The Baby Snooks Show: "Halloween" (1946)

Many, perhaps most, radio shows in the days of Old Time Radio had Halloween episodes. Indeed, The Jack Benny Program very nearly had one every year. The Baby Snooks Show, starring comedienne Fanny Brice as the title character, was among the many shows that had Halloween episodes. Indeed, the November 1 1946 episode "Halloween" is significant as one of the earliest references to trick or treating in popular culture.

Baby Snooks was a mischievous toddler created by Fanny Brice. Fanny Brice first played Baby Snooks on vaudeville, drawing inspiration for the name from George McManus's comic strip The Newlyweds, which featured an infant named Baby Snookums. She would later draw inspiration from the popular child star Baby Peggy. First appearing in a successful series of shorts starting in 1921, Miss Brice transformed Baby Snooks into a caricature of Baby Peggy. It was in 1934 that Fanny Brice began appearing as Baby Snooks in The Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway. Baby Snooks made her radio debut in 1936 on The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air. The following year Fanny Brice (then 46 years old) played Baby Snooks in the film Everybody Sings (1937).  Starting in 1938 she occasionally appeared on the radio show Good News of 1938. In 1940 Baby Snooks was a regular on Maxwell House Coffee Time.

It was in 1944 that Baby Snooks received her own radio show. The Baby Snooks Show starred Fanny Brice as Baby Snooks, who lives with her parents, Lanhcelot "Daddy" Higgins (played by Hanley Stafford) and Vera "Mommy" Higgins (played by Arlene Harris by the time of the 1946 Halloween episode). While Baby Snooks was essentially a good kid at heart, she had a rather impish sense for mischief, often driving Daddy up the wall.

In "Halloween" Baby Snooks is doing exactly that. As the episode starts, Baby Snooks wants to go out trick or treating with her friends. Unfortunately, Daddy won't let her as a doctor for the life insurance will be dropping by to examine him and he wants peace and quiet lest his blood pressure goes up. While Daddy is trying to rest, Baby Snooks gets on his nerves until he finally lets her go out trick or treating. It is then that Daddy dons a mask with huge tusks to scare the kids and teach them a lesson about running about and wreaking havoc on the streets. Unfortunately, Daddy's plan backfires when one of the fathers of Baby Snooks's friends takes offence at him scaring the kids, resulting in the two fathers pulling a series of pranks on each other that escalate in their outrageousness.

Of interest to those fascinated by the history of Halloween is the scene in which Baby Snooks and her friends are trick or treating. Here it must be pointed out that trick or treating was a relatively recent development. It had originated in Canada in the late Twenties and then spread throughout the United States in the 1930s. It is for that reason that one does not begin to see references to the custom until the 1940s. As odd as it might seem today, The Baby Snooks Show episode "Halloween" is then one of the earliest references to trick or treating in popular culture. In "Halloween"Baby Snooks and her friends trick or treat at announcer Harlow Wilcox's house. Mr. Wilcox gives the kids a treat of Jell-O. If that seems like an odd treat for Halloween, keep in mind that Jell-O was the show's sponsor and the scene is effectively a commercial for the product.

The Baby Snooks Show episode "Halloween" is a lot of fun, with Daddy's pranks growing more and more outrageous as the episode progresses. As might be expected, his pranks don't always work out as intended. Over all, it is an enjoyable listen any time around Halloween.