March 23, 2004
Roosevelt was a master of radio, Corwin says
On March 12, the 71st anniversary of President Franklin Roosevelt's celebrated "Fireside Chats" on radio, visiting professor Norman Corwin told NPR's "Day to Day" that the president was a master of the medium. "His 'Fireside Chats' were not just friendly neighborhood get-togethers. They were substantive," Corwin said. "The choice of that term 'Fireside Chat' is an indication of how shrewdly he used the medium. It was not 'Fireside Addresses,' it was not a press conference, it was nothing but a chat, which invoked the sense of a small group of people sitting around a radio." Listen to Corwin on NPR»