["The Little Chatterbox Theme"] Who's that little chatterbox, the one with pretty a burnbox? Whom do you see? It's little orphan Annie. She and Sandy make a pair, they never seem to have a care. Cute little she, this little orphan Annie. Bright eyes, cheeks of rosy glow, there's a store of healthiness handy. Mite's eyes always on the go, if you want to know. Heart says Sandy, always wears a sunny smile, now wouldn't it be worth the while if you could be like little orphan Annie. It's 5.45 now and time to hear about orphan Annie's adventures and all about Ovaltine too. But before we hear Annie today, here's an important letter about Ovaltine that'll be mighty interesting to you boys and girls who've been home sick lately and find it a mighty slow business getting back to your old pep again. This letter came in from Mrs. Harvey Treaser, 1019 Lynn Avenue, Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania. And here's what she says, My daughter was very ill last winter. The doctor advised me to give her Ovaltine. And she's getting it regularly now. My daughter started to eat as she never ate before. She has gained eight pounds in the last two months. Before she only weighed 36 pounds, but now weighs 44 pounds and is on her third can. We will always be loyal to Ovaltine, for it surely brought my daughter back to health. Well, isn't it great the way Ovaltine helped Mrs. Treaser's daughter? Just think, by the time she was on her third can of Ovaltine, she had gained eight pounds. She was eating like a trooper and getting right back to good health again. And so, if you've been sick lately and it's taking you so long to feel well that you're missing out on all kinds of fun, just remember that Ovaltine may be the very thing to help you. Because every single cup full of Ovaltine, you know, gives important minerals and vitamins to help build up strength and energy. So ask your mother to get you a can at her drug or grocery store right away. Drink it regularly every day. And then just see if you don't begin to pick up fast and become stronger and huskier than ever. Just bubbling over with good old orphan Annie Pett. And now, for our adventure. You remember yesterday when Annie and Joe went down to see the new bridge. They met Caesar Rennelli, an Italian boy whose father Tony works at the bridge. And here are Annie and Joe now, standing on the riverbank, and Caesar has promised to introduce them to Mr. Amos Strong, the chief engineer. Listen to what Annie says. Leaping lizards. It sure going to be great meeting this big engineer, isn't it, Joe? I'll say. Shucks, anybody who could play in all this must be a great man. I never saw so many people working before all in one place in my life. Where'd they all come from, Caesar? Gosh, yes. There aren't this many people in Simmons' corners. Most of them come like my father from other bridges. They're called bridge builders. They go wherever a bridge is being built. But where do they all live, Caesar? They're barracks down on the riverbank where the men live. They're married with a family like my father, Tony. They find a little house or a shack somewhere. Bridge building is a fine work. My father says, once a bridge builder, always a bridge builder. Shucks, I wouldn't mind building bridges myself when it's as exciting as this. Maybe I'll get to be a big engineer like this Mr. Strong. Suffer and sunfish. Let's go meet him. Can we now, Caesar? Sure. Mr. Strong likes me. He say he likes all young people. Come on. Will he be in that little house there with the glass front? That's the office. It looks down over the whole construction. We'll find him there if he's here today. Shucks. Aren't you even going to knock, Caesar? It wouldn't do any good to knock with all of these noises going on. Come on. Well, well, what do you want? Not sure, is it? Yes, sir, Mr. Hogan. It's me. I come to see Mr. Strong. Yeah, well, Strong's not here now. You can see that, can't you? Oyster roof on my house. You're always hanging around here getting in my way. I don't mean to get in your way, Mr. Hogan. I just wanted some friends of mine. Come on out of here. Come on out with me. I'm busy. Ain't got no time to be wasting on a pack of kids. Outside, I said. Outside. Yes, sir. We're going. Jumping grasshoppers. Who was that, Caesar? That was Mr. Hogan. He's the boss of the bridge construction. Boy, oh boy, he sure sounded tough. I guess he doesn't want us around here. It's all right. Red Hogan's bark is a lot worse than his bite. We'll just wait out here for Mr. Strong to come. Red Hogan? That's what a man call him. Shucks, it's no wonder. Didn't you see his hair, Annie? He could stick his head out the back window of a car at night, and he wouldn't