The "fact man," Joseph Nathan Kane, 96, was at the Library Oct. 11 to mark his donation of a year's worth of early radio shows.
Mr. Kane gave a collection of 78 rpm records of his 1938-39 coast-to-coast radio show, "Famous First Facts." He also donated a vintage 1930s microphone.
Mr. Kane is author of the standard reference works Famous First Facts, Facts about the States and Facts About the Presidents, which are known to many a reference librarian.
For example, a question received by the Library's National Reference Service (NRS), "Who was the first president to fly?" was answered by NRS Chief Barbara R. Morland after she referred to Facts About the Presidents.
"On Oct. 11, 1910, Theodore Roosevelt flew in a biplane," she said. "Today is the 85th anniversary of that first," she told a Pickford Theater audience of about 40 people.
The ceremony marked the public availability of the collection, due to the completion, by the Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound (MBRS) Division's magnetic recording library, of the transcription of the acetate records to archival reel-to-reel tape and the cataloging of references therein.
Gene DeAnna, MBRS recorded sound reference center reference librarian, said, "To have a full year of a radio show is indeed special. It's unusual because the holdings on early radio are spotty; a lot went out on the air that was not recorded. The only reason we have this is because Mr. Kane paid Mutual Broadcasting Co. to make these custom recordings for him."
The collection will join the American TV and Radio Archive, created by Congress in 1976 to collect, preserve and store TV and radio programs. At 500,000 and counting, it is one of the largest such collections in the world. It includes the NBC Radio Collection and the Armed Forces Radio and TV Service.
During the ceremony, selections from some of Mr. Kane's shows that were broadcast in 1938 were played.
"Good evening everyone," said the announcer. "There's always a first. ... Sixty-four years ago today the first Republican elephant cartoon was used. Sixty-two years ago today, the first cigarette machine was patented, and 28 years ago today the first commercial mail shipment was made."
A notebook of typed, mimeographed scripts that accompanies the recordings includes some of Mr. Kane's penciled corrections to the trio of facts regularly featured at the beginning of each program.
During the next part of the show, actors would read, unrehearsed, from scripts to reenact a famous first, such as the first American soldier to land in France in World War I or the first American man to eat 53 ears of corn in one sitting. The secret? No butter or salt, the actor said, only to be beaten out by someone who claimed to have eaten more. "Next time I won't eat the cob," he said.
One problem Kane ran into often was people who claimed to have predated his findings of famous firsts, he said. "At least 5 percent of any work I do goes in the garbage pail. Everybody else has something earlier." When he reported the invention of the first department store, 50 families wrote to him and described how their immigrant grandparents had sold variety goods in pushcarts before opening a store.
He told the Associated Press in a 1976 interview that he spent most of his time tracking down people who claimed to be firsts and doing research in libraries and museums.
For his habit of disproving what was thought to be common knowledge, Mr. Kane earned the sobriquet of "the man historians hate." Some examples that contradicted what was printed in history books include: "Samuel Pierpont Langley constructed and flew a heavier-than-air machine more than seven years before the Wrights at Kitty Hawk," and, "Samuel Wilson, a provisions inspector during the War of 1812, went by the nickname 'Uncle Sam,' and regularly stamped inspected packages with the initials 'U.S.' Hence the moniker was applied to the U.S. Government."
Mr. Kane recalled another pair of firsts that proved quite controversial. He said electric light was introduced 30 to 40 years before Thomas Edison by an inventor who died poor. He said the same was true for TV technology -- 30 to 40 years before its official invention date, someone had discovered it was possible to transmit moving pictures over the airwaves. He too died a penniless unknown, according to Mr. Kane.
Mr. Kane lives in Manhattan, not far from the WOR radio studio where his broadcasts were made. He described the variety show as an experiment to prove what radio technology could do. An audio slice of life of the 1930s, the recordings include live audiences who provided rousing laughter and clapping.
"This is a rich, rich multimedia collection," said John Y. Cole, director of the Center for the Book, the host for the presentation. The event was jointly sponsored by NRS, MBRS and the Center for the Book. In addition to members of Mr. Kane's family, representatives of his publishing house, H.W. Wilson, attended the presentation.
Concluded Dr. Cole: "Joe Kane is a living treasure. He is a reference machine who has for years honored and contributed to the world of librarianship through his reference books." And now he has contributed to the American TV and Radio Archive through his archive of recordings.
