Family Theater

Premier Air Date: February 13, 1947

Finale Air Date: September 11, 1957

Total Episodes: 540

Station: Mutual

30 minutes.

Director: Father Patrick Peyton

Radio / Anthology / Drama / Family

The show was produced by Family Theater Productions, a film and radio studio extension of the Family Rosary Crusade, as a way to promote family prayer.  The show 's famous tagline was, "The family that prays together, stays together".  The program had no commercial sponsor, yet Father Peyton arranged for many of Hollywood's stars in film and radio at the time to appear.  In its ten-year run, well-known actors and actresses, including James Stewart, Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Raymond Burr, Jane Wyatt, Charlton Heston, Bing Crosby, Jack Benny, Gene Kelly, William Shatner, and Chuck Connors, appeared as announcers, narrators or stars.

A total of 540 episodes were produced.  The program featured not only religious stories but half-hour adaptations of literary works such as A Tale of Two Cities , Moby-Dick and Don Quixote.