Jim and Marian Jordan were veterans of small-time vaudeville before they ventured into radio comedy in Chicago, first as The O’Henry Twins in 1924, then as The Smith Family in 1925, as The Air Scouts in 1927 and in Smackout from 1931 to 1935.

Finally along with writer Don Quinn, they created Fibber McGee and Molly for Johnson’s Wax. The show premiered on the NBC Blue network in April 1935 and developed into one of the most popular radio comedies of all time.

From their home at 79 Wistful Vista, McGee, the blundering windbag, and Molly, his long-suffering, forgiving wife, presided over one domestic disaster after another. Listeners waited each week for Fibber to open his closet door, whereupon the stacked contents would crash to the floor.

The show featured a number of regular supporting characters: their neighbor Gildersleeve, Beulah the maid, henpecked Wallace Wimple, the Old Timer, Mayor La Trivia and Myrt, the telephone operator whose voice was never heard.

After Johnson’s Wax dropped the show in 1950, Pet milk sponsored it until 1952, then Reynolds Aluminum until 1953, when the half-hour format was replaced by a 15-minute weekday series that ran until 1957. There was a comic book in 1949, the Jordans made some movies in the 1940s and a television series had a brief run on NBC in 1959-1960, but nothing equaled their success on radio.