"Seventies Childrens' and Cartoon Series"
ABC AFTERSCHOOL SPECIALS These were thought up in the heady early '70s,
when people actually believed in educational TV for kids (of course, a federal
mandate that the network produce such shows also helped). One of the first
ones shown, circa 1973, was titled "Last of the Curlews." A rather sad animated
hour about a bird becoming extinct. The shows originally aired monthly and were
a mixed bag of animation and live action. Other episodes included "Santiago's
Ark," "The Incredible Cosmic Awareness of Duffy Moon," "It Must Be Love --
Because I Feel So Dumb," and "Follow the North Star." Some productions were
light entertainments, while others could be utter downers. As the '70s were
on, they all became live-action domestic dramas, and depressing. (Bruce Elliot)
Especially memorable was the marijuana one where Scott Baio pigs out on
chocolate ice cream before almost murdering his brother with an oar while
rowing on a lake; Pinballs, starring Kristy McNichol and her awesome shag
haircut; the death-in-the-family one where Melissa Sue Anderson argues with
her little sister, who promptly falls out of a tree, breaking her neck.
Melissa must cope with the subsequent funeral, her parents' depression, and a
bunch of T-shirts her sister used to wear, with her name ironed on the front.
This was a traumatic episode; I don't think they ever ran it again. (Lisa
McElroy)
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THE BANANA SPLITS Featured four guys in suits with dubbed dialogue. They
went by the names of Fleegle (a kind of dog), Bingo (a gorilla), Drooper (a sort
of lion), and Snorky (a baby elephant that never spoke). They jumped around,
played tricks on each other, and had a good time. They would also film little
segments of them running around in those little six-wheeled recreational
vehicles so popular at the time. And naturally, they had a rock band. During
the dreadful songs, we'd be treated to some proto-MTV-style video editing,
which mostly featured them running around an amusement park. The show also
featured a separate adventure segment called "Danger Island," featuring Jan
Michael Vincent, which introduced the short-lived catch phrase "Oh-oh Chongo."
(Bruce Elliot)
This wild musical bunch of nameless guys in costumes of scruffy, unidentifiable
creatures ran around Saturday morning TV way too fast as if to offer final proof
that everyone who was anyone on TV in the '70s had to be a rock star or at the
very least pretend to be. Now all you have to do to impress TV viewers under
seven years old is kill people. Who says life doesn't get simpler? "One banana,
two banana, three banana, four..." (Nina Blake)
The album is amazing, and why not? Participants on it include Al Kooper, Gene
Pitney, and Barry White. About ten years ago, the band I was in covered and
recorded "Gonna Find a Cave." In addition to their album, the Banana Splits
released two 7" EPs and a couple of cereal-box-cutaway cardboard singles.
(Gwynne Kahn)
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THE ELECTRIC COMPANY The Electric Company was the kids' show that I
actually learned the most from, despite the fact that it's mainly remembered
for live-action "Spider-Man." I always liked it better than Sesame Street
now (not that I'm a regular, but passing through), I notice that a lot of
learning appears to be memorization, which isn't all that good. "E.C.," like
"Zoom!" (which I remember less), taught older kids. Plus, it had Tom Lehrer
songs and quite an opening ("Hey you guys!"). (Sean Gaffney)
The part I remember most was the silhouette of the two faces, each saying one
of the two syllables of a word, which would visually fly out of their mouth as they
spoke, thus creating the word: "C" "AT" "CAT," and then a little jingle played after
it. (Jazmine Yates)
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GREAT SPACE COASTER "It's the Great Space Coaster, get on board! On the
Great Space Coaster, we'll explore! Come and ride a fantasy, to a place where
dreams fly fast and free!" Gary Gnu rocked, and the prissy pink bird looked like a
toilet brush. (Morgan and Ferris)
The only thing really worthwhile about this puffy-character-littered kids show was
"No Gnews is Good Gnews," where a foam rubber gnu puppet gave a newscast of
absolute irrelevancies, successfully prophesying the current status of the news
media (Jon Salenger)
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KROFFT SUPERSTARS If the name "Lidsville" doesn't key you off to where these
two kiddie-show lunatics are coming from, you've already had too much to
smoke. They're responsible for the generational brain damage resulting from
bizarro Saturday morning fare such as The Bugaloos, Dr. Shrinker, Wonderbug,
The Great Space Coaster, Sigmund and the Sea Monsters, and Jurassic Park
precursor Land of the Lost. One of the Spumco (Ren and Stimpy) animators told me
he'd once scored 'shrooms from Krofft; in return, he'd been informed that H.R.
