Corwin, An American in England, etc.). Broadcast from the mid-1930s to the mid-1950s.
Repository/Collector:
Belfer Audio Archive
Repository/Collector Type:
College or University
City:
Syracuse
State:
New York
Country:
United States
Extent:
374 16-inch glass and aluminum based lacquer discs and a few reel tapes
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription) and Reel-to-reel
Supporting documentation:
The Norman Corwin Papers includes correspondence, manuscripts, radio scripts, printed material, published material, and photographs.
Historical relevance:
Norman Corwin (1910-2011) was an American writer, screenwriter, producer, essayist and teacher of journalism and writing. His early radio programs included love stories, satire, biography, fantasy, mystery, Bible stories, travelogues, history, media analyses, philosophy, and current events. He has been called America's "poet laureate of radio." On May 8, 1945, his one-hour live broadcast on the occasion of the end of World War II, On A Note of Triumph, drew 60 million listeners; poet Carl Sandburg praised it as "one of the all-time great American poems." Corwin is also the author of several books, including Holes In A Stained Glass Window (1978) and Trivializing America (1983), and his script for the movie Lust For Life (1957) was nominated for an Oscar. His television credits include his 1971 series "Norman Corwin Presents." In the 1990s he began a new series of radio program for National Public Radio, whose casts have included William Shatner, Jack Lemmon, Charles Kuralt, Martin Landau, Hume Cronyn, and Charles Durning. Corwin was recognized many times over his career for his achievements; his awards include a Peabody (1941, the first year they were awarded), the One World Award (1946), a duPont-Columbia Award, and an Honorary Doctorate from Lincoln College (1990). He was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1993, and in 2006 a documentary "Film" on his life (A Note of Triumph: The Golden Age of Norman Corwin) won an Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Feature).