January 18 Those Were The Days Radio Players is formed when more than 100 fans of old time radio from throughout the Chicago area come to the Museum of Broadcast Communications to express their desire to read and perform vintage radio scripts.
February 8 In anticipation of the MBC’s move to the Chicago Cultural Center from its present River City location, Chuck announces that the new expanded quarters for the museum will have room for an exhibit honoring Jack Benny. He proposes a “Benny’s Vault” project to be supported by TWTD listeners. Response, during “Jack Benny Month,” is immediate and generous.
February 29 For the first time since TWTD went on the air in 1970, the program is broadcast on a Leap Year Day. The vintage old time radio shows selected for this date, therefore, were all originally broadcast on a February 29.
April 25 Final TWTD broadcast from River City before the Museum of Broadcast Communications moves to the Chicago Cultural Center on Michigan Avenue.
May 16 Those Were The Days begins broadcasting from the still-underconstruction facility and radio studio at the Chicago Cultural Center, the soon-to-be new home of the Museum of Broadcast Communications.
June 3 TV appearance. Lifestyle Continental Cablevision. “50th Anniversary of the film ‘Casablanca.’ Host Pat Cheffer with guests Frank Miller, author of Casablanca — As Time Goes By; Pat Principe and the musical ensemble “Tuxedo Junction,” and Chuck Schaden, Those Were The Days host.
June 6 TWTD remote broadcast from the Chicago Historical Society on the occasion of the opening weekend for the Society’s exhibition “Chicago Goes to War 1941-1945.” The Fourth U.S. Army Band from Fort Sheridan, giving a midday concert at the Society, plays “Those Were The Days” instead of the broadcast’s usual recorded theme at the 1 p.m. sign-on.
June 13 Museum of Broadcast Communications opens to the public in its new location at the Chicago Cultural Center.
August 14 Old Time Radio Collectors and Traders Society presents award to Chuck in recognition “of his dedication to the preservation of old-time radio shows and to maintaining the integrity and reputation” of the Society.
NOVEMBER 14, 1992 CBS Radio Mystery Theatre re-enactment features, from left, original producer-director Himan Brown, and actors Les Tremayne, Ken Nordine, Jim Dolan, Jack Bivans, Russ Reed, Sondra Gair and Dick Thorne.
September 13 TWTD Radio Players begin a series of re-enactments of vintage broadcasts (presented once-a-month on Sunday afternoons) in the Radio Hall of Fame studio at the Museum of Broadcast Communications in the Chicago Cultural Center.
November 14 CBS Radio Mystery Theater re-enactment in the Claudia Cassidy Theater at the Chicago Cultural Center. Chuck produces and hosts the program sponsored by the Radio Hall of Fame with producer-director Himan Brown, actor Les Tremayne and an all-star Chicago cast headed by Ken Nordine. A live version of “The Suicide Club” is presented.
December 26 TWTD presents “An Old Time Radio Christmas Party,” an original comedy script written and directed by Ken Alexander and starring members of the Those Were The Days Radio Players.
December 31 Chicago Sun–Times media columnist Robert Feder, in his year-end column writes:
No one has kept faith with his audience more loyally than old-time radio guru Chuck Schaden. Now heard seven days a week over two radio stations, Schaden has shared his undiminished enthusiasm for radio’s golden age for more than two decades. And who else but Schaden could pull together a four-year radio retrospective series on World War II?