PufnStuf's initials stood for "hand-rolled." But I still have my own theory about the
show's homosexual/castration anxiety subtext. An evil witch plots to steal a pretty
young British boy's magic flute, until he is saved by a chickenhawk-like father figure
who calls himself "Puf" (as in "pouf"?). (Gwynne Kahn)
Sid and Marty started out doing puppet shows on the '64 World's Fair and eventually
produced Donny and Marie. Along the way, they left a freaked-out swath in the minds
of a generation. It featured an enormous pinball machine you could ride in. (Bruce
Elliot)
Recently there was a Sid and Marty tribute-type event at the Hollywood Directors'
Guild. My sister and I went, forced our way into Sid and Marty's face, and -- despite
the rest of the crowd waiting for some of their attention -- made them take pictures
with us, sign our souvenirs (I hate that!), and handed them a copy of Ben Is Dead
magazine while professing our gratitude for their inspiration. When inside they spoke
of the new upcoming movie versions of some of their Saturday morning cartoon
shows, and I uncontrollably blurted out, "Can my sister and I be Electra-Woman and
Dynagirl?" Gulp. Silence. And then, I can't believe it, they completely ignored me!
Whatever! At least I learned the correct lyrics to the very important song "Oranges
Poranges," sung by Witchiepoo's punk rock band: "Oranges poranges, who said...
there ain't no rhyme to oranges." (Darby Romeo)
At the end of every H.R. PufnStuf episode, Puf exclaimed, "Keep those cards and
letters coming!" I took this to heart and wrote Jimmy (Jack Wilde), who set my five-
year-old heart aflame. A love letter in an envelope crayoned full of X's and O's. When
I received a typewritten letter in return I felt like Marcia Brady after meeting Desi
Arnaz, Jr. It wasn't until more than a decade later that my mother admitted to the
interception of my letter and forgery, with the lame excuse that the show was
already in reruns. (Lorraine Mahru)
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LANCELOT LINK, SECRET CHIMP The greatest live-action children's show ever,
this all-primate (as in, no humans) rock 'n' roll spy spoof ran for two precious seasons
only starting in 1970, though it has since been rerun on Nickelodeon and The Comedy
Channel. Cast, in addition to the simian 007 Lance, included Mata Hairi; Inspector
Darwon; (negative German stereotype) Baron von Butcher; (negative Spanish
stereotype) Creto; (negative Asian stereotypes) Dragon Woman an Wang Fu; (negative
Arab stereotype) Ali Assassin; and (Brit stereotype who looked eerily like Queen
Elizabeth) the Duchess. ABC/Dunhill released an album of Lance's groovy group the
Evolution Revolution, easily one of the most brilliant rock albums of the era.
(Gwynne Kahn)
After its two-season run on ABC, the producers realized this entirely dubbed show
could be redubbed and shown in almost any TV market in the world. Alas, the secret-
agent formula didn't translate well in most markets. However, the show did very well
when it ran in Central Africa, andin 1987 it became the number-one show in Zaire.
(Bruce Elliot)
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THE MUPPET SHOW Okay, who else thought they were real when they were little
kids? Sesame Street was cool until you outgrew it and moved on to The Electric
Company, then it was 3-2-1 Contact, and then you were ready for the big time -- The
Muppet Show (begun in 1976). Featuring guests like the Star Wars characters, Debbie
Harry, Liberace, and GG Allin (What? You don't remember that one?), the Muppets
revived the variety show for the next generation too young to remember The Smothers
Brothers or Donny and Marie. There were hints at animal crossbreeding between pigs
and frogs, the Mad Bomber, the Swedish Chef, Pigs in Space, Beaker, and a host of
other cool characters. Remember how awesome Animal was? I had an Animal puppet
I used to carry with me everywhere and got this girl to go out on a date with me in
second grade by convincing her it was the puppet's birthday! Pretty smooth, huh? I
still think one of my best opening lines has to be when I walked up to a beautiful
Hollywood sex goddess and said, "So... who's your favorite Muppet?" (Howard Hallis)
Miss Piggy was sooo big at one point, she reached the closest state to being human
a nonhuman creature can reach. I think she even went to one of those gala affairs
with Michael Jackson or something. She was sexy, and tough, and I bet she got a lot
of marriage proposals. (Ju-Ji Yamasuki)
Jim Henson (R.I.P.) created these in the early '50s, specifically for TV. He coined
their name by combining the words "marionette" and "puppet." Kermit has been around
since the beginning and Miss Piggy was originally called Piggy Lee. The muppets were
a fixture on the old Ed Sullivan show. Even before Sesame Street, I had a stuffed
ventriloquist-style doll of Rolf (the gravel-voiced dog who played piano). Almost
forgotten today are the grotesque reptilian muppets who appeared on Saturday Night
Live's first season. They lived in a steamy primordial world, where they all worshipped
a stone idol that spoke with a Brooklyn accent. The humor of these bits was decidedly
adult. When Lily Tomlin hosted the show, she sang a duet of "I Got You, Babe" with one
of these muppets named Scrag. Side note: Deep in the bowels of the NBC building at
Rockefeller Center, there is a notoriously crappy dressing room. It is tiny, and has a
"closet" that is actually a simple pipe access. Jim Henson and Frank Oz got stuck with
this room in 1956 when they were doing The Steve Allen Show. Pissed off at the crummy
quarters, they painted all sorts of trippy muppetlike faces onto the pipes. Now legendary,
the faces are stil there! (Bruce Elliot)
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SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK Number two in the book of "Oh my god do you remember....?"
