Background

Mary Margaret McBride was born on November 16, 1899 in Paris, Missouri. She was the daughter of Thomas Walker McBride and Elizabeth Craig. Her father was a farmer who liked to keep moving; he acquired farms, improved them, and then traded them. Her maternal grandfather was a Baptist preacher, and from him, as well as from her mother, she acquired a strong sense of morality. At the age of eight she took the temperance pledge and was faithful to it for the rest of her life.

Education

Mary Margaret (she was never called Mary) was educated in a one-room schoolhouse and then in the Paris grade school. At the age of eleven she was sent to the William Woods School in Fulton, Mo. , through the beneficence of her Great-Aunt Albina, who had an interest in the institution and wanted her grandniece to become a teacher (and eventually principal of the Woods School). After her graduation in 1916, her great-aunt also financed McBride's studies at the University of Missouri. She graduated in 1919 with a Bachelor of Journalism degree.

Career

From her youth McBride had wanted to be a writer; and true to her ethical code, after one year she told her great-aunt, who terminated her financial support. McBride then supported herself by minding faculty children and working on the Columbia (Mo. ) Times as copyboy, reporter, and society editor for $10 per week. Through a friend McBride obtained a position on the Cleveland Press in 1920. Later that year she took a job in the publicity department of the Interchurch World Movement in New York City. After a few months, through a former associate in that organization, she became a reporter and feature writer on the Evening Mail. When the paper was sold in 1924, McBride became a freelance writer, and for the next ten years she produced articles for such periodicals as Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Harper's, Scribner's, McCall's, and Collier's. A four-part article about jazz written in collaboration with Paul Whiteman was one of her first pieces and was published in the Saturday Evening Post. In 1926 the article appeared as a book titled Jazz. She also wrote other books in this period, including Charm, with Alexander Williams (1927); four travel books with Helen Josephy, beginning with Paris Is a Woman's Town (1929); and The Story of Dwight Morrow (1930).

McBride received sizable fees for her articles and was able to travel to Europe, to invest in the stock market, and, by the end of the 1920's, to live on Park Avenue. However, the stock market crash of 1929 hurt her financially, and because of the subsequent depression, by the end of 1931 there was no longer a demand for her articles. During the next three years McBride had difficulty in obtaining writing assignments. Thus, in 1934 she auditioned for a position as woman commentator for an afternoon radio program on radio station WOR. She was hired, and paid $25 per week to broadcast for half an hour each day, posing as a grandmotherly individual, Martha Deane, who talked about her "grandchildren" and dispensed advice on taking care of children and managing the household. McBride soon found this pretense uncomfortable, and one day told her audience that she was not a grandmother, nor was she married; she stated that she would just be herself and talk about her current and past experiences. The listener response was positive; after a while she eliminated the household hints and just talked and did interviews. McBride broadcast for WOR as Martha Deane until 1940, doing a forty-five-minute program from 1936. In 1937 she undertook a fifteen-minute daily program under her own name for CBS; in 1940 it was broadcast nationally. McBride found the fifteen-minute format constraining, and in 1941 she went to work for NBC, which gave her forty-five minutes each day. In 1950 she moved to ABC, where she remained until 1954.

During her twenty years in radio McBride's large and very loyal audience was composed largely of housewives who enjoyed listening as a respite from their daily routine. In 1954 she moved to West Shokun, N. Y. Although retired, she continued to broadcast and, until 1956, to write a syndicated newspaper column for the Associated Press. Between 1954 and 1960 she did programs for NBC, and from 1960 until 1976 she broadcast a syndicated program for New York Herald Tribune Radio. She also broadcast a local program over WGHO in Kingston, N. Y. , until a few months before her death. She died on April 7, 1976 in West Shokun.

Achievements

• McBride is known as the hostes of many popular daytime talk shows on major radio networks from 1934 to 1954. She talked about many subjects including food and interviewing such famous persons as Sally Rand, Eleanor Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman and others. She was also a syndicated newspaper columnist, author of travel books and a magazine writer. McBride was a popular media figure; there is a tea rose named for her.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Fantastic Fifties Cookbook: 1,000 Classic Recipes by Mary Margaret McBride

    (The Fantastic Fifties Cookbook: 1,000 Classic Recipes is ...)

  • The early Catholic missionaries in the Pacific Northwest, 1774-1844 (Vol-1)

    (This book was digitized and reprinted from the collection...)

  • Mary Margaret McBride - Encyclopedia of Cooking - Deluxe Illustrated Edition - Complete 12 Section Set

    (The book is bound in a bright yellow hardcover measuring ...)

  • A long way from Missouri

    (A hardcover copy, missing the dust cover, copyright 1959 ...)

  • How Dear to My Heart

    (McBride's warmly written book about her mother and family...)

  • Mary Margaret McBride Encyclopedia of Cooking Volume 4

    (Cookbooks)

  • Mary Margaret McBride Encyclopedia Of Cooking

    (NO COVER. Used. 1959. Click on one of our photos to see a...)

  • Paris is a woman's town

Views

Quotations: "There is no time so short as the time between when your kids stop wrecking your furniture and your grandchildren start. "

"As a grandmother, I've learned that you can't buy love. But your grandchildren are disappointed when you don't try. "

"There are two types of grandmothers - the ones who feel relieved when they hear the first 'Let's go home' and the ones who feel hurt. The latter are definitely in the minority. "

"The Baby Boom has spawned an even bigger Grandma Boom. For every baby born, two women turn into grandmas. "

Personality

In her style and approach McBride was a pioneer of later radio and television talk shows. She ad-libbed and had the ability to make her guests feel comfortable, thus enabling them to talk freely. During her radio career she interviewed people from Eleanor Roosevelt and Harry Truman to plumbers, businessmen, fencing champions, small boys, and housewives. She spoke with a Midwestern accent, in a voice described as "homey" and "folksy. "

In 1939, 1944, and 1949 she observed the anniversaries of her radio program with gala celebrations; the last two, held in Madison Square Garden and Yankee Stadium, respectively, were attended by huge crowds. The loyalty of her fans extended to the products of her sponsors. At first McBride hesitated to accept sponsors, but then she laid down some ground rules: she would not accept a product without first using it herself; alcohol and tobacco were never accepted. She became a "super salesman" and had a long waiting list of would-be sponsors.

Food was one of her abiding interests and was often a topic of discussion on her programs; she often nibbled while broadcasting.

Connections

McBride never married.

Father:

Thomas Walker McBride

1862 - 1937

Mother:

Elizabeth Craig

References

• It's One O'Clock and Here Is Mary Margaret McBride: A Radio Biography