1963-1965

When Vicki Vola was elected AFTRA national president, she was fresh off serving four consecutive terms as vice president of the New York Local.

Vola was a prolific actor in radio and television, appearing in thousands of broadcasts. Her early broadcasting experience came in 1932, when she was just 16, with Denver radio station KLZ. She also acted in radio and theater primarily in Los Angeles and San Francisco (KGO, Doctor Kate, Gloria Gale) until making the best decision of her professional life in mid-1938: She left the West Coast to try her hand in the highly competitive radio world of New York City. It paid off, and she found herself never lacking for work.

She was perhaps best known as secretary Edith Miller in Mr. District Attorney, first in radio in 1940  and 11 years later on TV. She also performed in the early runs of the daytime dramas Search for Tomorrow and Love is a Many Splendored Thing, as well as Theatre Five, Power and the Glory, Columbia’s Shanghai Lil and Johnny Dollar. In 1948, Radio Mirror magazine described her as “one of the busiest gals in radio.”

In her farewell address as president at the 1965 AFTRA National Convention in Boston, Vola expressed: “Always with its sights trained on the future, AFTRA has anticipated trends and technological advances. Five years ago, AFTRA signed the first pay-TV agreement, the first and still the only agreement in this field. Seven years ago, foreign replay payments were obtained, the first protection in that area … My tenure as national president has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life, made more so by a wider contact with members and administrators all over the country … It has been a privilege to serve. AFTRA presidents don’t fade away, they just continue to serve.”

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