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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 June 2018
Radio drama gave Americans a new form of commercial entertainment in the 1930s, but the stories themselves contained time-honored elements. One of these was the rhetorical tradition scholars have identified as American civil religion. Radio Westerns were particularly well suited to promulgate familiar civil religion themes. They described the United States as an instrument of divine will in history, celebrated Americans as pious people, and associated national expansion with the implementation of God's will.
The Lone Ranger was the most famous Western to articulate these themes. The show's writers consciously sought to create in their hero a “composite of all men who uphold the laws of God and man.” During its long broadcast history from 1933 to 1954, the show attracted a large audience and inspired publishing, film, and television ventures. By the late 1940s, however, owing in part to World War II and in part to the Cold War, some Americans on both sides of the microphone found the old formula unsatisfactory.
Gunsmoke, which premiered in 1951, exemplified a second generation of radio Westerns. Though still civil religious, these Westerns located the United States' religious significance less in national triumph than in personal triumphs of its citizens. In doing so, they critiqued the earlier Westerns and shifted from what Martin E. Marty has called the “priestly” to the “prophetic” form of civil religion. Their impatience with the older Westerns' use of civil religion also paralleled theological critiques of the popular Christianity of the 1950s.
1. “The Ranger Rides Again on Errand of Mercy Here,” Washington Times-Herald, April 12, 1950, 8; see also “Kids in Hospitals ‘Oh, Ah and Gee’ at Lone Ranger,” Washington Times-Herald, April 11, 1950, 10; and Parker, David Willson, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger as a Form of Popular Art” (Ph.D. diss., Northwestern University, 1955), 168–69Google Scholar. Parker was given access to The Lone Ranger's records and was allowed to interview several executives involved in its production. His dissertation contains extended quotations and reproduces corporate documents.
2. Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 170; see also Osgood, Dick, WYXIE Wonderland: An Unauthorized 50-Year Diary of WXYZ Detroit (Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1981), 60 Google Scholar.
3. Bellah, Robert N., “Civil Religion in America,” in American Civil Religion, ed. Richey, Russell E. and Jones, Donald G. (New York: Harper and Row, 1974), 33 Google Scholar. This article originally appeared as “Religion in America,” Daedalus 96 (Winter 1967): 1–21.
4. To use a familiar example, American politicians speak constantly of God but seldom of Jesus and never of specific doctrines, such as transubstantiation, that divide even Christians. For a recent general introduction to civil religion, see Gentile, Emilio, Politics as Religion, trans. Staunton, George (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001), xiv–xix, 1–25Google Scholar.
5. Striker, Fran Jr., His Typewriter Grew Spurs: A Biography of Fran Striker—Writer (Runnemede, N.J.: Quest, 1983), 29–37, 98–99 (quote on 29)Google Scholar; David Rothel, Who Was That Masked Man? The Story of the Lone Ranger, rev. ed. (San Diego: A. S. Barnes, 1981), 27–55; J. (Joseph) Bryan III, “Hi-Yo, Silver!” Saturday Evening Post, October 14, 1939, 21, 131, 134, 136; Dunning, John, On the Air: The Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 406–9Google Scholar; Osgood, WYXIE Wonderland, 48–52; and Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 129–55.
6. Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 135; Bryan, “Hi-Yo, Silver!” 131; “The Origin and Development of the Lone Ranger,” in Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 133.
7. The precise articulation of this formulation is drawn from the shows themselves and examples follow in the text. However, variations of these themes are typical of American civil religion. Linking the United States to God's purposes in history was an expression of American exceptionalism, or the idea that the United States represented not simply a different but also a better way for all humans to live. The notion that individuals must orient themselves toward the nation's divine purpose reflected both the Puritan idea of society as a moral covenant and the post-Revolutionary assertion that self-government was only possible among a moral citizenry. Finally, associating divine purpose with national expansion reflected the idea of the United States as a redeemer nation. On exceptionalism, see Seymour Martin Lipset, American Exceptionalism: A Double-Edged Sword (New York: Norton, 1996); on the similarity of Puritan covenant theology and republicanism, see Bellah, Robert N., The Broken Covenant: American Civil Religion in Time of Trial (New York: Crossroad, 1975)Google Scholar; and on redeemer nation ideology, see Tuveson, Ernest Lee, Redeemer Nation: The Idea of America's Millennial Role (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968)Google Scholar.
8. Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 184–85; “The Lone Ranger Standards and Backgrounds,” in ibid., 214; “The Lone Ranger's Origin,” The Lone Ranger, June 30, 1948. Consider also “This Is A Free Country,” broadcast on September 22, 1941. Jim and Caroline Fletcher were homesteaders in a region dominated by cattlemen who resented the young “nesters.” Hooded night riders harassed the couple before the Lone Ranger and Tonto intervened. By sowing discord among the cattlemen, the Ranger isolated two troublemakers and convinced the others they could live in harmony with the homesteaders. At the show's close, one converted cattleman said to the Fletchers, “The Masked Man set us straight. This here is big country, plenty of space for all of us. From now on, we’re friends.” A moment later, even the heavens seemed to agree when Jim Fletcher remarked, “The sun's coming up. For the first time since we come out here, it's shining on a free country, a real free country!” Similarly, a special broadcast marking the show's fifteen anniversary on June 30, 1948, recounted the Lone Ranger's origin. At one point, the Ranger instructed Dan Reid, Jr., son of his slain brother, about the heritage handed down to him by his parents. “They have given you a land where there is true freedom, true equality of opportunity, a nation that is governed by the people, by laws that are best for the greatest number,” he said. “The Lone Ranger's Origin,” The Lone Ranger, June 30, 1948. Such examples could be multiplied. All audio recordings were obtained from private collectors. Most are also available online at The Internet Archive, http://www.archive.org, accessed December 12, 2011.
9. Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 214.
10. “Faith at Foxhead,” The Lone Ranger, June 11, 1943.
11. “Faith and Guns,” The Lone Ranger, September 1, 1947.
12. Of course, even abstract religion implied that total non-belief was not genuinely “American,” and characters who refused religion completely, such as Bull Davis in the first part of his play, were depicted unsympathetically. An example of a radio Western that used explicitly Christian language was Ranger Bill, Warrior of the Woodlands, produced by the Moody Bible Institute in the 1950s. Unlike The Lone Ranger, it was part of a not-for-profit religious ministry.
13. Parker, “A Descriptive Analysis of the Lone Ranger,” 200.
14. “The Fire God,” The Lone Ranger, December 12, 1945.
15. “Reverend Thomas Starr King,” Frontier Fighters, n.d.; “Brigham Young,” Frontier Fighters, n.d.
16. “The Deacon Agrees,” The Lone Ranger, January 29, 1945.
17. “The Burro That Had No Name,” Death Valley Days, June 17, 1938; for the account of Balaam's ass, see Numbers 22. For the development of the commercial nature of early radio, see Douglas, Susan, Inventing American Broadcasting, 1899–1922 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987)Google Scholar; Smulyan, Susan, Selling Radio: The Commercialization of American Broadcasting, 1920–1934 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994)Google Scholar; and Fortner, Robert S., Radio, Morality, and Culture: Britain, Canada, and the United States, 1919–1945 (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2005)Google Scholar.
18. Roosevelt, Franklin D., “Annual Message to Congress,” in God's New Israel: Religious Interpretations of American Destiny, rev. ed., ed. Cherry, Conrad (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998), 291 Google Scholar.
19. “We Hold These Truths,” December 15, 1941 (as this also was the one hundred fiftieth anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of Rights, the show had been planned before the attack); Bannerman, R. LeRoy, Norman Corwin and Radio: The Golden Years (University: University of Alabama Press, 1986), xi, 73–88Google Scholar.
20. Bowles, Chester, Tomorrow Without Fear (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1946)Google Scholar; Chafe, William H., The Unfinished Journey: America Since World War II (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 81–84, 93Google Scholar; Wittner, Lawrence S., Cold War America: From Hiroshima to Watergate (New York: Praeger, 1974), 19–21 Google Scholar.
21. Miller, Douglas T. and Nowak, Marion, The Fifties: The Way We Really Were (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1977), 344 Google Scholar.
22. Paley, William S., As It Happened: A Memoir (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1979), 219–21Google Scholar.
