Yours Truly, Bob Bailey
13th June 1913 - 13th August 1983
Bob Bailey, full name Robert Bainter Bailey, was born on June 13, 1913 in Toledo, Ohio. Born into a show-business family, he grew up in a theatrical atmosphere. Bailey started his career as an actor in radio shows and soon became a regular member of the Chicago radio community. He had recurring roles in radio shows like The Road of Life, Scattergood Baines and That Brewster Boy.
In 1943, Bailey made his first Hollywood film - Jitterbugs - starring with the famous Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. In this remake of a 1933 Fox film called Arizona to Broadway, Bob Bailey played the role of Chester Wright, a swindler pretending to have discovered the pill that changes water to gasoline.
This role was such a success that he was hired for Laurel & Hardy's next movie, The Dancing Masters, where he played the role of Grant Lawrence, an inventor that is trying to persuade Laurel and Hardy to finance his latest discovery.
After a few other small roles in movies like Wing and a Prayer and Sunday Dinner for a Soldier, his movie career seemed to end. His talents, and especially his beautiful voice, were better suited to radio, so Bailey returned to his first love.
His first real success came with the radio show entitled Let George Do It, where he essayed the role of the detective George Valentine. The show ran on the West Coast Mutual-Don Lee network from October 18, 1946 to September 27, 1954. During its original run, the audience was limited to West Coast listeners but transcribed repeats were heard in New York City from January 20, 1954 through January 12, 1955.
The Old Time Radio historian Elizabeth McLeod said about Bailey that "the actor's interpretation of George Valentine is that of an intelligent, thinking man leavened by just a touch of world-weary cynicism." Bob Bailey played the role of George Valentine almost to the end, when Olan Soule replaced Bailey in 1954.
Let George Do It was an excellent show in its own right, but it happened that it was to be the warm-up act for Bob Bailey's most masterful radio role, that of the detective Johnny Dollar.
For many Old Time Radio fans, Johnny Dollar stands as the greatest detective ever created for radio. The radio show Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar aired on CBS for over 12 years, from February 11, 1949 to September 30, 1962. The name of the show derives from the fact that the detective closed each show by totaling up his expense account and signing it End of report...Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar.
No fewer than eight actors portrayed Johnny Dollar in the weekly half hour episodes, but many consider that Bob Bailey stands head and shoulders above the rest. He joined Yours Truly Johnny Dollar in October 1955 and played the role until November 1960.
Bailey also wrote a script while he was playing Johnny Dollar under the pen name Robert Bainter. This was entitled The Carmen Kringle Matter and was aired on the West Coast on Saturday, 21st December1957 and on the following day throughout the rest of the USA.
He quit acting as Johnny Dollar when CBS moved the production of the show to New York, in late 1960, and then he started writing TV scripts.
Author John Dunning described the consensus opinion of Johnny Dollar’s fans by remarking that Bob Bailey "had the ability to imbue the role with an unforgettable quality not quality not heard before or after”.
Bob Bailey made one more film appearance, as a reporter in the 1962 drama Birdman of Alcatraz, where he played with Burt Lancaster. After this film, Bailey withdrew from show business. He suffered a stroke and passed away in 1983. He was 70 years old.
Happy listening my friends,
