WOR AM 710 & FM 98.7 New York – Martin Block – Make Believe Ballroom – April 11 1965

Martin Block landed on air in New York in 1934 at WNEW. Within a year, he was hosting a show called “The Make Believe Ballroom.” Block borrowing both the concept and the title from West Coast disc jockey Al Jarvis. The show created the illusion that Block was broadcasting from a ballroom, with the nation’s top dance bands performing live. The show became so popular, that by 1940 it was broadcast nationally. In the 1940s Block hired a young record collector named Joe Franklin, as his “record picker.” Franklin went on to host his own radio and television programs in the New York City market for more than 65 years.

Martin left WNEW in the mid-1950s, and went to fork for ABC Radio, & WABC for a while, and in the 1960s, he spent the final years of his career doing his Make Believe Ballroom on 710 WOR New York. -Ellis

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