23. Barnouw, Erik, A History of Broadcasting in the United States, vol. 2, The Golden Web, 1933–1953 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), 214, 244, 286–90Google Scholar; MacDonald, J. Fred, Don't Touch That Dial! Radio Programming in American Life, 1920–1960 (Chicago: Nelson-Hall, 1979), 82, 84–86Google Scholar.
24. Miller, Merle, The Judges and the Judged (1952), in Blacklisting: Two Key Documents (New York: Arno, 1971), 75–81, 98–101Google Scholar; Cogley, John, Radio-Television, vol. 2 of Report on Blacklisting (1956), in Blacklisting, 100–110; Barnouw, The Golden Web, 253–57, 265–77Google Scholar.
25. Bannerman, 219; Julian, Joseph, This Was Radio: A Personal Memoir (New York: Viking, 1975), 168–202 (quote on 170)Google Scholar.
26. This paralleled developments in the movie Western. High Noon screenwriter Carl Foreman said his film was an allegory about the House Un-American Activities Committee. Lenihan, John, Showdown: Confronting Modern America in the Western Film (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1985), 119–20Google Scholar.
27. Pierard, Richard V. and Linder, Robert D., Civil Religion and the Presidency (Grand Rapids: Academie, 1988), 170–83Google Scholar.
28. Ibid., 196. For the religious underpinnings of Eisenhower's policies toward the Soviet Union, see also Chernus, Ira, Apocalypse Management: Eisenhower and the Discourse of National Insecurity (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
29. Marty, Martin E., Modern American Religion, vol. 3, Under God, Indivisible, 1941–1960 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 279 Google Scholar.
30. Miller, William Lee, Piety Along the Potomac (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1964), 125–27 (quote on 127)Google Scholar; Mathews quoted in Marty, Under God, Indivisible, 359; McIntire quoted in Marty, Under God, Indivisible, 369.
31. “The Biography of Gunsmoke,” WAMU-FM broadcast, Washington, D.C., April 25, 1976; Cecil Smith, “Meston: Gunsmoke Gets in His Eyes,” Los Angeles Times, December 25, 1960, A10–A11; Meston, Daja Wangchuk, Comes the Peace: My Journey to Forgiveness, (New York: Free Press, 2007), 23 Google Scholar.
32. “Biography of Gunsmoke”; “Wild Jack Rhett,” Escape, December 17, 1950; “Pagosa,” Romance, August 6, 1951; Paper, Lewis J., Empire: William S. Paley and the Making of CBS (New York: St. Martin's, 1987), 181 Google Scholar; Dunning, On the Air, 12; “Mark Dillon Goes to Gough Eye (first audition starring Rye Billsbury),” Gunsmoke, June 11, 1949; “Mark Dillon Goes to Gough Eye (second audition starring Howard Culver),” Gunsmoke, July 13, 1949.
33. “Biography of Gunsmoke”; Barabas, Suz Anne and Barabas, Gabor, Gunsmoke: A Complete History and Analysis of the Legendary Broadcast Series (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1990), 32–33 Google Scholar. Meston's letter was said to have been directed to the New York Herald-Tribune, but it is unclear if the newspaper ever published it.
34. Smith, “Meston,” A11.
35. “The Preacher,” Gunsmoke, November 13, 1955.
36. “The Preacher,” Frontier Gentleman, October 19, 1958.
37. “Father O’Tool's Organ, Part 1,” Have Gun, Will Travel, August 7, 1960; “Father O’Tool's Organ, Part 2,” Have Gun, Will Travel, August 14, 1960.
38. “The Coltsville Terror,” Hopalong Cassidy, January 15, 1950; “Oil Lease Swindle,” The Lone Ranger, June 1, 1938. “The Coltsville Terror” reused the script for The Marauders, a Hopalong Cassidy feature film released in 1947. Interestingly, Hopalong star William Boyd disapproved of second-generation Westerns. “They aren't Westerns,” he said. “We call them head-knockers.” Hedda Hopper, “Hopalong Discusses Current Cowboys,” Los Angeles Times, November 2, 1961, C8.
