Midwestern Hayride

Midwestern Hayride, sometimes known as Midwest Hayride, was an American country music show originating in the 1930s from radio station WLW and later from television station WLW-T in Cincinnati, Ohio. During the 1950s it was carried nationally by NBC and then ABC television. The program featured live country music (performed mainly by local musicians but on lesser occasions by national stars) and what was then called "hayseed" comedy, much of which was the inspiration for the later TV series Hee Haw. It is credited as the first country music program regularly broadcast by a national network.

Inspired by the Shreveport-based Louisiana Hayride, the show was originally called Boone County Jamboree (named for nearby Boone County in Northern Kentucky). Midwestern Hayride was first broadcast before 1937 and was carried live on radio each Saturday evening through the early 1970s.

Television station WLW-T came on the air in 1948, sharing larger quarters with radio station WLW in the former Elks Building, re-christened Crosley Square. It eventually became the originating studio for the regional network Avco Broadcasting Corporation, which included WLW-A in Atlanta, WLW-D in Dayton, WLW-C in Columbus and later WLW-I in Indianapolis (after WLW-A was sold) when the program moved to television in the early 1950s. Then originating from WLW-T, Midwestern Hayride was simulcast on WLW radio until the early 1960s, then was revived in the mid-60s. At the show's peak there was a one-year waiting list for tickets to be in the audience (100 people was the limit for each weekly show).

In 1951, Midwestern Hayride was picked up by NBC-TV as a summer replacement for Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows. NBC aired it each of the following summers through 1956, except 1953. ABC-TV then carried it during the summers of 1957–59. For much of its television run MH was hosted by Dean Richards, lead vocalist of The Lucky Pennies, a local singing group. Richards also introduced a "Polka Time" segment (geared to Cincinnati's German heritage and its local breweries) aired near the program's close until 1969, when he was replaced by Henson Cargill riding on the success of his hit song "Skip a Rope".

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