The Pro

The professional quizgoer is a hardy type of radio fan spawned by giveaway programs. Some pros--a shrilly competitive breed--travel from quiz show to quiz show in packs. But most are mavericks, jealous and watchful of their fellows. All but a few are women.

Last week in Manhattan, there were about 30 known quiz pros. One of the most successful and least retiring is 63-year-old Sadie Hertz of Brooklyn.

Some of the regulars wear flamboyant disguises, assume fake accents to attract the attention of M.C.s, invent fantastic names and laugh-getting occupations. Mrs. Hertz does not stoop to such obvious devices. "I'm comical," she explains, with a gap-toothed grin, "I'm cute." After a fashion, she is. Short (4 ft. 10 in.) and pear-shaped, Sadie looks rather like a good-natured witch (a role she played last Halloween with obvious relish on WOR's Daily Dilemma). Her other assets as a quizgoer include ten years of experience, a bobbing head of tight grey curls, a Brooklyn accent, and an eagerness to do virtually anything in public for laughs--and prizes.

"Terrible Centennial." When television came, Sadie was ready. She has already appeared on five or six telecasts. Last week she became a regular M.C.'s assistant on Du Mont's School Day?,. "With her front teeth and television," says Comedian Happy Felton, "she's in."

Sadie's reputation as a quiz queen has little relation to her general or specific knowledge. When she doesn't know the answer (which is most of the time) she glibly ad-libs anything that pops into her head. Quizmasters, who hate and fear "dead air," cherish her gift of gab."What's a Capulet?" Felton asked her recently. "Someone with a small size cap," was Sadie's assured reply. Felton: "What great events occurred between 1860 and 1870?" Sadie: "Terrible things. They had a centennial. Things was terrible. McKinley, Buchanan and Lincoln all was killed. It was a terrible centennial."

Sadie goes to an average of two giveaway shows a day, seven days a week. She has probably attended more than 5,000 radio programs, a hands-down record. In the old days, pickings were slim. "We used to go for fun. All you got was little bits of derlies and glassware and all like that."

"False Representative." In 1946, Sadie claims, she was nearly ruined by a magazine article which reported that her Brooklyn apartment was jampacked with program loot, and that she netted an average $35 a week in prize money. For six months, she moans, she couldn't get on a single program: "What a noive to say I make thoity-five dollars! I never won a refrigerator in all my living life. They gimme a false representative."

As a matter of fact, Sadie has never made the big leagues of quiz business. She hit her peak, as Mutual's Queen for a Day, in October 1945, when she won $400 worth of small prizes. Another time, she acquired a shiny new barber chair, which she sold for a secret but satisfactory sum.

Charles Hertz, Sadie's husband for 45 years, works in a towel supply company and dutifully accompanies her on her weekend rounds. On week nights, when Sadie is busy at the studios, she leaves his supper out for him, and cleans up when she gets in after the last program. "He's the sufferer," she says. "He had a noivous prostration when he seen my name in the papers."

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