| Show Name: | Lonely Women |
| Format: | Soap Opera |
| Runtime: | 15 minutes |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
| Syndicates: | NBC |
| Starring: | Betty Lou Gerson Barbara Luddy |
| Announcer: | Marvin Miller |
| Creator: | Irna Phillips |
| Sponsor: | General Mills |
Lonely Women was a radio soap opera in the United States during World War II. It "told of women separated from their men by war." The 15-minute program, which was sponsored by General Mills, ran one season on NBC, with its first episode broadcast June 29, 1942.[1]
Lonely Women was conceived and written by Irna Phillips,[1] a prolific producer of radio soap operas. Her entry on the Jewish Women's Archive website notes her contributions to the genre as follows:
Working with a full-time secretary and staff of writers and researchers, Phillips produced five daytime serials during the early 1940s. Among her most popular radio soap operas were The Guiding Light, Woman in White, The Right to Happiness, Lonely Women, and The ‘New’ Today’s Children. Known for her trademark cliff-hangers, the use of organ music to create moods, and the “crossover” (when characters from one show appeared on another), she was among the first scriptwriters to utilize the amnesia victim and the murder trial. Shunning sensationalism, Phillips preferred to focus on real-life families as they coped with such socially significant issues as juvenile delinquency during World War II, the adjustments of returning war veterans, adultery, adoption, and divorce. In contrast with other radio soap operas, which typically endorsed traditional visions of domesticity and femininity, Phillips’s serials frequently conveyed the complexities of modern women’s choices.[2]
The show's main characters were Fifth Avenue model Marilyn Larimore (played by Betty Lou Gerson) and lovesick secretary Judith Clark (played by Barbara Luddy). Although the cast was originally all-female, men were added later. Additional characters and the actor or actress who played the part were as follows:[3]
| Character | Actor/Actress | |
|---|---|---|
| Mrs. Schultz | Virginia Payne | |
| Nora | Nanette Sargent | |
| Judith Evans | Eileen Palmer | |
| Helen | Florence Brower | |
| Peggy | Harriette Widmer | |
| Mr. Schultz | Murray Forbes | |
| Bertha Schultz | Patricia Dunlap | |
| George Bartlett | Reese Taylor | |
| Jack Crandall | Les Tremayne | |
| Edith Crandall | Muriel Bremner | |
| Laura Richardson | Kay Campbell | |
| Henry | Cliff Soubier | |
| Virginia Marshall | Eunice Topper | |
| Mr. Conway | John Barclay | |
| Judge Carter Colby | Herb Butterfield | |
| Mrs. Carter Colby | Muriel Bremner | |
| John Murray | Willard Waterman | |
| Announcer | Marvin Miller |
When the show started, it replaced Arnold Grimm's Daughter.[4]