right after Sid and Marty Krofft shows. People have reremebered each and every
episode of these between-Saturday-morning-cartoons and short-form animations,
from "Conjunction Junction" to "Interplanet Janet" to the lonely little "I'm Just a Bill"
sitting on Capitol Hill. In the past few years there were actually a few Schoolhouse Rock
"tribute" bands; they've started showing the episodes on TV again, and now they're
offering the collection on video, and Rhino Records has released the whole collection on
CD. These shorts came from a time when teaching children through TV was actually
attempted. I passed one of my history tests specifically because I remembered "The
Preamble Song" ("We the people..."), and lolly lolly lolly do I know where to get my
adverbs! Learning through a song is a great concept if you can keep a beat -- just ask
Potsie. (Darby Romeo)
"A noun's a special kinda word, it's any name you ever heard, I find it quite interesting,
a noun is a person, place, or thing!" (Bridget Miller)
I never learned my times tables in third grade because our teacher had huge charts with
all of them staplegunned to the ceiling and you could just look up during tests and copy
the answers. But I did finally learn my three-times tables from Multiplication Rock's
"Three Is a Magic Number." It ruled; there was this funky groove with simply "3, 6, 9,
12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30." (Riley More)
I remember the cartoons for "Hey Little Twelvetoes" and "Figure Eight" as being so
dreamy and poignant; they always made me sad. (Nina Blake) * Note: Keep an eye out
for Bob "Three Is a Magic Number" Dorough, who's been touring the U.S. recently --
sometimes with other old-school Schoolhouse folks -- singing all of your favorites. As
well, try to catch The Simpsons parody of these shorts. Brilliant.
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SESAME STREET Long-running, liberal-oriented kids' show: who didn't watch it?
This was almost as important as going to school -- perhaps since we got just as
much out of it. Their trips to the factories with that weird trippy bouncy Stereolab-ish
music in the background. Mr. Hooper's death. Each episode was brought to you by a
number and a letter. I loved the painter, played by the English neighbor on The
Jeffersons, who while trying to paint the number on a door would inevitably goof up and
paint it on some bald guy's head. Their fine line of fad LPs: Sesame disco, Sesame
Street Fever, Sesame country, etc. Nobody ever should have ever seen the Snuffle-
upagus but Big Bird! (Darby Romeo)
Bert and Ernie (I always wondered if they were TV's first gay couple) doin' the pigeon
walk -- and finally got to see Bert's legs! (Bridget Miller)
And Oscar the Grouch who lived in a trash can, TV's first homeless puppet. (Nina
Blake)
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ZOOM! Between Fanny Doodle, "The Cat Came Back" song, and Miss Mary Mac, kids
learned more than just the zip for Boston, Mass. (02134) (Katy Krassner)
I learned that it was possible to eat lemons, 'cause the littlest girl on the show did and
shocked all the other kids. (Ju-Ji Yamasuki)
Zoom! or "The Stepford Children"? Horrible Boston-based PBS kids' program in which
child prisoners (all wore matching striped polo shirts) played boring games, acted nice
around each other and kids with handicaps, and generally behaved themselves. (Nick
Gillespie)
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CARTOON SERIES:
EMERGENCY PLUS FOUR Jack Webb productions briefly branched out into Saturday
morning cartoons with this spin-off from Emergency. Our two favorite firemen tooled
around with a van full of ethnically balanced kids who couldn't stay out of trouble.
