The Lucky Strike Papers

The Lucky Strike Papers: Journeys Through My Mother's Television Past was originally brought out by BearManor Media in 2007.  BearManor has now released a revised version of the book.

In 1951, a critic in Down Beat magazine wrote that Sue Bennett was "one of the coming female singers in the country." Bennett was a featured singer on several network shows during TV's early years, including Kay Kyser's College of Musical Knowledge, and Your Hit Parade (also known as the Lucky Strike Hit Parade).  She also appeared regularly on such programs as The Freddy Martin Show, and John Conte's Little Show. 

Decades later, Andrew Fielding began exploring the period of live television, via the shows on which his mother sang. His resulting portrait of the era—which includes conversations with such early television luminaries as Dorothy Collins, Snooky Lanson, Eileen Wilson, Raymond Scott, Merv Griffin, Morey Amsterdam, Milton DeLugg, Arthur Penn, and Kay Kyser —is enlightening, and captivating.

Editorial Reviews from the Original Edition:

The Lucky Strike Papers is "a fascinating look at the early years of live television..."--Radiogram magazine, 2009

The book "was one of the best works on early television I have ever had the pleasure of reading. Fielding has done a remarkable job capturing a time period when television was new, broadcasts were live and those working in the medium were learning on their feet." 

• Review on the website "Television Obscurities," 2010. 

"It’s a splendid book, sensitively written, that chronicles the phenomenon of live TV, and the musical variety type programs which are no longer with us....Mr. Fielding manages to write a very personal memoir about a story that was not his own, and that is something wondrous."

• Novelist and nonfiction writer Jacqueline T. Lynch, on her blog "New England Travels," 2013.

“For anyone curious at all about the early days of live television, and the transition from radio to TV as being the dominant form of home entertainment, this book is a delight... "

• 2008 review on the blog "Master of My Public Domain," by Michael Coston. 

"...Fielding has a distinctive approach, using a narrative voice that's almost quasi-documentary in tone.  It's very effective, giving the reader the sense of flipping through the pages of a scrapbook and reading the captions written on the backs of pictures.  In doing so, he generates a warmth not only for the age, but for the people participating in it.  He makes it come alive, which is one of my tests as to how good a book is.”

• 2014 review by Mitchell Hadley, on his blog "It's About TV. "