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Photographs from the Mary Margaret McBride Collection

Authors: Netta Cox, with contributions from Marsha Maguire

Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress

Washington, D.C.

2008

Encoded by Marsha Maguire, 2008

Finding aid URL: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mbrsrs/eadmbrs.rs008002

Latest revision: 2008

Table of Contents

Collection Summary

Key Subjects and Formats

Names

Topics

Forms of Material

Administrative Information

Acquisition of the Collection

Additions

Processing Information

Restrictions on Use of the Collection

Restrictions on Access to the Collection

Preferred Citation

Biography of Mary Margaret McBride

Scope and Content of the Collection

Arrangement of the Collection

Detailed Description of the Collection

Additional Guides

Papers of Mary Margaret McBride in the Library of Congress

Collection Summary

Key Subjects and Formats

The following headings represent names, topics, places, and formats of major significance in the collection.

Names

Topics

Forms of Material

Administrative Information

Acquisition of the Collection

The Mary Margaret McBride Collection, which includes these photographs, was a gift to the Library of Congress from Cynthia Lowry, McBride's long-time friend, in 1977.

Additions

No further additions to the collection are expected.

Processing Information

The collection was processed by Netta Cox in 2006.

Restrictions on Use of the Collection

Restrictions may exist on copying, quoting, or publishing materials included in the collection. For additional information, contact a reference librarian in the Recorded Sound Reference Center, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 20540-4690; (202) 707-7833.

Restrictions on Access to the Collection

The Photographs from the Mary Margaret McBride Collection are open for research.

Preferred Citation

Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: [Container number, eg., Box 3], Photographs from the Mary Margaret McBride Collection, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress.

Biography of Mary Margaret McBride

Mary Margaret McBride (1899-1976) was a journalist and the host of an immensely popular daily radio program from the mid 1930s into the 1950s. Her first program, Martha Deane, was broadcast on station WOR from 1934 until 1940. In 1937 CBS hired her to host a fifteen-minute talk show under her own name, but her most popular program, a forty-five-minute interview and talk show on NBC, ran from 1941 until 1950.

McBride's daily program featured interviews with over twelve hundred leading public and political figures of her time, such as entertainers, other radio personalities, authors, educators, doctors, and adventurers, but she also talked with average people who had interesting stories to tell. Interviewees included Eleanor Roosevelt, Governor Thomas E. Dewey, Frank Lloyd Wright, Bob Hope, Carl Sandburg, Margaret Bourke-White, Zora Neale Hurston, Tennessee Williams, Joe DiMaggio, a man leading a campaign to improve teenage driving skills, a female test pilot, the woman who invented crossword puzzles, and the American Mother of 1942.

McBride's interviews provide a highly personal perspective on American life during the Great Depression through World War II, its aftermath, and the beginning of the Cold War. They constituted the first thirty minutes of her show and were followed by informal discussion of household matters and advertising. Commercials were targeted at McBride's primary audience -- women -- who eagerly purchased the products she promoted and made McBride a favorite with sponsors. Her popularity with listeners and sponsors alike allowed her to retain both editorial and commercial control of her program.

McBride moved to ABC in 1950. She died on April 7, 1976, at age 76.

Scope and Content of the Collection

The photographs and accompanying paper documents form part of the much larger Mary Margaret McBride Collection, 1935-1950, in the Recorded Sound Section of the Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress. Representing McBride's long and influential career as a pioneering woman radio journalist, the McBride Collection includes over twelve hundred hours of interview programs and other radio broadcasts. The photographs include portrait, publicity, and family photographs of Mary Margaret McBride; pictures of McBride and her guests, such as Omar Bradley, Mike Wallace, Eleanore Roosevelt, Thomas Dewey, and Mary Martin; shots of her radio program's anniversary celebrations; images relating to her 1960 autobiography, Out of the Air and of various products and locations; and depictions of broadcasting both in and outside of the studio.

Arrangement of the Collection

The photographs and accompanying documents are arranged by file.

Detailed Description of the Collection

Additional Guides

Access to the audio recordings in the Mary Margaret McBride Collection is available through the SONIC recordings catalog of the Recorded Sound Reference Center. Click on Recorded Sound Catalog (SONIC) and search by guest name or date of broadcast.

Papers of Mary Margaret McBride in the Library of Congress

The Papers of Mary Margaret McBride, 1926-1975, are available in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress. Consisting of correspondence, articles, clippings, printed material, photographs, and other papers pertaining chiefly to her career in journalism, the papers were transferred from the Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division in 1980. A finding aid to the papers is available in the Manuscript Division Reading Room.