39. “The Massacre,” Fort Laramie, August 5, 1956. Homicidal religious fanatics appeared on Gunsmoke, as well. In “Kangaroo,” a John Brown-like madman threatened to cut Chester's right hand off, and, in “Kitty's Killing,” a religious fanatic threatened Kitty, forcing her to kill him in self-defense. “Kangaroo,” Gunsmoke, January 18, 1959; “Kitty's Killing,” Gunsmoke, February 2, 1958. The association of violence with redemption in popular American culture is discussed in Lawrence, John Shelton and Jewett, Robert, The Myth of the American Superhero (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 106–25Google Scholar.
40. Slotkin, Richard, Regeneration through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600–1860 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1973)Google Scholar. Slotkin analyzed modern Westerns, especially in relation to twentieth-century U.S. foreign policy, in Gunfighter Nation: The Myth of the Frontier in Twentieth-Century America (New York: Atheneum, 1992). Catherine L. Albanese, Nature Religion in America: From the Algonkian Indians to the New Age (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), tells a similar story. Seventeenth-century Puritans viewed nature as a “savage” place of divine testing where the English has to guard against losing their “Englishness.” In the Revolutionary period, nature was understood to be the basis of natural law, while, in the early republic, it was seen as God's gift to a chosen people. To the transcendentally minded, it was a place where individuals could throw off the shackles of civilization and directly experience a divine presence. For many, nature evolved from a place apart from God to a place where on could encounter God.
41. Marty, Martin E., “Two Kinds of Two Kinds of Civil Religion,” in American Civil Religion, ed. Richey, and Jones, , 145–51, quotes on 145 and 147.Google Scholar
42. Hudnut-Beumler, James, Looking for God in the Suburbs: The Religion of the American Dream and Its Critics, 1945–1965 (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1994), 78–84, 110–30, 145–66Google Scholar.
43. Warshow, Robert, “Movie Chronicle: The Westerner,” in The Immediate Experience: Movies, Comics, Theatre and Other Aspects of Popular Culture (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1962), 146, 153 (this essay previously appeared as “The Westerner,” Partisan Review [March 1954]: 190– 203)Google Scholar; McLuhan, Marshall, Understanding Media: The Extension of Man (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964), 298 Google Scholar.
44. Harold Innis and Susan Smulyan have shown how radio also played an important role in national boundary setting. Harold Innis, The Bias of Communication, 2d ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008), 33–60, distinguished between “space biased” media, such as radio, and “time-biased” media, such as stone tablets. The former can send messages over vast distances, but the messages are fleeting and may be replaced hour to hour or minute to minute. The latter are hard to move but endure for long periods of time. Space-biased media can homogenize diverse cultures within the scope of their reach, in this case, undermining local identities in favor of a national “American” identity. Smulyan, Selling Radio, argued that the institutions radio created, such as national networks, wired transmission systems, and an advertising-driven business model, privileged national celebrities, regulatory authorities, and markets over their local counterparts. Radio also can be compared to other media as a vehicle of Western stories. Postwar Western literature shifted from what historian Richard Etulain called a “frontier” focus to a “regional” focus, but much of it appeared in literary journals and did not command national attention. Television needed to win a large audience quickly, so it reverted to B-Westerns more like the first than second generation of radio Westerns. Some movies of the 1950s were revisionist— The Gunfighter, The Ox-Bow Incident, and Bad Day at Black Rock tackled heroism, vigilantism, and racism, respectively—but movies were more expensive than radio shows, making it harder to experiment. Etulain, Richard W., Re-Imagining the Modern American West: A Century of Fiction, History, and Art (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996), xiii–xiv Google Scholar; Yoggy, Gary A., “When Radio Wore Spurs: An Analysis of Westerns on Radio,” Old-Time Radio Digest (March-April 1985): 17–8Google Scholar; Lenihan, Showdown, 115–47; Loy, R. Philip, Westerns in a Changing America, 1955–2000 (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2000), 1–14 Google Scholar.
45. As Walter Ong put it, “When I pronounce the word ‘permanence’, by the time I get to the ‘-nence’, the ‘perma’ is gone, and has to be gone.” Ong, Walter J., Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word (London: Routledge, 1982), 32 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
46. Lenthall, Bruce, Radio's America: The Great Depression and the Rise of Modern Mass Culture (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), 83–87 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
47. Dunning, On the Air, 302, 404–5.