Back in the days of Saturday afternoon matinees at the local theaters, there were three factors worth noting.

First, the audience consisted mostly of the younger generation.

Second, the price of admission to the theaters back in the 1930s, ’40s and early ’50s for school age youngsters was rather reasonable. Those admission prices ranged from a dime to a quarter.

Third, the film program usually consisted of three separate parts. The main feature was either a cowboys and Indians or outlaws movie, or some film with a theme which would appeal to young folks. There also had to be a cartoon, hopefully fairly recent for that era, with sound. To make the program complete, there was a continuing serial feature, sometimes called a &uot;cliffhanger,&uot; We’ll explain this cliffhanger part a few paragraphs later.

Those serials were a series of short films with one major theme or concept consisting of 12 to 15 episodes or chapters. The intention was for one of those episodes to be shown at each Saturday matinee in sequence to conclude the main plot with a somewhat logical ending. Thus, those who followed these serial adventures had to see the whole series.

At the end of each episode or chapter would be a scene showing the hero or heroine in a suspenseful situation. One just had to be at the theater the following Saturday afternoon to see what would happen next.

Sometimes the particular serial segment would end up with the star (wearing a white hat) being tied up and placed across the railroad tracks by the villains (wearing black hats). Then the segment would conclude with a train coming down the tracks. Would the hero survive? A week later the next part of the serial would start off with a short recap of the previous week’s film. Then the train would suddenly go off on a side track and the star being rescued by his buddies to continue the plot.

Another popular ending scene would have the star going off the edge of the ledge, or cliff, and falling down towards a river several hundred feet below. Was this to be the conclusion of a 15 part series at the end of chapter six? Chapter seven showed our hero going over the edge of the cliff, then grabbing onto a branch of handy tree a few feet below the cliff’s brim. There, maybe this explains in part the cliffhanger nickname or label for these old Saturday afternoon matinee serials.

What really inspired this column, besides memories, is a current magazine ad. A firm in Pennsylvania is selling 56 different video cassettes based on these serial epics dated from 1932 to 1952.

Many of these films are westerns. They have titles like &uot;Flaming Frontiers,&uot; &uot;The Oregon Trail,&uot; &uot;Rustlers of Red Dog,&uot; and four separate serials based on Zorro and starring four different leading actors. (It’s a good thing Zorro always wore a mask.)

Some of the once popular serials are based on comic page and book characters like Red Ryder, Captain America, the Green Hornet., and Smilin’ Jack the aviator.

Several of these serials have a futuristic aspect with spaced-out characters and titles like Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, &uot;King of the Rocketmen,&uot; and &uot;Radar Men From the Moon.&uot;

How those folks out in Hollywood could create a dozen episodes each for those last two titles defies any logic.

The folks who acted in those old serials were rather obscure, except for two names. Gene Autry, better known as &uot;The Singing Cowboy,&uot; and baseball team owner later in life, was the star of

&uot;The Phantom Empire,&uot; issued in 1935. The other actor was John Wayne who was the lead star in &uot;The Hurricane Express,&uot; dated 1932.

All those serials from the Saturday afternoon matinee days were cheaply made and gave real meaning to the concept of B-films.

What replaced those serials, plus the dramatic, variety and comedy programs on radio can be emphasized with just one word &045; television.

Ed Shannon’s column appears each Friday.