Ah, nostalgia - it's not what it used to be.
There are two milestone birthdays that relate to my childhood memories today.
Born 120 years ago, the peculiarly named Ub Iwerks [he was of German immigrant stock] was the animator who, with Walt Disney, co-created Mickey Mouse!
I always hated that fucking mouse, so let's move on...
Far more significantly, today marks the 110th anniversary of the birth of one Joseph Barbera, another animator - but one whose creations I still look upon with deep fondness...
click to embiggen
As co-founder of the mighty Hanna-Barbera organisation, he (alongside William Hanna, with whom he had already created Tom & Jerry for MGM) gave birth to myriad classic kids' shows that preoccupied our rainy-day telly-watching, including Huckleberry Hound, Quick Draw McGraw, Yogi Bear, The Jetsons, Touché Turtle, Secret Squirrel, Snagglepuss, Captain Caveman, The Banana Splits (and its featured cartoons Arabian Knights, The Three Musketeers and Micro Ventures), The Perils of Penelope Pitstop, It's the Wolf, Help!... It's the Hair Bear Bunch!, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, Harlem Globetrotters, Josie and the Pussycats, and these!
Happy memories...
Adore all of these. We would sit with the TV Guide at the start of a new Saturday Morning TV schedule and all vote about what we were going to watch. The Banana Splits was a very strange show. I loved that elephant. Speaking of which... have you ever seen the slasher flick that came out featuring The Banana Spits as killer anima-trons? It's kind of lame, but kind of a hoot.
ReplyDeleteI've never seen (or heard of) that, but I did love the "Muppet Show on acid", Meet the Feebles... Jx
DeleteThe Banana Splits was my favourite show on a Saturday morning! I loved the dog! And the music.
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It was a mind-fuck, that programme - we loved it, too! And I still find myself saying "O-oh, Chongo!" (from Danger Island, one of the mini-series they featured in the middle of it) to this day... Jx
DeleteI h8 the mouse too. but I LOVED the jetsons, top cat, and the flintstones. the rest of the H-B cartoons were stupid (JMHO).
ReplyDeleteLoved Top Cat and The Flintstones, and I absolutely adored Wacky Races (and its spin-offs) when I was a kid! I don't think we ever got The Jetsons over here. I also liked Scooby Doo until they introduced that stupid "Scrappy Doo" character. Jx
DeleteI remember seeing the Jetsons on TV - maybe still when ITV was broken up into regions.
DeleteYou try having kids, (OK, unlikely) you can't get away from the mouse. Every room in the house ends up with several Mickey Mice sitting on every surface grinning blankly at you
ReplyDeleteSounds like a horror film. Jx
DeleteAnother vote to feed the Mouse to Top Cat and the gang!
ReplyDeleteWacky Races and The Perils of Penelope Pitstop were my favourites, although I watched loads of the Hanna Barbera cartoons and, at the time, whatever I was watching at the time would probably have been my favourite.
That is the nature of childhood. Fickle. Jx
DeleteTom and Jerry were wonderful
ReplyDeleteMy granddaughter loves Scooby Doo! We just introduced her to the old Rocky and Bull Winkle Show! It's fun watching the old shows with her. The tradeoff is having to watch "My Little Pony" *ack* xox
ReplyDeleteI never quite understand why anyone thinks teeny-tiny kids would care about "the newest" animation or whatever. Sit 'em in front of a box set of a cartoon from the 1960s or 70s, and they'd be just as happy as they would with a modern CGI construct! If not happier, because as we know, everything was better back then :-)
DeleteJx
I didn't like the HB Tom and Jerry episodes, I preferred the Fred Quimby ones - the drawings were different, softer, better - more detailed. I was a fussy child.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I loved Top Cat and Whacky Races!
Sx
Actually Hanna-Barbera produced all the early ones between 1940 and 1958, which is when Fred Quimby was in charge of animation. I also went off them when HB left and the production went to Czechoslovakia in the '60s - all that spikiness and psychedelic backdrops made it into a different thing altogether... Jx
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