The Clicquot Club Eskimos
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The Clicquot Club Eskimos was a popular musical variety radio show, first heard in 1923, featuring a banjo orchestra directed by Harry Reser. A popular ginger ale, Clicquot Club was Canada Dry's main rival. Clicquot (pronounced "klee-ko") was the name of the Eskimo boy mascot depicted in advertisements and on the product.
In the early 1920s Reser's banjo performances on WEAF/New York were sometimes described by newspaper columnists as "sparkling," and this prompted WEAF production manager George Podeyn to approach the Clicquot company about sponsoring Reser's band. The station's policy at the time, however, dictated that no advertising intrude on a program's content.
The radio program aired on WEAF from 1923 to 1926, graduating in 1926 to NBC, where it was heard as a half-hour show on Thursday at 10pm, then Thursday at 9pm (1927-28), Tuesday at 10pm (1928-30) and Fridays at 9pm (1930-33). On January 23, 1933, it began on the Blue Network, Mondays at 8pm, continuing that year until July 24. After a two-year hiatus, it resumed Saturdays at 8pm on CBS, where it was broadcast from December 21, 1935 until January 4, 1936, returning to NBC that year from January 12 to April 12, airing Sundays at 3pm.
Band members wore eskimo suits when performing before a studio audience. Reser's band used different pseudonyms on recordings made for many different labels. Tom Stacks was the featured vocalist.
