Halloween Martin

Halloween Martin
Martin in 1926
Born(1900-10-31)October 31, 1900
El Paso, Texas
DiedJuly 29, 1971(1971-07-29) (aged 70)
Cook County, Illinois
Alma materDePaul University
OccupationBroadcaster
Known forFirst woman DJ, first morning radio program
Career
ShowMusical Clock
Stations
StyleMorning show

Halloween Joan Martin Kurtzeborn (October 31, 1900 – July 29, 1971) was an American broadcast announcer and radio disc jockey. She was one of the first radio disc jockeys in Chicago and an early innovator in what became known as morning radio.[1] Historian Donna Halper credits Martin as the first woman to host her own morning radio show,[2] with music scholar Maren Hancock calling Martin one of the first modern DJs.[3]

Early life

Halloween Joan Martin[4] was born in El Paso, Texas,[5] on Halloween in 1900 to a Canadian-born father, physician and dentist George Gordon Martin, and a Texas-born mother, Mabel Clare Kountz.[6] She told the Associated Press that she went without a name for months until her parents chose the unusual birth-circumstance-inspired name.[7] Martin grew up in Chicago with her brother Gordon, where she attended DePaul High School for Girls.[8] She later matriculated at DePaul University, where she studied acting,[5] as well as the liberal arts, graduating in 1926 with a PhB.[9]

Career

After university, Martin joined the Chicago Herald and Examiner as a staff writer and columnist where she contributed to interior decorating content for the Prudence Penny column. Her editor also hosted a radio program on the same subject, and when they were unable to host one day, Martin was asked to substitute. Her appearance was well received, and she was subsequently given a 20-minute segment, which led to her first job offer in radio at KYW.[9]

Her entry to radio in 1929 came just eight years after Westinghouse established the first commercial radio station in 1921 in Pittsburgh, followed by KYW that same year, with commercial radio regularly transmitting music played on phonograph records. Non-commercial, amateur radio enthusiasts had been previously transmitting various types of live and recorded music since the 1910s.[10]​ Cultural critic Susan J. Douglas describes radio at that time as a "deeply sexist industry in which it was gospel that people did not like and would not trust the female voice over the air."​[11]

Nevertheless, women were heard, but only in gender-defined roles related to home economics. Before Martin was brought on board, popular woman's voices on KYW included Anna J. Peterson, likely the first woman to host cooking programs on American radio, and Leona Alford Malek, who hosted a popular weekly home economics program.[12] In the early 1920s, there were no morning shows on American radio, as the industry initially designed programming only for evening listening, a slot primarily designed for men, but also for shared family listening time. Some stations began to slowly expand their programming, at first to the middle of the day, and finally to the morning slot about a decade later.[13]

The Musical Clock

While away on a business trip in 1929, KYW station manager Homer Hogan was staying at a hotel. One morning, he received a wake-up call from the front desk. The woman's voice on the other end of the line left a lasting impression on him and inspired an idea for a new show. Hogan contacted Martin at the station and asked her to play phonograph records in the morning, interspersed with her announcing the time every five minutes.[5] This idea led to Martin becoming the host of one of the first morning shows.[13] Known as "The Musical Clock", the two-hour program began broadcasting that same year at 1020 kilocycles (equivalent to 1020 kHz on the AM band today). Chicago department store retailer Marshall Field became the program's first sponsor a year later.[5]

The Musical Clock gave Martin the freedom to work as a nascent disc jockey, choosing her own music and writing her own scripts.[9] She would awake every morning at 3:45 a.m. to prepare for the show. During the program, Martin would play, what writer Arnold Passman describes as "light, yet lively music", according to the needs of her audience. This included popular music, musical comedy, classical, and jazz music. As the program played, Martin would announce the time every five minutes, and play four commercials every hour, selling the offerings of the advertisers to listeners with an informed, and educated perspective on the product at a time when radio executives said it was impossible for women to sell products effectively. Later on, Martin added announcements about the temperature and weather. Audience reception was overwhelmingly positive, with the radio stations and networks monitoring the mail and the feedback closely. One listener described Martin as "the voice with a smile".[5]

When KYW left Chicago in the 1930s, Martin's fanbase persuaded other stations to keep her on the air. She was re-hired by WBBM in 1934. The Musical Clock's sponsor claimed that by 1938, Martin had come close to holding "the all-time record for the greatest number of broadcast hours of any program on any station or chain in the country", announcing 70,000 songs in 4,700 hours of radio broadcasting.[1] The next year, Sears, Roebuck and Co. became the new sponsor of the show, with Marshall Field unsuccessfully trying to win back the show. Martin remained at WBBM until 1944,[1] when she moved the show to WCFL for 30 minutes, six times a week.[14] Upon the recommendation of her physician, Martin retired from the show in 1946.[1]

Radio disc jockey Norman Ross, who started the same year as Martin, was her competitor in the morning radio slot over at WMAQ.[15]​ Other competitors with similar shows included Frank Cope on The Alarm Klok Klub on KJBS in San Francisco.[13]

