I first met Mr. Thomas a whole lot of years ago at the 1993 Friends of Old-Time Radio convention in Newark, NJ. He and Jan Merlin (”Roger Manning”) were attending for the entire convention, and Al Markim (”Astro”) and Ed Bryce (”Captain Strong”) were coming in on Saturday to perform a recreation of one of their Tom Corbett, Space Cadet radio scripts. Understand, this was a pretty impressive thing to happen; the entire main cast, along with the announcer (the late, great Jackson Beck) were all performing their original roles…and yes, it was as amazing as you think it was. From that famous opening, “Tommmmm….Corrrrrrbittttt….Spaaaaaaaace Cadettttttttttt…” to the end credits, this group not only worked their hearts out, but they also had a lot of fun. (Especially Jan Merlin, who really enjoys slipping into the character of Roger.) I spent a good bit of time with Frankie that convention, as we kept running into each other outside when we indulged our cigarette habit. For photos from that convention, and from the Tom Corbett recreation, see The 1993 Friends of Old-Time Radio Convention Pics Page also on The Nostalgia pages.

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