‘Australian Amateur Hour’ was a talent quest radio programme originally made in Sydney. It was later broadcast from all major cities and ran for 18 years from 1940 to 1958. A team of seven staff travelled around Australia for eight months a year to audition contestants. Ten talented acts were chosen to perform on the show which was taped each Thursday. After the show, listeners voted for their most popular performer either by phone or letters.
Milton Vogel performing at the Australian Amateur Hour in Ipswich, 1947 (image courtesy of Picture Ipswich)
Australian Amateur Hour visited Ipswich a number of times in view of auditioning talent for the programme. The Wintergarden Theatre was the local cinema in Ipswich and was also used for concerts and eisteddfods. On the night of Thursday 25 August, 1949, the Wintergarden Theatre opened its doors to over 2000 people from Ipswich and surrounding districts to hear the first Amateur Hour programme to be broadcast from Ipswich. The doors were closed shortly before the programme started and those who could not find seating had to stand in the aisles. Mr Dick Fair, the compere of the show commented on the high standard of the vocal, instrumental and mimic talent Ipswich had to offer.
Teviotville Twelve playing at an Amateur Hour at the Wintergarden Theatre, Ipswich, 1949 (Image courtesy of Picture Ipswich)
Those who took part in the programme were; Junior Cambrian Choir; Tom O’Connor, mimic; Milton Vogel, yodeller and guitarist; Josephine Loane, mezzo soprano; Alwyn Rose, Tenor; George Wells, pianist; June and Lois Twidale, vocal duet; Ester and Harry Tawns, flute and viola; Ernest Berlin, baritone; and the Teviotville Twelve, instrumental combination. The Teviotville Twelve won first place.
Australian Amateur Hour was the top-rating Australian radio show for many of its 18 years.
Information taken from ‘Dearth, Fair, Dear in Closing Amateur Hour Presentation’, The Age, November 7, 1958; 2AD: 75 years on the air, Australia’s Amateur Hour; Australian Dictionary of Biography, Fair, Richard Edward (1907 – 1982); ‘Some Stood to Hear “Hour’”, The Queensland Times Friday 26 August, 1949; ‘Ipswich Auditions for Amateur Hour’, The Queensland Times, 5 November, 1946; Picture Ipswich (Ipswich Libraries).