Myrt Unmasked

"How's every little thing, Myrt?"

This is a photo of my Auntie Ethelyn in the 1940s. Sadly, she's no longer with us. One of the last times I ever saw her was at a 60th wedding anniversary party for her and my Uncle Spencer. This was around 1999. It was -- as folks of their generation called it -- a big t'do. One thing I remember about that party was all the balloons and posters that read: Happy 60th Myrt and Spence.
Myrt? I thought to myself. Who's Myrt?
I must've thought it out loud, actually, because my aunt explained it to me: "When I was younger, I was a telephone operator for Ma Bell..."
(For those of you too young to remember when telephones were telephones and not video cameras, Ma Bell used to be the phone company. THEE phone company. The ONLY phone company. It was the Bell System Telephone Company and it was named after Alexander Graham Bell, the man credited with inventing the telephone.) (Why they called it "Ma" is beyond me. Unless it was a symbolic/maternal/feminization thing, like Mother Ship or Lady Luck or something like that.)
"Well," my Auntie Eth continued, "when I was an operator, there was a popular radio program called Fibber McGee and Molly, and they had a character on that show named Myrt who was a telephone operator. And ever since then, anyone who knew me called me Myrt."


'Tain't Funny, McGee
Jump ahead a few years. My friend Brian, who also has a blog or two, sent me a batch of CDs loaded with old time radio programs from the 30s and 40s. So I plugged in some Fibber McGee and Molly episodes, in memory of my aunt, and it was love at first... hear.
This show was off the wall, laugh out loud funny. It's no wonder it lasted more than twenty years. From 1935 till, I think, 1959 (I don't feel like wiki-ing it right now) this show aired on NBC. But its hey-day was the 1940s.

Marian and Jim Jordan as Fibber McGee and Molly

I'm guessing it must have been the Seinfeld of its time. The culture was filled with catch phrases that originated on Fibber McGee and Molly. "Tain't funny, McGee!" "That ain't the way I heered it!" "Snooky," "Whatsay?" were to the 1940s as "Sponge-worthy" "Master of your domain," and "Hello Newman," were to the 1990s.

And of course, "How's every little thing, Myrt?"

One thing my aunt didn't mention about her namesake was that she never really existed as a character. That is, nobody played her on The Fibber McGee and Molly Show. No actress portrayed Myrt. Myrt was never even heard. She was the telephone operator and all you ever heard was McGee's end of the conversation. You never heard Myrt. McGee would pick up the phone, ask the operator to direct his call, and as soon as he realized Myrt was his operator, he'd say...

Images from the RKO movie Heavenly Days, starring Fibber McGee and Molly (1944)
(click to enlarge)

Funny thing was, no matter how important the phone call, McGee always had time to chat with Myrt. Even if he was calling about an emergency: "Hello, operator, get me the poli---" and as soon as he realized who the operator was...

(click to enlarge)

Poor Molly, always at Fibber's side, could only hear one end of the conversation, and, to hear McGee talk, it always sounded like Myrt's family was in some sort of crisis...

(click to enlarge)

Myrt In Popular Culture

Myrt was one of the most popular characters never to be heard in the days of old time radio. So popular, in fact, that she even "appeared" in Warner Brothers' Looney Tunes cartoons alongside other pop-culture heroes of the time. F'rinstance...

Images used without permission. DVD available at Amazon!

An interesting note (interesting to me, that is; prob'ly not to anyone else) is that the above cartoon, The Wabbit Who Came To Supper (1942), features Elmer Fudd, a character voiced by the great Arthur Q Bryan, who was also the voice of Doctor George Gamble on Fibber McGee and Molly. (Oh, dear readers of this blog, you will be inundated with worthless trivia like this aplenty in the months to come!)

Fibber, Molly, and Doc Gamble (Yes, a doctor called Gamble!)

In the 1943 Daffy Duck cartoon, Daffy The Commando, we find Myrt as an international telephone operator, as a Nazi Buzzard speaks to her from behind enemy lines (I've exaggerated the Buzzard's accent for comedic purposes...)

Images used without permission. DVD available at Amazon!

So you see how popular Myrt was back in the day. I'll betchya every poor telephone operator, between 1940 and 1950, had to deal with callers all day long who thought it was clever to use  McGee's catch phrase...

Original photo from Shorpy.com, with apologies from me.

But the main thing I guess I'm trying to convey with this lengthy blog post, is that in every example I have illustrated above, every caller -- be it Bugs Bunny or the Nazi Buzzard, or McGee himself -- suddenly stops and smiles, and whatever they were originally calling to complain about -- along with all their cares in the world -- go out the window as soon as they realize Myrt is on the line. "Oh! Is that you Myrt?" was always met with a smile, and I'll betchya my Auntie Ethelyn had that same effect on people and that is why she earned -- and retained for the rest of her life -- the nickname Myrt.

Goodnight all. And, as always, thank you for blogging at Bleggah!