Classic Children's Television Shows.

[shadowkat]

Why is it I'm wide awake and raring to go, now, but want to sleep between 6 -10 am, and 1-3PM?

Sinuses are bugging me a bit. I feel like I have a catch in my chest or some congestion. Probably combination of allergies and chemicals (paint and pesticides ie. Raid).

Off and on over the past few years, I've been discussing children's television programming with Doctor Who fans. Who keep telling me that Doctor Who is a treasured British children's series, and they didn't have much children's programming.

Culture shock. Television more so than movies depicts some of the cultural differences between our countries. For one thing when I visited France in the 1980s, I was surprised to see US series in French, same with Australia (they had US television shows, but not the new ones, reruns from five years ago). As did Wales and Britain. Actually, I found watching television during the summer in England and Wales to be a painful experience in the 1980s...not that I had reason to do it that often. Did see a lot of Fawlty Towers.

Anywho...I thought I'd skip down memory lane in regards to kids shows.

In the 1970s, I watched the following television shows as a child, near as I can remember. And my brother and I loved Saturday morning cartoons. We'd eagerly await the new cartoons...which premiered the third Saturday in September. They were on from 7 am to roughly 12 noon, on all the networks. We only had four networks and UHF back then. Prior to showing up on Saturday morning, the networks would air a preview of the upcoming series as a sort of advertisement on the Friday night before. So you could plan which ones to check out.

* Hong Kong Phooey -- sort of a take on Superman and Mighty Mouse. Except with a mild-mannered dog.
So imagine cartoon dogs playing all the roles in Superman.

* Sid and Marty Krofft's HR PufnStuf (aired from 1969 - 1971). I loved this show, but only vaguely remember it. (I was born in '67). A young boy named Jimmy has in his possession a magic flute named Freddie that can talk and play tunes on its own. One day he gets on a magic talking boat that promises to take him on an adventure. The boat happens to belong to a wicked witch named Witchiepoo, who uses the boat to kidnap Jimmy and take him to her home base on Living Island, where she hopes to steal Freddie for her own selfish needs. Fortunately Jimmy is rescued by the island's mayor, a six foot dragon named H.R. Pufnstuf, and his two deputies, Kling and Klang. Then his adventures begin as he attempts to get back home.

* Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids -- hosted by Bill Cosby (this was in the 1970s, when Cosby was still a cool guy, before all the allegations came out against him. And before you say anything about Cosby, keep in mind the same allegations came out about Trump -- actually they were worse, and people elected him President. Lando wouldn't let me hear the end of it. He's not wrong, we are a racist society. Sexist and racist. Just not bloody sure what I can do about it.) The show however was pretty good -- it was about a bunch of black kids in the inner city learning how to help each other and stand up to bullying and racism.

* Battle of the Planets (1978) - adored this cartoon

* The Muppet Show -- basically a light children's satire on variety shows and various cultural and political issues of the time, starring the Muppets.

* School House Rock - 1973 - 2009 (Schoolhouse Rock! is an American interstitial programming series of animated musical educational short films (and later, videos) that aired during the Saturday morning children's programming on the U.S. television network ABC. The topics covered included grammar, science, economics, history, mathematics, and civics.) -- this was the result of the Children's Television Act of 1969, which was updated in 1996.

* The Secret Lives of Waldo Kitty (which was an illegal adaptation of the Secret Lives of Walter Mitty starring cats and dogs...and got into trouble with James Thurber's estate, for well doing it without permission)

* Sesame Street (1969)

* The Brady Bunch (1960s, early 70s, mostly in reruns)

* The Monkeeys (1966 show, in reruns in the 70s)

* Batman (1966 -- in reruns in the 70s)

* The Addams Family

* The Archie Show (1968) -- became Archie Funnies in 1970s

* The Flintstones...

* The Jetsons

* Lost in Space - 1965 (A space colony family struggles to survive when a spy/accidental stowaway throws their ship hopelessly off course. This is basically the American version of Doctor Who.)

* The Pink Panther (1969) -- a cartoon based on the Blake Edwards films, except without the adult content.

