 Ladies and gentlemen, the railroad hour. And here comes our star-studded show train. Tonight, the Association of American Railroad celebrates its 250th broadcast by bringing you transcribed the Fremel story, starring Gordon MacRae and his guest star Dorothy Warren-Scholes. Our choir is under the direction of Norman Luboff, and the music is prepared and conducted by Carmen Dragon. Yes, tonight a salute to the Dean of the World of Operetta is brought to you by the American Railroad, the same railroads that bring you the food you eat, the clothes you wear, the fuel you burn, and the multitude of other things you use in your daily life. And now, here is our star-starring Gordon MacRae. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to our special anniversary broadcast. Tonight, we're celebrating our 250th consecutive week on the air, and listening in San Francisco tonight, waiting to speak to you and play for you, is the great Rudolph Fremel. In celebrating this railroad-hour milestone, we salute this greatness as we bring you the Fremel story. Fetching musketeers, comrade musketeers, bound to ride side by side through and far. Yes, tonight Dorothy Warren-Scholes and I want you to hear a few of Rudolph Fremel's songs, which make up the singing story of our century. The Vagabond King, Rosemarie. The Firefly Three Musketeers. Oh, these operatives have been part of our growing up, the musical fabric of our lives. Sounds of silver seam on the sweet lurdies that never die. Songs that sing themselves across the years. You want to hear about the man who wrote those wonderful songs? Well, the Fremel story begins on the birthday of Charles Rudolph Fremel, whose father was a baker in the city of Prague, Bohemian. While he was just a little boy, his father came home one day with an earthquake, an explosion. A bicycle? Where did you get it? I bought it. Enough to eat and you bought a piano? What are you going to do with it? I played the accordion, so everybody said I could play the piano too. The accordion will play sideways. A piano is the same thing. Only it sits on the floor. Listen, Mama, it has talent. But someday our little Rudy may even play the piano in the orchestra at Hirschmeyer's Cafe. If we don't have to chop it up for Firewood to stay alive. The sign is attracted to the piano. This means he will be a famous piano player. Or maybe it means he will be a famous piano mover. Well, that's how Rudolph Fremel first shook hands with the piano. It was a warm winter out here in Prague, though they didn't have to chop it up for Firewood. And they sold enough kuchen in the bakery shop so they could afford to give Rudy piano lessons. Now, Rudolph, let me hear you do exactly the same thing. All right. Rudolph, you'll never learn anything about music unless you do it the way I tell you to. It's my papa's piano and I'll play it the way I want to. Happy to say that Rudolph Fremel's piano teacher was wrong. One of the melodies which Rudolph Fremel improvised early in his life in Europe, he gave the title Chansonet, the little song. But many years later, it was to become a very big song indeed. Parica? She loved to sing it to him. Now anyone who said seriously about the music of writing love songs should fall in love. So maybe you'd like to hear about Rudolph Fremel's first girlfriend. It was a love story, something like an opera that Rudolph Fremel might have written himself. Her name was Rose. And her father was a perfume manufacturer, one of the wealthiest men in Prague. Rose and her father lived in a huge mansion with more rooms than there were buns in the frimmel bake shop. And Rudy sent her the only kind of love letter he knew how to write. It's lovely. Father, I want to play something for you. It's another piece of music by that Rudolph Fremel. I don't want to hear it. You're being very unfair. Rose, I'm being practical. In the perfume business, when I'm through with the day's work, I have perfume. A carpenter, when he's finished the day's work, has a house. What does a piano player have when he's finished? Air. But Rudy Fremel is more than a piano player. He's a composer. He's a no-good-nick. I do not wish to say that his music smells bad, but it is not perfume. They say that no one ever forgets his first love. Perhaps many years later, when he was writing the score for Vagabond King, Rudolph Fremel may have been thinking of a boyhood sweetheart in a big mansion in the city of Prague when he wrote it. There were those who recognized the growing talent of Rudolph Fremel. Yes, the baker's son from Prague was awarded a scholarship at the National Conservatory of Music. And there he met a man whose name is almost a legend throughout the world. Mr. C. Me, Mr. Dvořák? Yes. I have been examining some of your work, Fremel. Much of it is good. Nice themes. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Dvořák. Never lose sight of your themes. They are the most important thing in music. I know. I'm always searching for melodies. I... I cannot say melodies. I said themes. Any fool with one finger on a piano can write a tune, but to develop a theme, to shape it into a living thing that moves and dances in the different lights from the orchestra. That is composition. That is music. That's why you went to America, isn't it, Mr. Dvořák? To find new themes. A world of themes, my boy. A whole new world of themes. I am too old to hear it, but I know it will be true. The new century will listen to the music of the new world. Oh, Mr. Dvořák, do you think I... I will have a chance to go to America? To the new world? In just a moment, we return to the second act of the frimmel story. Since the end of World War II, you and all of us have benefited tremendously from an exciting and dramatic wave of improvements in America. New wonder drugs, new things to eat and wear, new home appliances and the emergence of television are only a few of the changes that have put their mark on our everyday life. And keeping pace with these developments have come exciting new advances in railroading. In the last eight years, for example, America's railroads have virtually revolutionized the nature of the power that hauls most everything you