Personal life

Martin married a younger man, Le Roy E. Kurtzeborn,[9] a classic car enthusiast and member of the Model T Ford Club International.[16] As Chicagoans suffered under the Great Depression, Martin performed fundraising and charity work for the needy on behalf of the private Joint Emergency Relief Fund of Cook County in the early 1930s.[17] The couple reportedly lived in Chicago's Old Town in the 1950s, where they enjoyed antique car shows together.[18] The Chicago Tribune published a photo of them at a car show in their red 1910 Hupmobile.[19] The car won numerous awards in the 1950s. Martin also expressed an interest in numismatics, with the Chicago Coin Club listing her as a member. She was active in the club for several years, writing and producing live entertainment for at least two of the club's banquets and serving as second vice president.[20] Martin died in Chicago in July 1971.[21] Her husband outlived her by eight years.[16] Her family owned a farm house just outside of Medaryville, Indiana, with most of the family buried in Winamac, Indiana.[6]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d Sies, Leora M.; Sies, Luther F. (2003). The Encyclopedia of Women in Radio, 1920-1960. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co. pp. 111, 182, 200. ISBN 9780786414765. OCLC 51931111.
  2. ^ Halper, Donna L. (2001). Invisible Stars: A Social History of Women in American Broadcasting (2nd ed.). Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe. pp. 36, 43, 45n. ISBN 9781315720845. OCLC 958109571.
  3. ^ Hancock, Maren (2021). "Tales from the Turntables: 'Narrating' and 'Narrativizing' the 'First Club DJ". In Anderton, Chris; James, Martin (eds.). Media Narratives in Popular Music. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 219-236. ISBN 9781501357305. OCLC 1244762053.
  4. ^ "Camp Johnston Men to Have Dance Party". Chicago Tribune. May 20, 1920. p. 15.
  5. ^ a b c d e Passman, Arnold (1971). The Deejays: How the Tribal Chieftains of Radio Got to Where They're At. New York: Macmillan. pp. 52-58. ISBN 9781587905452. OCLC 149670.
  6. ^ a b "Deaths". Journal & Courier. May 29, 1944. p. 5.
  7. ^ "Girl's Voice Helps Chicago Beat Boss Into The Office". The Bangor Daily News. March 10, 1931. p. 10.
  8. ^ Connelly, Jane (October 25, 2022). "Meet Chicago's First Disc Jockey - DePaul Alumna Halloween Martin". DePaul University. Retrieved February 9, 2026.
  9. ^ a b c d "Halloween Martin winds up 'Musical Clock' program". The De Paulia. 17 (22-Z142). March 31, 1938. pp. 1, 4. Note: The name of Martin's husband is misspelled in this article.
  10. ^ ​Hilmes, Michele (1999) [1997]. Radio Voices: American Broadcasting, 1922-1952. University of Minnesota Press. pp. 34-44. ISBN 9780816626205. OCLC 248316753.
  11. ^ Douglas, Susan J. (1999). Listening In: Radio and the American Imagination. Times Books. p. 164. ISBN 9780812933000. OCLC 876109914.
  12. ^ Grossman, Joanne Murray; Fife, Terry J. (2001). In Schultz, Rima Lunin; Hast, Adele (eds.). Women Building Chicago, 1790-1990: A Biographical Dictionary. Indiana University Press. pp. I, 531-532, 688-690 ISBN 9780253338525. OCLC 44573291.
  13. ^ a b c Lieberman, Philip A. (1996). Radio's Morning Show Personalities: Early Hour Broadcasters and Deejays from the 1920s to the 1990s. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. p. 3. ISBN 9780786400379. OCLC 246908395.
  14. ^ "From the Production Centres". Variety. 154 (8): 21. May 3, 1944.
  15. ^ Douglas, George H. (1987). The Early Days of Radio Broadcasting. McFarland. pp. 184, 189. ISBN 9780899502854. OCLC 15486570.
  16. ^ a b "Obituary for LeRoy E. Kurtzeborn". Chicago Tribune. June 1, 1979.
  17. ^ "All-Star Radio Revue". Chicago Tribune. January 8, 1932. p. 22.
  18. ^ "'10 Hupmobile to Chug Down to Springfield". Chicago Tribune. August 16, 1953. p. 9.
  19. ^ "Antique Autos on Display". Chicago Tribune. September 21, 1958. p. 18.
  20. ^ Wolf, Carl F.; Sochon, Jennie (1986). "History of the Chicago Coin Club". Chicago Coin Club. Retrieved February 9, 2026.
  21. ^ "U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014". Social Security Administration; Washington D.C., USA; Social Security Death Index, Master File.
    • Cook County, Illinois Death Index, 1908-1988. Cook County Clerk; Chicago, IL; Cook County Genealogy Records (Deaths).

Further reading

  • Russo, Alexander (2013). "Tick Tock Goes the Musical Clock Time Discipline and Early Morning Radio Programs." In Loviglio, Jason; Hilmes, Michele (eds.). Radio's New Wave: Global Sound in the Digital Era. New York: Routledge. pp. 194-208. ISBN 9780203124673. OCLC 849928777.
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