* Tom & Jerry

* The Bugs Bunny and Road Runner Show

* The Hannah Barbara Hour

* Sid & Marty Krofft Super Show

* Free to be You and Me

* ABC Afterschool Specials

* Reading Rainbow

* Kimba - the White Lion (basically the story that Disney co-opted for The Lion King, except he didn't grow up and we just followed Kimba's adventures as he eluded his evil uncle, Scar.)

I googled and UK had kids shows.

See here: Classic Kids TV Shown in the UK in the 70s and 80s

We actually had some cross-over. But Tarzan the cartoon never to my knowledge aired in the US, nor did Book Tower, we had Reading Rainbow instead.

Comments

[cactuswatcher]

I was surprised to see US series in French

I wish I could remember who it was, maybe it was Hugh O'Brian (Wyatt Earp), but one of the stars of a famous cowboy show from the 50s told the story of going to West Germany and seeing his show in German. It was all okay until the Indians rode over the hill shouting "Achtung! Achtung!"

I saw quite a few of those shows on your list. HR PufnStuf had a very catchy theme song. Fat Albert was indeed a good show. Everybody liked Lurch from The Addams Family. I have to admit I saw the theater cartoons with Pink Panther first, and liked those better. They were some of the last 'shorts' made before theaters switched to just showing only the main film.

I was in high school when Lost in Space came out. We were so disappointed it was for much younger kids than us. Probably the first show everyone my age had something really bad to say about. Batman was probably the second. But little kids just loved Batman.

[shadowkat]

I was in elementary school or about 6 or 7 watching Batman and Lost in Space in reruns. We also had the Afternoon movie - usually Disney films, Frankie and Annette movies, and Elvis movies.

They worked very well for little kids. Lost in Space was sort of scary to 5 or 6 year old. I think if I saw either as a teen or older, I'd have cringed and disliked them. They really were made with little kids in mind. Anyone over the age of 14 probably would not have enjoyed them

[cactuswatcher]

Lost in Space was sort of scary to 5 or 6 year old.

Yes, I can imagine. Robby the Robot, flailing his arms shouting "Danger, Will Robinson, danger!" was probably very upsetting for a little kid. For teens the reaction was more likely head shaking, and "Oh brother, this again!"

[shadowkat]

No, it was more the nasty monster that would pop up on the planet that was the problem. Every episode had some weird monster or alien. Also, I found Zachary to be frightening as a kid. The robot was just silly.

[ex_peasant441]

Some of these I have watched, a few I have heard of but never seen, and several are completely unknown to me. They may not have travelled across the Pond at all, or it might just be that I didn't see them because we weren't allowed much television.

Batman counts as my first fandom, since I got absolutely obsessed.

The Muppet Show definitely aired in the UK but I never watched it. It was probably on at a time we didn't watch. Same with the Adams Family.

And all our cartoons came from America. I remember Bugs Bunny, Tom and Jerry, The Flintstones, Pink Panther, Top Cat, Wacky Races, Roadrunner, Tarzan (I'm sure this was American - they all were) and Scooby Doo.

That list of UK shows actually contains very few I ever saw or remember and there are several ones that were important to me which are missing. I guess ones experience of tv varied a lot depending on when you were allowed to watch.

[shadowkat]

Interestingly enough, Tarzan wasn't on either the 1970s or 1960s list. Since it had Ted Cassidy (Shaun and David's father, who died sometime in the 70s),.

Also look closely at the list of UK shows, most aren't US shows, they are Australian or British. Animal Planet was UK and didn't pop up where we were. I think you were just restricted in your television watching, so may not have been aware of them. There are some rather creepy and frightening series on that list.

I also think, much like today, some parents hated television and kept their kids away from it, others liked it, and some were in between. My father wasn't crazy about it, but my mother adored it. Both my parents were highly educated and intellectuals. So had zip to do with educational level. They did watch less than our neighbors. I watched shows at my best friend's house next door that I never watched at home. They had a big color television set, we only had black and white up until I was about seven years of age.

