Schlepperman Story

[Yhtapmys]

Here's an apocryphal story from Larry Wolters' radio column in the Chicago Tribune from Feb. 11, 1935. If I have a chance, I'll see if I can put together more stuff on Schlepperman. I'm using a search engine to paste together these stories and not all the characters translate.

Whether it's true, I don't know, but it's a funny story

Here's one of those incredible yarns that bob up in radio every now and then. It concerns Sam Hearn, who plays the part of Schlepperman in the Jack Benny show. The Schlepperman characterizations, it seems, brought down the wrath of an attorney by the name of Schlepperman. The Mr. S., however, was appeased when Hearn called on him and retained him as his attorney. Mr. Hearn also appears on the "Penthouse Party" program as one J. Pierpont Fox. Recently, according to the story, a J. Pierpont Fox turned up to object. So Mr. Hearn deployed Lawyer Schlepperman to cool off [missing word] Fox.

Yhtapmys

[Yhtapmys]

This tidbit is from Wolters' column of May 13, 1935
There seems to be a growing vogue for Jewish dialecticians on the air. Sam Hearn, who is the “Schlepperman” of Jack Benny’s show is credited with starting a trend that has spread to other comedy programs. Louis Sorin plays the part of the guy whom Walter O’Keefe chooses to call “J. I. MacGillicuddy” on the CBS caravan show. You'll find one, too, on Phil Baker’s hour. His real name is Artie Auerbach, a photographer on the New York Daily Mirror. Baker's show, incidentally, will move back to Chicago for a few weeks beginning May 24. There's also a Yiddish stooge on Joe Cook’s Circus Night program. Ted Bergman is the chap who does the part. And soon, it’s reported, Al Jolson will add such a character to his Saturday night revue. Patsy Flick is slated for the assignment.

We all know who Artie Auerbach is and readers here will know Patsy Flick also did dialect roles on Jack's show.

As for the stooge on Joe Cook's Circus Night programme, he went on to far bigger and better things after dropping the Yiddish accent. For while Cook, the star of the show, rests in obscurity, that underpaid bit player has been famous for generations. First, he adopted a different name, a name he used when he appeared as a character with Fred Allen, and then later on Life with Luigi, and finally as a caveman named Flintstone. For you know Ted Bergman as Alan Reed.

And now you know the rest of the story.

Yhtapmys

[Yhtapmys]

And just some random notes about Sam Hearn. They may or may not be of interest.

The Chicago Tribune of May 23, 1920, under the headline, "This Knocks 'Em Out of Their Seats in Vaudeville" gives us this joke:
Sam Hearn: While coming from Denver I met a chap on the train who seemed to be very well known. Every one on the train knew him. They called him Porter

Hearn appeared on Broadway in Oscar Hammerstein's 'Good Boy' which opened Sept. 5, 1928, with Charlie Butterworth and Helen Kane amongst the cast members. The show ended up in front of Actor's Equity because Kane signed with Paramount-Famous-Lasky to appear in pictures and she jumped her touring company contract. The story reads in part:
BOSTON, Mass., May 12.--Helen Kane, appearing in Arthur Hammerstein's "Good Boy" at the Shubert Theatre here, has been missing Tuesday and has not been located despite a thorough search for the actress by Hammerstein's agents. The theatre world here understands there is a storm brewing over Miss Kane's departure inasmuch as a complaint has been filed with Frank Gillmore, executive secretary of Actors' Equity Association by members of the cast of "Good Boy" asking that Miss Kane be summoned before the council of Equity to show cause for staying away from the show.
The complaint to Equity was to New York by Sam Hearn, a principal in the show, who is company deputy for the Actors' Equity. ...

Hearn had a long vaudeville career. He was working the Orpheum circuit on the west coast in early 1920 with Charlie Grapewin on the bill. Charlie was an acrobat but everyone remembers him as Uncle Henry in The Wizard of Oz.

In 1926, I've found him on a bill in Chicago with Tom Howard (later of It Pays to Be Ignorant) and Joe Penner.

The Hartford Courant of Aug. 27, 1927, describes him thus:
Sam Hearn, “the political feller,” finds a great deal of humor in the news of the day and can keep an audience chuckling at his droll comments. The crowds at the Allyn this week have liked him immensely. Sam has been featured in the “Greenwich Village Follies” and other musical comedies...

And, to go back further, he appeared in Toronto in 1912 on a bill headlined by Harry D. Ward, which ended up in New York the following year (he played violin as part of the act).

Then there's "The Spice of 1922" at the Winter Garden. Read about it http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9800E2DA1539EF3ABC4F53DFB1668389639EDE where his name is the only one I recognise.

And Sam also wrote to the New York Times, and his letter was published on November 5, 1936:

Letters to the Times
Suggested to Mr. Whalen To the Editor of The New York Times:
If the object of the World's Fair event is to show the progress civilization has made, let us not forget the important part entertainment has played in enabling people to live happily.
When the big event takes place, two years hence, this country will undoubtedly be out of the depression and in an era of good times. It will be opportune to pause and recollect what kept many of us going during those tough days.
I'll tell you what it was -- a sense of humor, by the movies, cartoons, the stage, the circuses, vaudeville, puppet shows, burlesque, radio. There has never been any trouble that a good laugh could not cure.
So I suggest to Grover Whalen, why not a section at your World's Fair devoted to the history of [missing word] and humor tracing it from the early days of court jesters up to the present time?
Humor has always served a great purpose, and I recommend it as the subject for a most worth-while exhibit.
SAM HEARN. New York, Nov. 3, 1936.

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