need any daylight. He's not as bad as he sounds. They say Mr. Flint put the whole job of construction in his hands. Mr. Flint has, eh? That's what my father says. Say, here comes Mr. Strong now. You mean that big man coming up the bank there, Caesar? That's him. Gosh, he sure does look the part, doesn't he? With that khaki suit and that big leather belt. I guess I am gonna be an engineer. I didn't think he'd be so old, Caesar. He's not really old, Annie. That's just because he got a white hair, and his face is so tan from being out in the open. See, before he started this bridge, he was building one down in Peru. Peru? You mean Peru, South America? That's right. Boy, oh boy, now I know. I'm half an engineer already. Hello, Mr. Strong. Well, hello, Caesar. I'm glad to see you. Has your mother got those shirts of mine done yet? I guess she's ironing them now, Mr. Strong. I'll bring them over tonight. Oh, that's all right. No hurry, Caesar. On a job like this, I guess a clean shirt wouldn't stay clean very long anyhow. Mr. Strong, here are two friends of mine who want to meet you. This is Annie Waterbox, and this is Joe Contessa. Howdy. I'm glad to meet you. Glad to meet both of you. Hello, Mr. Strong. Oh, gee. Come in the office, won't you? Got some order to give, and then we'll have a little chat. I'm always glad to meet children. You got two more back home in Texas? Fine strapping youngsters. And seeing others, the next best thing to see in them. Come on in. Hey, hey, you kids back here again? I told you to get away from here, didn't I? I told you. Ah, it's you, Mr. Strong. I thought it was them kids come back to bother the life out of me. Yeah, it's me, Hogan. Kids, too. They won't bother you. Yeah, they're always getting under my feet. Well, maybe if you didn't look at your feet so much, Red, and looked at the stars a little more, you wouldn't be bothered so much. Say, listen. Yes, sir? I don't like the way they're sinking those piles down there, number three pier. Yeah? Well, what's the matter with them? I just looked over the job, Red, and those logs are second grade timber. They're not strong enough to hold up the foreman while the concrete hardens. Well, they looked all right to me. Well, they're not. I don't know where Mr. Flint got that timber. Everything in this job is supposed to be grade A, number one. Somebody must have sold him a bad lot. I guess Flint knows what he's doing all right. Well, not when he got those logs he didn't. I want you to go down to log file, Hogan, and pick out good timber, understand? Then substitute it for that bad lot in number three. Yeah, but that'll run up the cost. Now, Flint won't like that. I don't care whether he likes it or not. This bridge is going to be built according to specifications, so long as I'm on the job. Now, you got your orders, Red. Go to it. All right. Only Flint won't like it. Well, right now you're getting orders from me, not Mr. Flint. Now hop to it. Yes, sir. Yeah, Hogan's a good arseman. Yeah, but he's stubborn as a mule. He hates to take orders. What's the matter with our number three file, Mr. Strong? Well, what do you know? I forgot you kids were here all the time listening. Oh, it's just a bad lot of logs, Caesar, that I guess Mr. Flint must have got stuck with. Some smart salesman must have sold him second grade stuff instead of first. You see that big heap of logs out the window there where Hogan's heading? I see them. Boy, oh, boy, that's a big heap, all right. Gosh, they're piled up high. They'd make some smash if they ever fell over. Well, we use those logs in sinking piles. Yeah, we sink them way down in the riverbed, you see. And then we build timber up around them in forms till we got a hollow square the size of a house. Then we pump the water out of it and fill it up with concrete. And that makes a big solid block of pure concrete that holds up part of the bridge. Gee. But the inferior logs, second grade stuff, might not hold the frame solid enough for the concrete to harden even. And that would mean that that section of the bridge would be weak. And I've never built a weak bridge in my life. Shucks, I'll bet you haven't, Mr. Strong. Yeah, let me look at you kids. I've been so busy, I... Well, what do you know? Annie, you're the spitting image of my daughter at home in Texas. Yes, sir. If I didn't know, I'd think it was my Annette standing right here before me. And, Caesar, looks to me as if you'd picked a couple of pretty good friends for yourself. You bet I have, Mr. Strong. Shucks, are you really from Texas, Mr. Strong? Oh, sure. I used to be a cow puncher when I was young. Before I went to college and learned to be an engineer. Gosh, that's what I want to do, Mr. Strong. What? Be