Also what kids watch has a lot to do with what their parents want to watch. Mine loved science fiction, Westerns, and Masterpiece Theater, so I saw Space 1999, Star Trek, various Westerns, and British costume dramas. Also daytime soaps, because my mother and grandmother adored them.

We also had the Wonderful World of Disney.

[shadowkat]

That list of UK shows actually contains very few I ever saw or remember and there are several ones that were important to me which are missing.

Noticed much the same thing with the US lists. Which was interesting.

I guess ones experience of tv varied a lot depending on when you were allowed to watch.

Very true. Most of the television I saw as a kid aired either on Sat mornings, or in the afternoons between 3-8pm.

I was in bed by 8pm.

I didn't watch that much, was outside most of the time -- since I lived in rural Pennsylvania and was busy wandering about the creeks and woods and playing with frogs and toads during the summers. Saw most of it during the winter months and on Sat's. But my best friend who was allowed stay up later, saw them and would tell me about them on the way to school. We also watched a lot of shows when I spent the night at her house.

Lost in Space, Batman, Little House on the Prairie, Bionic Woman and Six Million Dollar Man, along with Night Gallery, Twilight Zone and various Japanese Horror Films and American Bandstand we saw at her house. Also the Tonight Show and Saturday Night Live. (The forbidden shows)

[ex_peasant441]

Noticed much the same thing with the US lists. Which was interesting.

Whoever complied the lists was using some odd criteria of their won no doubt. They have for example missed out Blue Peter and Newsround, which I would call the epitome of children's TV from that era.

I didn't watch that much, was outside most of the time -- since I lived in rural Pennsylvania and was busy wandering about the creeks and woods and playing with frogs and toads during the summers. Saw most of it during the winter months and on Sat's.

Yes, the same here, we only watched a little. A lot of the shows mentioned were on early in the afternoons before we got home or on Saturday mornings when we never watched because we were playing outside. We really only saw the second half of the children's TV slot on weekdays and the early evening shows at the weekend - things like Doctor Who, Emu, Basil Brush.

Most children's TV was home made, with the very occasional serial imported - I remember a few Australian and New Zealand ones and a handful of American shows (Batman, Little House on the Prairie, The Red Hand Gang, and later the Muppets) so the main imports were the cartoons. But of course we had loads of films from America so we had a good sense of your culture from those.

[jesuswasbatman]

Oooo, "is Doctor Who a childrens' programme or not" is one of *those* fandom arguments.

Basically, it started out being aimed at children but made by the adult drama department at the BBC (which led to a lot of internal feuding because the childrens' department felt their territory was being trespassed on, and also because the childrens' department at the time were very into being *improving* for kids and thought that SF/fantasy was trash). It's always been marketed as an all-ages show but from the sixties to the mid-eighties there were regular rows in the right-wing press and from moral guardian organisations about whether it had too much violence and horror for kids (fun fact: the first big violence controversy was over a scene from the third ever story).

And there's an element of fandom who have always been a bit embarassed about following an all-ages show and wanted it to be darker and grimmer and more sexually explicit. Now this is standard for adult fanfic of kids' shows, but it got more controversial in the 1990s before the revival of the show, when some of that faction of fandom got control of the spin-off novels which were viewed at the time as the "legitimate" canon, and started taking them in that direction.

But British people who aren't in fandom certainly do think of it as an all-ages show and always have done.

The other interesting thing about Doctor Who and Lost In Space is that originally Doctor Who was going to be much more like Lost In Space with the Doctor being the morally questionable Zachary Smith character who kept getting everyone else into trouble. Then the kids turned out to like him more than the official heroes and he became the hero instead.

[shadowkat]

Fascinating historical perspective on Doctor Who.

Explains why just a few people on my DW reading list insist it's a kids show, and everyone else treats it like an all ages series or more adult. Remember seeing the same thing happen with Buffy, in which one segment saw it as a fun teen show, meanwhile there are scholars between 30-70 years of age who saw it as very adult and were perplexed by this. (LOL!)