eat, wear and use. Yes, the mighty power of 18,000 efficient new diesel electric locomotive units has been put at your service in the last eight years alone. And that's not all. Beautiful new passenger equipment has brought a kind of comfort and convenience never before imagined. More than 500,000 new freight cars have rolled out on the steel highways of the railroads to help speed the goods America depends on. 12 million tons of shining new steel rail and 300 million new chemically treated cross ties have been put into service. New electronic and communications equipment has helped the railroads set records in safety and efficiency. Yes, despite the fact that the returns on railroad investment are among the lowest of any major American industry, the railroads have spent one of the largest sums on record $8 billion of their own money to improve their equipment and service to you. These railroads are America's basic form of transportation, vitally necessary to the nation's progress and strength. And because that will continue to be true, the railroads will continue to build for still better service and greater efficiency in the job of providing America with its number one form of transportation. Now here is act two of our special 250th broadcast of the railroad hour, a salute to one of the greatest operetta composers of all time. The Fremel story written by Lawrence and Lee starring Gordon MacRae and Dorothy Warren Schultz. Guns of foil and danger will, your service stranger and bow guns of shame and sorrow will. Oh, what a song. Well, it probably won't come as much of a surprise to you, but Rudolf Rimmel found his way to the New World. In Carnegie Hall, he played his own piano concerto with Walter Damrosch and the New York Symphony. Everyone hailed his piano orchestra, proclaimed his amazing powers of improvisation. And Rudolf Rimmel might be honored today only as a great concert pianist and the composer of Sirius' orchestral works. But as it happened, a temperamental woman lost her temper and changed the whole course of Rudolf Rimmel's life. Mr. Herbert, Victor Herbert, what has he ever written? And please, control yourself, Madame Trentini. Composers, composers, if only a singer could get along without them. But, Madame Trentini, you should not be angry with Victor Herbert. After all, note in Marietta was your greatest success. I will never do another operetta with Victor Herbert. Well, Madame Trentini, I have just left Mr. Herbert and he swears he will never do another operetta with you. Fine, then we are both happy. Everybody's happy, except me. Who will I get to write the Firefly? That is your problem. There must be somebody who can write music besides Victor Herbert. Now, wait, Mr. Rimmel, before we go in, it is clearly understood if Trentini likes the song, you're hired. But, Mr. Hammerstein, what can I do to make sure the lady will like me? Nothing, just play the music. Any word you say to a temperamental singer is certain to be the wrong thing. I should say nothing at all? Well, perhaps as you're leaving you might say that you're glad to have met her. I hope I will be glad. Now, here we go into the lioness' day. Oh, Mr. Hammerstein, you are late. Madame Trentini, allow me to present the distinguished European composer, Mr. Rudolph Rimmel. Does he speak English? Not a word. He doesn't look very bright. Here's the music of one of his compositions. He'll accompany you. Giannina Mia. We'll change the title. Try it, Madame Trentini. Try it, please. He's not bad. Pretty. Oh, thank you. I'm so glad you like it, Madame Tetrazzini. Tetr... Trentini's temperament. Rudolph Rimmel got the assignment to write his first operetta. All through the rehearsals of the Firefly, the baker's son from Prague was sure he had not conquered the New World. The evening the Firefly was to open, he even took a nap in his New York apartment. No one thought to awaken him. And the composer didn't reach the Lyric Theater until the curtain was coming down on the finale. Music like this, Mr. Rimmel. Pest is history. The music that Rudolph Rimmel has written is part of my life, part of your life. Part of the history of this nation and of the world. In fact, we can hardly imagine a world in which these songs did not exist. From San Francisco, Mr. Rudolph Rimmel. So asking it to be part of your celebration of the 250th broadcast of the railroad hour. It was good to hear you sing some of my old songs. But now, I would like to play for you one of my numbers, which I have just composed from my newest Broadway show. Wasn't that it, sir, ladies and gentlemen? We want to thank Dorothy Warren-Scholl and the other members of our cast. Paula Winslow, Isabelle Jewel, Herb Butterfield, and William Johnstone, and Stuffy Singer. The Fimmel story was written by Lawrence and Lee. The railroad hour is brought to you each week at the same time by the American Railroads. Marvin? Life in these United States since the end of World War II has been marked by a steady and spectacular series of advances in almost every area of our national life. And not the least of these dramatic improvements have been the impressive gains made in the efficiency and service of America's railroads. Intensive research, plus the expenditure of more than a billion dollars a year on the average, has enabled the railroads to fill our expanding transportation needs for commerce and defense. In a fashion that makes it clear, however swiftly America moves ahead, your railroads will keep pace. Providing the big, basic transportation service so essential to both commerce and defense. All aboard! Well, dear friends, it looks as if we're ready to pull out, and so until next Monday night. And Starlight, on behalf of the other members of the cast and the American Railroads, this is Gordon McRae saying goodbye. The railroad hour was transcribed in Hollywood. Gordon McRae may be seen in Warner Brothers' The Desert Song in Technicolor. Our choir was under the direction of Norman Luboff, and our music was prepared and conducted by Carmen Dragon. Until next week, this is Marvin Miller saying goodnight for the American Railroads. Now, stay tuned for your Monday night of music on NBC!