an engineer like you. Yeah, wait a minute, young man. I remember everything that glitters isn't gold. This job of mine sometimes up is pretty tough business. But, gee, building big bridges down in Peru and South America. Oh, there. Has my press agent been working? I told them, Mr. Strong, that you built a bridge in Peru. I thought so. Well, kids, now, don't think it was all romance and picture stuff. That bridge was a mighty serious proposition. It was a railroad bridge. And it swung across a gully in the Andes Mountains that was a thousand feet high. Leaping lizards. How high? A thousand feet. And that's pretty deep. It was rough country, too. Rock it and jag it as the teeth of us all. We didn't get help with the caliber we get here. They were mostly half-breed Indians, old inkers. But they were good workers. And we got the thing done at the time. Shucks, it must have been some bridge. It was. Handsome a bridge as I ever saw. Steel netted cable swinging across a great gulf against the sky. I'm a little proud of that bridge. Well, it makes this one look, well, I guess I'm not as young as used to be. A man has to take the jobs that comes across his path. Well, but I tell you, if you kids are interested in bridges... I'll say we are. You bet, Mr. Strouong. All right, then, you come around to me some day when I'm not so busy and I'll tell you a lot of stories about bridges you never dreamed of. Will you? Jumping grasshoppers. Why, sure I will. Just now I'm going down over that log pile to see that Hogan picks out a mass of good timber. Come in and see me some other time, will you? You bet we will. Well, so long then, and see you later. Gosh, Caesar, he's the swellest guy I ever met. You bet, me too. Mr. Stroung is one of the greatest engineers there is in the whole country. I can believe that all right. You can almost tell that from the way he walks. Look at him going down the riverbank there out the window. Every step he takes is just like his name. Strong. Shugs, he told us he needed to come around and he'd tell us all about bridges. And you bet we'll come, Joe. I wouldn't miss hearing Mr. Stroung talk for anything. Me neither. Look, he's down there by the big heap of log now. I see him. Mr. Hogan isn't there, though, and he told him to pick out good logs. I guess Mr. Stroung likes you too. It was awful swell the way he asked us to come around. I'll say it was. What was that? It's a log pile. The logs that are rolling, leaping, lizards, they're rolling right down on top of Mr. Stroung. Come on. He'll be killed. He'll jump away. Oh, that first log got him. Mr. Stroung, Mr. Stroung. Keep back. Keep back now, all of you. Keep back, I tell you. Those logs may start rolling again in a second. That's all right. I'll help Mr. Stroung. He's my friend. Now get back, I say. I don't want anybody else to get back. I'll help my friend. I'll help Mr. Stroung. I'm coming, Father. I'll help with the tools. Leaping, lizard, show of wings. Good boy, Cesare. Good boy. Mr. Stroung. That's you, Tony? Si, si. Get me out of here. All right, all right. Except for my leg, but I can't move. We get you out, Mr. Stroung. We get you out. Then we see about this. We see who pushed these logs. What's this, Father? You say someone... Si, si. Yes, Cesare. Someone pushed the logs down on Mr. Stroung. Tony, he see them doing. Did you hear what Tony said? Someone pushed those heavy logs down on top of Mr. Stroung. Who could have done a terrible thing like that? Luckily, Mr. Stroung only hurt his leg. But he might have been killed. It looks as though we're going to see plenty of excitement around here before that bridge is built. But now, do you know why you hear these adventures of Orphan Annie every night? I'll tell you why. It's because the boys and girls who are real friends of Orphan Annie are drinking their Ovaltine every day. And that's the way they're helping to keep her adventures going on the radio. And if you like Orphan Annie and like to listen to her every day, you certainly want to prove it by drinking your Ovaltine too. And by the way, when you fix your Ovaltine, be sure to add enough sugar so it will be as sweet as you want it. And boy, oh boy, what a treat you get. Because Ovaltine's all chocolatey looking and so good you'll want to drink about a barrel full. And every single thing in it is good for you too. So, if you haven't been getting Ovaltine, ask your mother to get you a can at her drug or grocery store right now. And now, you certainly want to be here right on time next Monday at 5.45 to see the exciting things that will be happening to Annie next. Until next Monday at 5.45 then, goodbye. For more information on Orphan Annie and Ovaltine, visit www.orphananny.com
