Today I’m sharing the text of a tribute to Grandpa Hughes of As the World Turns. I’ve actually had this post in waiting for awhile. I decided that I need to finish it up in honor of Memorial Day. You see where the Bauer family’s big celebration was on July 4th as the Bauer BBQ became a byword, for a time the Hughes Family Memorial Day Picnic was just as well known. Sadly it ended when I was a little girl. There is almost no mention of it online and the number of people who remember it decreases every year.
Grandpa Hughes had passed on long before I remember. However, the role of Grandpa Hughes was similar to Papa Bauer on Guiding Light. Briefly his son Chris (husband of Nancy) went to law school. Chris was supposed to return home to the family farm and work in the nearby small town. Instead Chris got involved with the wealthy Lowell family and moved to Oakdale. Grandpa eventually followed and served as family patriarch, but one that had been pushed off center functioning in a social world that was not his and not of his choosing. As the World Turns Set-up
According to his page on Soap Central, most people called him Pa (everybody in my family always talked about him as Grandpa), but his real name was William. The farm I talked about in the last paragraph was apparently in Gilmore, Ohio.
This keepsake/promotion was a card distributed by the then main sponsor of ATWT, Cheer detergent. The “characters” signed it below. I’m not sure if the actual actors did or not. In the back you can see Penny, Bob, Lisa, David, and Ellen. On the couch are Grandpa Hughes, Tom, Nancy and Chris (See Note).
According to the tribute article I give the full text of below, his actor Santos Ortega was a prominent radio actor. (Honestly I wonder if Old Time Radio people have any idea how much biographical information on radio actors I find in 1970s soap opera magazines.) His television work is commonly seen today is reduced to one scene. It was the scene in progress with then they broke in to say President Kennedy had been shot. They often show just that little bit. Nancy is talking to Grandpa Hughes.
So with that introduction to Grandpa Hughes, I hope you enjoy this article. It was written by a freelance writer who was a neighbor of Ortega‘s. As such she knew who to ask and probrably got better quotes from key people than anyone else could have.
Goldsmith, Melissa. “Santos Ortega, 1898-1976 As We Remember Him..:Friends and Associates Share Their Memories of a Beloved Man.” Afternoon TV, vol. 8, no. 8, Sept. 1976, pp 36-43, 68, 70.
Santos Ortega, Grandpa Hughes on As the World Turns for almost twenty years, died of cancer on April 19, 1976. Very few people enjoyed the success and long career that Santos did, having worked steadily for over 50 years.
He was born in New York City on June 30, 1898. His father, Raphael Ortega, was Spanish and died when Santos was only four years old. His mother, Isabella Corbett, was Irish and raised Santos and his older sister with help of two maiden aunts. Santos was married twice and had two children, Stephan, age 18, and Alison, age 13.
His career started in the old Hippodrome Theatre, where Santos ushers part-time while in high school. At 17 he auditioned for the chorus there – and that was his beginning. Santos always had a marvelous signing voice and loved to sing.
His first radio audition came when he was called to read for a main character part in a series called The Blackstone Plantation. Because he had the last name of Ortega the casting director just assumed that Santos naturally spoke fluent Spanish.
Or course Santos didn’t know one word of Spanish, but on the way to the audition he hurriedly read through a Spanish dictionary. It got him the part and he then made it his business to learn the language.
The list of radio serials and dramas for which Santos was well-known, seems to go on and on. He is especially remembered for his portrayals of detectives – such as Inspector Queen on Ellery Queen, Charlie Chan, Commissioner Weston on The Shadow, the first Perry Mason on radio, Nero Wolfe, Dr Barton on Crane City Hospitals, Big Sister, The Man I Married, When a Girl Marries, Eno Crime Clues, and The Affairs of Peter Salem.
Knowing that Santos had worked for Hy Brown from the late 1930s to just 5 months before he passed away, I first spoke to Mr. Brown about Santos.
“Well, as you know,” Mr. Brown said, “I produced Peter Salem and cast Santos for the lead – Peter Salem. Santos was a very great part of my growing up on radio, and he was one of the finest radio actors I ever worked with. he was the very best, no question about it. We worked together for over 40 years. I think I cast him for the very last job he did. It was just about 5 months ago when Santos wasn’t able to do much on As the World Turns and he called me. I immediately cast him for a radio drama I was doing and he did it.”
I asked Mr. Brown what the name of the last show was, but he couldn’t remember. He said that the whole world of nostalgia meant nothing to him – that he lives for today and holds little importance and no interest for what he was doing yesterday, interestingly enough, Santos felt very much the same way. He never kept any scrapbooks, he disliked pictures of himself, he rarely kept any magazine or newspaper articles regarding anything he had done, and he never kept any personal diary or log of his thoughts over the years.
What Mr. Brown did consider to important was that “Santos was a delightful person to work with, he never did a bad job for me in his life. He had the fantastic ability to project his voice for whatever was needed in the part we gave him. Weighing 170 pounds Santos could do as good or better voice for The Fat Man as Jack Smart the man cast for the part who weighed 350 pounds!” Hy Brown said.