(Bruce Elliot)
FAT ALBERT AND THE COSBY KIDS Based on Cosby's records from the early '60s,
Fat Albert was an animated show set in a slum in North Philadelphia. Colorful characters
such as the eponymous Fat Albert, Russell, Mushmouth, and Rudy. It always ended with
a moralistic musical number in which the Kids played instruments fashioned out of junk.
(Nick Gillespie)
Hey hey hey. I always thought it was weird, this black guy pretending to be hanging out
with these black cartoon characters. Bill was a good guy though. And I always wished
Fat Albert was my friend. But the character we'd imitate the most was the Mushmouth
guy who talked "eyebadeyba" with big flubbering lips. They were a jammin' junk rock
band (later influencing Einsturzende Neubauten, Pussy Galore, Artis the Spoonman, and
Doo Rag) and always went to their hideout to watch the cartoon "The Brown Hornet."
We can only assume this influenced Matt Groening's Simpsons to have their own "Itchy
and Scratchy." (Darby Romeo/Noel Tolentino)
FUNKY PHANTOM A Bicentennial-inspired cartoon about a dead Revolutionary War
hero who helped three modern-day teens solve Scooby-Doo-esque mysteries. Funky's
catchphrase: "Heavens to Hessians!" (Nick Gillespie)
ISIS The premise of this show was that a young lady archeologist finds an Egyptian
amulet on a dig and is compelled to put it on. The next thing you know -- blammo! -- she's
become the living embodiment of Isis, the Egyptian goddess of fertility! Along with this
fancy new outfit, she gets all these funky superpowers and flies around (with her arms
outstretched behind her in a very un-Superman-like style) doing good deeds and righting
wrongs -- you know, all that superheroine stuff that you would expect, with the requisite
moral to be learned at the end of the episode. I definitely had a crush on the classy chick
who played Isis. (Creepy Mike Ruspantini)
JEM The rock star, the doll, the cartoon, the role model. "Jem is her name, no one else
is the same!" (Skylaire Alfvegren)
Truly outrageous! By igniting her earrings she was transformed -- "Synergy power, on!" But
beware of the Misfits! The anti-Jem band who sang in the opening credits, "We are the
Misfits, our songs are better, and we're gonna get her!" (Morgan and Ferris)
JONNY QUEST Or, Jonny has two daddies. First animated series to showcase a positive
portrayal of a gay couple, J.Q. followed the adventures of young Jonny; his father, Dr.
Quest; his father's muscular companion, Race Bannon; Indian orphan Hadji; and lovable
pooch, Bandit. A Hanna-Barbera production, J.Q. took place in a world without women that
was populated exclusively by thawed-out cavemen, ex-Nazi commanders, and Third World
industrialists with pet Komodo dragons. (Nick Gillespie)
I still desperately want to live the Jonny Quest lifestyle and careen through an all-male
realm of exotic adventure. I still want to travel the world in a supersonic jet with my
bearded scientist dad, who can deflect a laser beam with his watch. I still want Race
Bannon to swing down, rescue me, and keep me safe in his big buff arms. But more than
anything else, I want to hear twangy spy-guitar music playing everywhere I go.
(Bruce Elliot)
JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS Saturday morning cartoon, 1970 to 1974. A fondly
recalled gem from the days when every cartoon had to have its own rock group.
In this ditty, an all-girl group toured the globe and just couldn't seem to stay out of
trouble. Kasey Kasem did the voice of Alexander, the hippie manager, and future
Charlie's Angels star Cheryl Ladd was the voice of Sherri, the dumb blonde. During
the second season, the Pussycats found themselves launched into space, where
they found even more trouble and adventures. Each episode would feature the gals
doing a horrid song. Capitol Records eventually put out an album of them and sent a
band of studio hacks on tour with it. Rumor has it that Kim Carnes, of "Bette Davis
Eyes" fame, was one of the singers. They also did tie-ins with Kellogg's who put
Pussycat records on the backs of "specially marked boxes." One obscure note: CBS
used this as the flagship of its 1970 Saturday morning season and went so far as to
create a series of informational vignettes featuring various Pussycats explaining
facts about the world. The vignettes ran between other cartoons, under the title In the
Know, with the gals doing the theme song. After Josie and the Pussycats was
canceled, CBS revamped the vignettes and retitled them In the News, which they ran
under this title until 1992. (Bruce Elliot)
ROGER RAMJET "Roger Ramjet, he's our man. If he can't do it, no one can."