"The other interesting thing about Doctor Who and Lost In Space is that originally Doctor Who was going to be much more like Lost In Space with the Doctor being the morally questionable Zachary Smith character who kept getting everyone else into trouble. Then the kids turned out to like him more than the official heroes and he became the hero instead."

This explains a lot. Because in some respects Doctor Who reminds me a little of that series, far better written and less limiting in scope. (Lost in Space was sort of Father Knows Best meets Space 1999 or The Outer Limits...) Zachary Smith was actually the most memorable and best thing in Lost in Space, along with the little boy, who was a popular child actor at the time, and Robbie the Robot. Lost in Space -- I found scary as a young child, lots of monsters. But it wasn't that violent.

I guess they must have originally set up Doctor Who as the heroes being the companions, with this older, somewhat questionably moral guy showing up and conning them into joining him on adventures. But failed to recognize that a kid would find the older guy convincing you to join him in marvelous adventures, who is an alien, far more interesting and entertaining than the Mom and Dad stand ins or kid stand-ins?

[jesuswasbatman]

In the first season, which is when I'm talking about, it was even worse than that. The way the story starts is that two high school teachers (in US terms), Ian and Barbara, are suspicious about the bizarre behaviour of one of their pupils, Susan Foreman. They follow her to her home, which turns out to be a junkyard, and discover that she and her grandfather, called only "the Doctor", are aliens with a time machine disguised as a police box. The Doctor, to Susan's horror, decides to kidnap them because he's afraid of what will happen if the government find out aliens exist, and that's the start of the show.

[shadowkat]

Whoa...and that was considered a kid's show? He really is a bit amoral.

Although, I can see why kids would like the Doctor and Susan better than the two high school teachers. LOL!

They really changed that series over time. And somehow managed to get away with it. Often big changes jar audiences. Although it does depend on how you change the show...and how gradual the changes are.

R.I.P. June Foray

[cjlasky7]

The queen of voice acting. The voice of Rocky the Flying Squirrel, Witch Hazel and Granny in the Looney Toons shorts, Talky Tina on the Twilight Zone, and a million other roles. Spiritual mother to Kristen Schaal, Pamela Adlon and the new generation of female voice actors.

Director Chuck Jones once said: "June Foray wasn't the female Mel Blanc; Mel Blanc was the male June Foray."

I can't tell you how much those Warner Bros. cartoons influenced my life. The talent! Directors like Jones, Bob Clampett (creator of "Beany and Cecil") and Friz Freleng, writers like Michael Maltese, and the music of Carl Stalling (post modern pastiche before it even had a name).

You have eight minutes. Establish characters and situation. Pack in as many jokes, as many different kinds of jokes, as possible. These guys, and Miss Foray, did it about as well as you can do it.

[yourlibrarian]

I think there's a difference between kids shows and family shows, and I'd say the latter is particularly likely to be gone these days whereas a lot of children's programming has departed from the networks (save PBS) and headed to places like Nickleodeon, Cartoon Network and ABC Family.

I was a bit baffled when reading that Merlin was a kid's show. To me that seemed largely an excuse to use dumb humor and lazy writing. I watched the first six episodes with a friend's eight year old daughter some years back and when there was a beheading in the first 10 minutes she was shocked and later had nightmares about some of the monsters.

[shadowkat]

This is true. Wonderful World of Disney was more of a family oriented television show, as was Little House on the Prairie.

Then there are shows that I'd classify as 15 or 16 and up. Which are Shadowhunters, Vampire Diaries, pretty much everything on The CW and Freeform, also all of the series on the old WB. Doctor Who falls more in the 15 and up category at the moment. In the past, I'd have put it in the Family fare category. But the reboot felt more 15 and up. Merlin also felt more like 15 and up.

[thedabaracds]

Excellent list; a ton of my childhood favorites on there. I'd only add Rocky & Bullwinkle, Underdog, and The Joy of Painting.

[shadowkat]

Okay, I think I confused Underdog with Hong Kong Phooey...because I rather loved Underdog, and only vaguely remember Hong Kong Phooey. Underdog...was basically Superman but with dogs.

Loved Rocky & Bullwinkle -- great political satire. Also remember the Joy of Painting...