Handsome, hulking Norman Ross was a great Olympic swimmer, a World War flier, later managed athletic tourists like Tilden, Nurmi, reported for the Chicago Journal. Now he is grey, 43, and made $25,000 last year as a Chicago radio character known to WMAQ’s listeners as Uncle Normie. He has five programs on the air, the main one being an early-risers’ hour for Chicago & North Western Railway. For this Uncle Normie has three alarm clocks, timed to go off one after another starting at 5 a.m.
This early-morning hour is mainly of heavy music and light chatter. Chicago boosters object to Uncle Normie’s occasional “It’s a lousy day in Chicago”; school authorities to his occasional stormy-weather advice to mothers: “I wouldn’t send the kids to school today. . . . Missing one day of school won’t hurt ’em.” Patriots stormed at his Washington’s Birthday crack: “He never told a lie. And look where he is now.” The bloomer people hit the ceiling last year when they found out his nonsensical “N.P. B.C. girls club” meant No Panties Before Christmas. But once when Chicago & North Western flagged him down, 2,800 protesting letters promptly restored his old zip.
Last week, when Ross’s contract was up for renewal, not only Marshall Field & Co., but Wilson & Co., packers, bid briskly for him. But Chicago & North Western outbid them both. This season Norman Ross figures his radio take will reach $35,000.
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