Mary Jane Higby remembers Santos from radio days and from a cruise on the Queen Elizabeth II that several radio personalities took about 3 years ago.
In her book, Tune in Tomorrow, Mary Jane told about an incident concerning Santos and a man named Louis Van Rootin who played Santos‘s side kick – Dennis.
At the end of each Bulldrog Drummond episode, Dennis would say to Drummond (played by Santos) “How did you ever figure that out?” One night without warning Santos said to Louis, “Now you’ve been with me all these years, Dennis, surely you can tell ME!” Louis, of course, had to ad-lib.
Santos Ortega is respected by everyone we talked to. It seems equally important to mention that the man for whom Santos had the greatest admiration was Lawson Zerbe. Lawson was Santos’s idea of the greatest theater actor there ever was – and Santos was saddened because Lawson didn’t make the transition from radio to television in later years. Santos said many times that the world was missing a great talent when Lawson Zerbe retired from radio and chose not to try television. One of Santos’s most treasured possessions was a pipe that Lawson‘s father carved for him.”
“he was doing a show, Eno Crime Clues. Lawson Zerbe recalled, “Santos was a great actor. It’s funny what you remember when you try to think back. Santos was always smoking big cigars, and I always noticed when he lit up I had difficulty breathing. We worked together a lot, and I never said anything to Santos about the smoke bothering me, but several years later when I started gasping I had some tests done. Do you know that I’m highly allergic to cigar smoke?” Lawson said. Lawson‘s voice was sad. “I just can’t tell you how much I know Santos will be missed. I was deeply upset when I heard that he was gone.”
Leon Janny and Santos worked together for at least 20 years on an average of 30 to 40 times a year. Leon had the part of Number One Son on Charlie Chan and Santos played the part of Charlie himself. Leon had no difficulty reminiscing about his dear friend.
One time stand out in particular,” Leon said. “Santos had a magnificent calendar wristwatch – I believe it’s called a chronograph. It told the days of month, the year, the quarters of the moon, and it chimed! Anyway, Sandy put all his faith in that watch. I’ll never forget one day just before we were to go on the air with an episode of Charlie Chan, Santos had obviously looked at his watch, figured that he had plenty of time, so he left the studio for a few minutes. When it was time to go on the air, the announcer banged on the gong and said his opening remarks and we went into the commercial. Then our director noticed that Santos wasn’t around. He looked at me, point to the studio clock and motioned me to move up to the microphone. I had to do the next line – which was Santos‘s to do as charlie Chan – which was “Charlie Chan bids you good evening and a warm welcome…” and then I read the Confucius saying that he always did. Just as I was finishing that I looked up and Santos was coming through the studio doors. I’ll never forget it as long as I live, Santos looked at me quizzically…then he looked at his watch…then at the studio clock … his eyebrows went up…he shrugged his shoulder and that was that. No matter what happened Santos was never upset. He had complete composure at all times. He was one of the most polished and talented actors I ever worked with. He always had a delightful superiority about himself — and I don’t mean that in a demeaning way. Perhaps it was something just a little more than a sense of confidence that he felt, and it enriched whatever part he played. A glance from Santos was worth more than a thousand words sometimes. He had a quizzical expression that said he thoroughly doubted everything you said but would never want to offend you by saying so.
“You know,” Leon continued, “he had a love for words and fantastic vocabulary. he had a tremendous library and a love and respect for the written word, that I’ve never seen in anyone else. He almost TASTED the words – to the audience’s delight. I would love to have seen him in the title role of something like King George IV Santos had such an elegance in his speech.”
I too remembered Santos’s love for words. One day after he had finished a live show of ATWT he stopped by our house on his way home. He stopped often, three or four times a week and he would sit at the kitchen table and have a cup of coffee while I was getting dinner.
He came in with great excitement. It seems that he had the entire cast and crew on ATWT in a state of confusion over a WORD he had heard discussed on the radio. (See Note 2) He proceeded to ask everyone what three words in the English language ended in -gry. With delight, as his eyes flashed, he told me everyone racking their brains trying to think of the words. One person called the New York City Library and another called his relative who was known for working the hardest cross word puzzles, however no one could come up with more than two words – angry and hungry. By the time ATWT was on the air everyone was still in suspense, so he told them what the third word was Very simply he said, “It is gry. It also only listed in the Oxford Dictionary – an English word meaning one, the grunt of a pig: and three , a unity of measure 1/10th of a line.” That was the kind of thing I can personally remember Santos getting a lot of fun out of. He always enjoyed a challenge and especially word games.
A long-time friend and radio personality, Paul McGrath, quite clearly remembered the first time he met Santos. “I first met Santos when he was on The Luck of Joan Christopher. Santos was a regular on that show and I played the part of Jimmy Mehin.”
“Santos was always friendly and we worked together for more years than I can count… yet I never went to his house and he rarely came to mine. He really had no peer; he was at the top. I never felt anything but the best for him. We had a running joke going – Santos would say to me “Did you catch me today on When A Girl Marries? and I would say, ‘Gee whiz, no Santos, I’m terribly sorry I missed it’ and Santos would say ‘Oh, that’s all right — I’ve got a recording of it; come on over tonight and I’ll play it for you.’ and then he’d laugh.”