Like Underdog, Popeye, and others, Roger Ramjet ingested some drug (Proton
Energy Pills) to become ultrapowerful and save the day. Unlike most other
cartoons, however, Roger Ramjet was actually funny. (Don Bolles)
SHAZAM! The Shazam! show was a contemporary of Isis and was similar in
that it had a mythological source for the superhero's power. In this case,
it's the whole pantheon of Greek gods/goddesses, who choose Billy Batson to
wield the power of Captain Marvel and fight against the evil forces of modern
times (i.e., the decadent '70s). Along with the guidance of the gods (whom he
has a confab with at the beginning of each episode), Billy also had a
traveling companion/mentor that went around with him giving him advice while
he kicked ass on the bad guys. As with Isis, there was always a moral lesson
to be learned at the conclusion of the show. (Creepy Mike Ruspantini)
WAIT 'TIL YOUR FATHER GETS HOME After the Flintstones and before The
Simpsons, there was a syndicated cartoon that ran in prime time in many
markets called Wait 'Til Your Father Gets Home. It featured the voices of
Tom Bosley, Jack Burns, and several others. The dad was an Archie Bunker-type
guy trying to deal with the wild and crazy times and with his hippie kid, and
it was about as funny. The pilot episode appeared on Love, American Style.
Later, the same pilot was done with a live cast, and starred Van Johnson: it
didn't fly. (Bruce Elliot)
OTHER CARTOON SERIES: Addams Family; Archies; Atom Ant; Bad Cat, Baggy
Pants and the Nitwits; Banana Splits; Battle of the Planets; Beany and Cecil; Beverly
Hills Teens; (Fat Albert's) The Brown Hornet; Brady Kids; Broomhilda; Bugs
Bunny/Roadrunner Hour; Captain America; Care Bears; Centurions; Charlie Brown
specials; Chilly Willy; Courageous Cat and Minute Mouse; Defenders of the
Earth; Donkey Kong; Dr. Suess specials: The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, Cat in
the Hat; Claymation: Davey and Goliath, Gumby, Mr. Bill, and Rudolph; Droopy;
Dungeons and Dragons; Dynaman; Ewoks; Fantastic Four; Far Out Space Nuts;
Felix; The Flintsones; Pebbles and Bamm Bamm; Captain Caveman and the Teen
Angels; Galaxy Rangers; Garfield; G.I. Joe; GoBots; Godzilla; Grape Ape;
Groovie Ghoulies; Sabrina; Wacky and Packy, The New Adventures of Waldo Kitty,
Lassie, etc.; Happy Days in Space; Harlem Globetrotters; Heckle and Jeckle;
He-Man and the Masters of the Universe; Hercules; Herself the Elf; Hong Kong
Fooey; Huckleberry Hound; Inch High; Private Eye; Inspector Gadget; Jabberjaw;
Jem; Jesus; Jetsons; Kid Super Power Hour; Kimba; Laff-A-Limpics; Lippy the
Lion & Har Dee Har Har; The littles; Mad Monster Party; Magilla Gorilla;
Mighty Heroes; Mighty Man; (Ralph Bashki's) Mighty Mouse; Monchichis; Mr.
Magoo; Mr. T; Muppet Babies; My Little Pony; New Shmoo; The Osmonds; Pac-Man;
Pink Panther; Pole Position; Popeye; Possible Possum; Punky Brewster; Q*bert;
Quickdraw McGraw; Richie Rich; Robotech; The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show; Dudley
Doright; Tom Slick; George of the Jungle; Super Chicken; Commander McBragg;
Sherman and Mr. Peabody; Fractured Fairy Tales; Wacky Races; Catch That
Pigeon; Roman Holidays; Rubik; Schoolhouse Rock; Scooby-Doo; Secret Squirrel;
She-Ra; The Shirt Tales; Skrewy Squirrel; The Smurfs; Snagglepuss; Snorks;
Space Ghost; Speed Racer; Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends; Squiggly Diddly;
Star Trek; Strawberry Shortcake; Sub Mariner; The Superfriends: Dyno Mutt and
Blue Falcon, Wonder Twins, Aquaman, Superman, Wonder Woman; Super Adventures:
The Fantastic Four, Bird Man, Herculoids, etc.; Tennessee Tuxedo; The
Tarzan/Lone Ranger Adventure Hour; Thor; Thundercats; Tom and Jerry; Top Cat;
Transformers; Underdog; Voltron; Wally Gator; Woody Woodpecker; Yogi Bear;
Zorro.
- Excerpted from Retro Hell (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1997).
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