As a friend of mine would say, "You have a blog and have tons of followers so you would be foolish not to use it to promote your next book." So here it goes...
THE LONE RANGER: THE EARLY YEARS, 1933 - 1937 is a book that has been two decades in the making. Add another two decades from research by my co-author and you can be certain how valuable this tome will be for generations to come.
THE LONE RANGER premiered in January 1933 but it was not until five years later, February 1938, that the radio program was recorded on a regular basis. Back in the 1930s, radio was considered a throw-away medium. No sooner did the radio broadcast conclude, the actors tossed their scripts into the box as they went out the door and returned two days later to rehearse for the next broadcast. It was not until 1938 that the radio broadcasts were recorded and this was solely for business reasons. Yes, that means only about 75 percent of the radio broadcasts are known to exist. This also means the first five years have, with but minor exceptions, gone undocumented by fans and historians. This 800-page book documents the first five years of the radio program, including a thorough and accurate history regarding the origin of the program, with scans of archival documents to back up the facts and age-old myths debunked.
It will not come as a surprise to fans of the program that the character we know as The Lone Ranger was different in the earliest of years than the persona we came to know by 1938. In those early years, The Lone Ranger was depicted more like Zorro and Robin Hood, laughing at danger, gunning down Mexicans and Gypsies, and sought justice in a manner outside the law.
The authors read almost every radio script from those first five years to provide us with a unique perspective of a darker rendition, the various masks The Lone Ranger wore before settling down with the accepted black domino mask, Tonto's blood-thirsty acts of murder and revenge, Tonto's silver-tipped arrows, the dog that ran alongside as a sidekick to the masked man, recurring villains and The Lone Ranger's musical obsession to sing by the campfire and play a guitar.
A plot summary for each radio broadcast is documented in the episode guide.
The tentative release date is June 1, 2021, but you can pre-order your copy now at www.martingrams.biz and pay no postage.
