In the 1920s, when radio was in its infancy, stations took to broadcasting from department stores. In Boston, radio station WNAC began broadcasting from the Shepard Stores on Tremont Street, perhaps as early as 1922. Both were owned by John Shepard. He may have made his money in retail, but beginning with WNAC’s first broadcast in 1922, he went all-in on radio.

Honey I’m in Love With You, Gennett 3059A, 1925

Perley Breed, meanwhile, was a saxophonist, probably born in Danvers Mass., who led a hot dance band in Boston in the mid-twenties. How he met Shepard is unclear, but Breed had a band in his store by 1923. The orchestra played for afternoon tea  and dinner dances in the store’s Tea Room, overlooking the Boston Common, and Shepard obligingly broadcast them. George Frazier recalled the Harvard men from New York never got over dancing in a department store. Speaking of colleges, Breed worked around Boston on the college circuit with the Shepard Colonial Orchestra In 1923-25.

Good musicians passed through Breed’s band, with clarinetist Brad Gowans being the best-known. Another was trumpeter Warren Hookway, who gave up music when he became a podiatrist. Breed also employed a pair of songwriting piano men, Sid Reinherz and Curley Mahr. Reinherz recorded four sides for Gennett himself in 1923; he’s remembered in ragtime circles for writing “The Boston Trot.” Boston-born Mahr worked mainly as a vocalists’ arranger and accompanist in radio and film into the 1950s.

The Shepard Colonial Orchestra first recorded for Gennett in November 1924, two Bix-flavored sides, “Tell Me Dreamy Eyes” and “Where’s My Sweetie Hiding?” (Gennett 5608). They recorded again on April 25, 1925 for Gennett, yielding, “Honey, I’m in Love with You.” This number is not helped by Frank Cornwell’s vocal, but that’s just my opinion. Cornwell later ended up in New York, leading a band at the Hof-brau Haus.

In the late 1920s, Breed was in London with a gang of Boston boys—the Starita brothers, the Cape Ann trumpeter Sylvester Ahola, and saxophonist Johnny Helfer. He was back home and known to be playing in Boston in the spring of 1932…but then I lose the trail. I’d read that Breed died in the early 1930s, but a reader of this blog informed me he died Feb 9, 1939 (see comments).

Music. This link will take you to “Where’s My Sweetie Hiding.” It’s credited to the Pelham Bay Serenaders, but it is Breed’s band.