Maurice Chapman, a prolific writer and 'Yes What?' backer, shapes Adelaide's 5AD and wider Australian radio
Maurice Chapman in the standard formal attire of 5AD announcers for evening programmes and Iris Hart, prolific Adelaide theatre and radio actor. After working together since 1932, they married in 1932 and divorced in 1946.
Iris Hart image courtesy Performing Arts Collection of South Australia
Maurice Chapman had major influence on the early years of Adelaide radio station 5AD and, later, on the wider Australian commercial radio scene.
The son of a German tutor at Adelaide University, and educated at Pulteney Grammar School and Prince Alfred College, Chapman joined 5AD in as a junior announcer in 1931, rising rapidly as scriptwriter, actor, producer and production manager to became general manager of The Advertiser radio network in 1938.
By 1937, Chapman had written more than 600 radio plays, mainly mystery serials and single-episode thrillers, but was best known for the Yes What? schoolroom farce he produced in 1936. Chapman also wrote and directed the long-running Starboard Lights series, dramatised stories of seafaring men, later published as short stories in 1941. His Jimmy Colt series, about an insurance-fraud investigator and pilot, also became a novel.
In 1938, Chapman produced the popular family radio series Bringing up Sally, playing the father in the 104 episodes. With the advent of recording equipment, Chapman pioneered the weekly Shipboard Interviews, featuring celebrities and interesting passengers arriving at Port Adelaide. Interviews were recorded on Saturday mornings, edited and broadcast that evening. Finished discs were copied and rushed by train or by air to Melbourne and Sydney.
In 1937, Chapman married Iris Hart, one of Adelaide's most glamorous theatre and radio actors. They worked and performed together from 1932 until Chapman enlisted for World War I in 1941. In 1946, Chapman was divorced from Hart and moved to Sydney as manager of radio station 2CH.
By 1949, Chapman moved out of broadcasting but influenced radio as Australian agent for the emerging technology of BASF recording tape and Akai tape recorders and hi-fi equipment in Australia. He negotiated contracts with NBC in the USA to provide hundreds of hours of taped music and drama programs such as the Burl Ives Show and Hawaii Calls to radio stations throughout Australasia.
