Flicklives

Last Summary Update: 11-06-2026

Slob Art; Christmas Parties; Burmese Dagger
Airdate: Monday - December 11, 1967

WOR Show
Original Airing

audio

(NOTE ABOUT TIME REFERENCES: Since there are many different copies of shows out there from different sources, all time references are from the beginning of one single recorded copy, since various copies, depending on when the recordee started recording, had news at the beginning or shortened themes. The times would vary from copy to copy.)

First Spoken Line After Theme Ends

And now this important radio station once again considers signgs of the times. . .

Show Description

[ Courtesy: GROK Summary - - ]   
  Jean Shepherd opens with his usual comic radio patter and a satirical "Seven Keys of Golden Happiness Hour" pitch, then pivots into a loose salute to "pop art" / "slob art." He riffs on a Miami plastic-surgery lawsuit, a three-dimensional Times Square Last Supper whose Judas finger follows the viewer, Rodin's Praying Hands as a revolving Christmas lamp, and assorted kitschy gift ideas (windbonnets, an executive desk with built-in TV and tape recorder, a $6,000 mink trench coat, a $10,000 battery-powered Malayan elephant).

He digresses into a Bucks County estate auction featuring an 8-1/2-foot painted Babe Ruth statue and a collection of "obscene doilies" made by an eccentric aunt, then reads a fan letter from a Bronx junior-high student who spotted a homemade poster nominating Shepherd characters (Flick, Bruner, Schwartz, Gasser) for school office and urges listeners to scrawl "Flick lives" in public places.

While contemplating life in a barbershop (complete with an Italian barber apparently taking numbers), Shepherd recounts a Japanese news item: a licensed fugu chef whose customers die from residual poison; she immediately hangs herself. This leads into reflections on fleeting fame - Miller Huggins Field being renamed Casey Stengel Field, and the newly named Ed Sullivan Theater - and the American inability to grasp the Japanese sense of responsibility.

The centerpiece is the Christmas-party ritual. Shepherd describes office parties as high-tension, cross-denominational ceremonies where firings traditionally occur and where "the mailroom really goes ape." He tells of a personnel director who unwraps a gift from his staff: a long, curved, wickedly sharp Burmese kris (assassin's dagger). After a moment of dead silence, the director - still holding the gleaming blade under the Christmas lights - later "uses" it on four of the men who gave it to him. Shepherd's dry punchline: "Once a personnel director, always a personnel director. A personnel director shall find weapons to do his evil work."

WOR ID

Time	Station ID (All times approximate)
13:51	Speaking of slob art, this is WOR friends, in New York

Commercials (All times approximate)

Time	Sponsor	Notes
13:59	WOR Christmas Fund
14:34	Limelight - Shep

Music (All times approximate)

Time	Music Title	Notes
02:33 +	Stars and Stripes Forever
21:17; 34:48	Yu Gao

Engineers, Staff, and Guests in Booth

Time	Engineer, Staff or Guest
15:09	Larry Londino

Instruments and Special Effects Played During the Show

Instruments Played

Kazoo

Airdate History ' - Original' date is earliest known broadcast)

This Show

		Date	Title
		December 11, 1967	Slob Art; Christmas Parties; Burmese Dagger	Original Airing

More Ways To Hear or Buy It

Show	Replay Date
Mass Backwards	December 07, 1999

The Best Source for Quality Jean Shepherd Audio

Found in the following set(s)

Set Name	Show #	Media
WOR Master Tape Set	MAST-09b	Cassette

Sorry, Not Available

"Imagine 4,000 years passing, and you're no longer a memory - Does it seem possible to you?
You better believe it's possible, not only possible but certainty." - Jean Shepherd - October 7, 1971