Virginia Payne, legendary as Ma Perkins, remembered his versatile and extraordinary voice: “My voice teacher was an avid radio listener, and of course had a highly developed musical ear. I always think of her comment that Sandy had quarter-tones in his voice. His was a remarkable and beautiful voice. I told Sandy what my teach had said, and we laughed about it. He said, ‘Perhaps I’ll lest that on my resume.'”
“When we were on the nostalgia radio cruise on the Queen Elizabeth II in 1974, we daily heard the beauty and the range of his voice. he was a great addition to the cruise – amusing, courteous, and gifted.”
After the invention of television many of the radio stars were immediately cast on daytime shows on the new medium. Santos was one of them. He first started on the 15-minute show of The Brighter Day. Then he was doing The Brighter Day and As the World Turns which was tricky. he only had minutes between shows and they were on different sides of New York. Finally Santos got tired of running across town and quit The Brighter Day to concentrate on As the World Turns.
A few years after the show started, Eileen Fulton was cast for the part of Lisa [Miller Hughes et al]. She remembered one of the first times she had a scene with Santos who played the part of Grandpa Hughes.
“I was new on the show,” Eileen said, “and I was so conscious of timing – everything was timed so close! We were on the air, doing the show live and I said my line to Grandpa, but he hesitated, and I thought that he had forgotten his line. So, I repeated my line, but in the form of a question, so he could pick it up if he had forgotten his. He picked it up and the scene ended. I walked off the set thinking that I had saved the day. Then as I walked by Santos I heard him say under his breath ‘Young whipper snapper… doesn’t give an actor a chance to do what he wants to do!'”
“Santos was the sum of all the parts he every played, truly an actor,” Eileen said. “He was very gentle and always a gentleman from the way he dressed to the way he behaved. I never heard Santos use any profane language. He had a high regard for the public and for his image.”
Don MacLaughlin, who played the part of Santos’s son Chris Hughes since the inception of ATWT had many memories, too. “I was most impressed with Santos when I met him in radio days, way before we worked together on television. Santos was very young and very handsome, and of course he had that great voice. I’ll always remember him giving me some advice, Santos said, ‘In radio you don’t have time to develop a role. You’ve got to compensate – do the best with what a part MIGHT be and what you have time to make it.’ He was right you know,” Don said.
Of course this articles wouldn’t be complete without a memory or two from Helen Wagner, who played Nancy Hughes, Grandpa’s daughter-in-law. She probably had more scenes with Santos, in the Hughes’ kitchen than anyone else.
Grandpa and Chris Hughes
“He was in many ways a difficult person to know. He was a very private and a very shy man. For that reason, one didn’t realize how easy he was to work with, or how talented he was until he was gone. I don’t really think of any particular story in reference to Santos, just many little things – warm moments like the many chips in a mosaic. Moments flash through my mind, like when he would touch my hand after a scene had gone especially well, or a smile or a glance. Now I appreciate them more. It is sad but that is how life seemed to be. You don’t miss someone or something many times until they are gone.”
“Santos offered so much more than any of us ever knew at the moment.”
Melissa Goldsmith is a New York based writer long association with the daytime television field, who for many years was a friend and neighbor of Santos Ortega.
Note 1: It’s kind of out of the scope of this article, but here’s a quick run down of the people in the photo. The people I care about anyway. Second in on the sofa in Grandpa Hughes (he signed Pa Hughes, but I normally heard him referred to at Grandpa by my family anyway). Next is his great-grandson Tom who will grow up to be one of the most recast roles in all of daytime and eventually part of the wonderful ToMargo pairing. Nancy and Chris Hughes were the linchpins of the show. Nancy continuing to be an important part of Oakdale until her actress, Helen Wagner, died during the last year of the show. It was Chris’s being torn between his immediate family and planned life in his small town and the world of the upper class Lowells that was the main focus of the show in the beginning. In the back see Bob Hughes, coolest guy in Oakdale for over 50 years as he was dubbed in the finale press coverage. The then Lisa Miller Hughes who would be a trouble making vixen for the rest of her time on the show. Finally David and Ellen Stewart. They had a rocky beginning before I came around, but they had one of the healthiest marriages on soaps (until his actor semi-retired and Ellen’s actress stayed behind without the show killing David – he went to Africa to work on AIDS research and later as a compromise moved to Atlanta to work on it at the CDC – so the long distance marriage took its toll on the show’s writing). Get a better run down of theses characters at my background info for the Tom Hughes Marries Margo Montgomery episode on the Soap Classics DVD.
Note 2: In A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court our hero eventually comes across someone telling a joke that was apparently even older than he thought and got on his last nerve – so he didn’t save the guy. I must admit that I have a similar feeling on coming unexpectedly on the -gry words riddle. This isn’t really a thing and it comes up ALL the time! Make it stop! Please! Here is the long answer which sums up as there are only 2 common words and if you start wandering into the obscure there are a lot more than 3. In Santos’s defense he’s right, one obscure one is indeed gry.
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