RUSC MAILING

Written by Ned Norris

It's Veteran's Day on November 11th and this year marks 80 years since the end of WWII.

Eight decades on, I still get goosebumps when I cue up Command Performance’s Victory Extra from August 14, 1945—hosted by Bing Crosby. It’s the sound of relief, gratitude, and a dawning peace carried live over American radios on V-J Day. You can hear a nation exhale.

Command Performance was radio’s promise to the troops: if you want it, you’ll get it. And on the Victory Extra, recorded within hours of Japan’s surrender, that promise blossoms into a celebratory time capsule—church bells outside, families huddled close to their sets, and Bing guiding the mood with his easy, steady touch. Joy never wipes away remembrance; it sits right alongside it.

The lineup is a roll call of radio’s golden age: Dinah Shore, Jimmy Durante, Bette Davis, Marlene Dietrich, Frank Sinatra, Lucille Ball, Cary Grant, Lena Horne, Orson Welles, Danny Kaye—many more. Musically it’s a map of August ’45 feelings, from tender moments (Bing’s What America Means to Me) to toe-tappers that bring the smiles back. Between numbers, the sketches are witty without cynicism—earned laughter, not cheap laughs.

What I love most: no ads, no hard sell—just service. The pacing breathes. The orchestras are unhurried. Performers speak as if they’re talking right to you, whether you’re on a stateside porch or halfway across the Pacific. It’s celebratory yet grounded—a gracious handoff from war to the work of peace.

If you’d like to listen the way folks did then, invite a friend, press play, and let the first moments set the tone. It’s ninety minutes that earn every grin and quiet pause.

To find it: hop into RUSC Radio, and choose War Time Wonders—there are over 100 shows there, including the Victory Extra.

Happy listening,

RUSC Old Time Radio
www.rusc.com
(Your friendly old-time radio guru)

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