Remember that one day when you could wake up without an alarm? When you would get your favorite bowl of cereal and sit between the hours of 8 and 12? This is a blog dedicated to the greatest time of our childhood: Saturday mornings. The television programs you watched, the memories attached to them, and maybe introducing you to something you didn't realize existed. Updated every weekend.
He reprised his role as Oliver Hardy from Hanna-Barbera’s earlier
animated series for The New Scooby-Doo Movies as well as additional
voices, voiced Wimper in Clue Club, Crazy Claws in The Kwicky
Koala Show, Bort in an episode of The Mighty Orbots, and Captain
Horatio Huffenpuff in Beany and Cecil (1988). He also provided voices
for The Funky Phantom, Yogi’s Gang, Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels,
Yogi’s Space Race, The New Fred and Barney Show, Richie Rich, Foofur and The
Smurfs.
Yogi’s
Space Racewas a 90-minute program
featuring the titular Yogi Bear (Daws Butler)
and a cast of returning and all-new Hanna-Barbera
characters. The program was comprised of four unrelated segments that shared
some of those characters. It failed to perform on the struggling NBC and was cancelled
halfway through its sole season. In order to make it more maneuverable on their
schedule, all of the segments were broken up into three separate programs. Buford
and the Galloping Ghost was a combination of the two 11-minute segments of Space
Race: The Buford Files and The Galloping Ghost.
The Buford Files was the
latest clone of Hanna-Barbera’s Scooby-Doo
franchise. It followed the adventures of lazy bloodhound Buford (Frank Welker)
who lived in Fenokee Swamp with twins Cindy Mae (Pat Parris) and Woody Boggs
(Dave Landsburg). Together, the three of them solved mysteries that baffled
local law enforcement: Sheriff Muletrain (Henry Corden) and Deputy Goofer McGee
(Roger Peltz). Buford, when actually active, could move his ears around like
radar dishes and had a nose that worked like a Geiger counter when looking for
clues. However, two things often stood in his way: his penchant for howling at
the moon (usually at the worst times), and an antagonistic raccoon that knew
karate.
The Galloping Ghost was about
the ghost of a gold prospector named Nugget Nose (Welker) who had taken a shine
to two young girls who worked at the Fuddy Dude Ranch: Wendy (Marilyn
Schreffler) and Rita (Parris). They met Nugget when they accidentally crashed
into his resting place (think bed rather than grave) in a cavern in an
abandoned mine. Nugget took great delight in tormenting their grumpy old boss,
Fenwick Fuddy (Hal Peary), whenever he did something mean towards the girls.
Wendy could summon Nugget whenever they needed help by rubbing the special gold
nugget necklace she wore. Along with having traits typical of a ghost,
including levitation, Nugget got around by riding his invisible horse.
The Buford Files character models.
Buford and the Galloping Ghost debuted
on NBC with the rest of Space Race on September 9, 1978. When NBC began
breaking up the show, it remained paired with Space Race in an hour-long
block until February 3, when it was finally broken off into its own program. Of
the three resulting programs, Buford and the Galloping Ghost lasted the
longest; remaining on NBC’s schedule until that September when it was removed
for the new season. The series was written by Herb Armstrong,
George
Atkins, Jack
Bonestell, Doug
Booth, Chuck
Couch, Gary
Greenfield, Len
Janson, Mark
Jones, Glenn
Leopold, Ray
Parker, Sam
Roeca, Jim
Ryan
and Susan
“Misty” Stewart, with music by Hoyt Curtin
and Paul
Dekorte. The series was animated at Filman in Madrid, Spain
and the characters were designed by Bob Singer.
Layout drawing of the Fuddy Dude Ranch.
Following the conclusion of Buford
and the Galloping Ghost and Yogi’s Space Race where the characters
also appeared, Buford, Nugget Nose and their friends all largely disappeared.
The series was seen again in reruns as part of USA Cartoon Express
and on Cartoon Network
and Boomerang.
EPISODE
GUIDE:
“The
Swamp Hermit / Phantom of the Horse Opera” (9/9/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy
Mae discover their friend has been kidnapped by escaped convicts. / Wendy and
Rita dream of stardom when a Hollywood producer visits the ranch.
“The
Vanishing Stallion / Too Many Crooks” (9/16/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy Mae
witness a horse disappear during a race. / An escaped convict takes refuge at
the ranch.
“The
Swamp Saucer / Sagebrush Sergeant” (9/23/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy Mae
investigate a UFO that landed in the swamp. / Fuddy’s army sergeant sister
visits the ranch and puts everyone on a strict exercise and work regiment.
“The
Man with Orange Hair / Bad News Bear” (9/30/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy Mae
investigate the theft of silver skates stolen by someone with orange hair. /
Nugget and the girls try to hide a bear from Fuddy and a safety inspector.
“The
Demon of Ur / Robot Round-Up” (10/7/78) – A statue disappears from a train
under Goofer’s watch. / Fuddy hires a robot to work at the ranch, threatening
the girls’ jobs.
“The
Missing Bank / Pests in the West” (10/14/78) – Goofer sends off $10 million in
an armored car, but the bank claims it never arrived. / NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
“Scare
in the Air / Rock Star Nuggie” (10/21/78) – An amphibious plane goes missing. /
Nugget becomes jealous when the girls fawn over a visiting rock star.
“Buford
and the Beauty / Frontier Fortune Teller” (10/28/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy
Mae must investigate the kidnapping of a movie star dog. / The girls turn to
Nugget to help expose phony fortune tellers looking to steal Fuddy’s furniture.
“Peril
in the Park / I Want My Mummy” (11/4/78) – Buford, Woody and Cindy Mae try to
get a job at the amusement park, but the park is shutting down due to sabotage.
/ NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
“The
Magic Whammy / Mr. Sunshine’s Eclipse” (11/11/78) – Banks are being
mysteriously robbed. / Nugget is called to scare away an annoying TV prankster
visiting the ranch.
“The
Haunting of Swamp Manor / Klondike Kate” (11/18/78) – Burford, Woody and Cindy
Mae investigate a haunted mansion. / Nugget is reunited with the ghost of an
old girlfriend he promised to marry when he struck gold.
“The
Case of the Missing Gator / A Ghost of a Chance” (11/25/78) – Smugglers go
through the swamp looking for stolen diamonds. / Fuddy tries to capture Nugget
in order to get $1 million from a guest looking for proof ghosts exist.
“Don’t
Monkey with Buford / Elmo the Great” (12/2/78) – Duchess’ diamond collar is
stolen during a parade by a chimp. / The girls buy Fuddy a horse for his
birthday, but he ends up being too much trouble.
John Stephenson – Captain
Snerdley, General Blowhard, various
For the history of Yogi the Bear, check out the post here.
Yogi’s
Space Racewas a 90-minute program featuring the titular Yogi Bear
(Daws Butler) and a cast of returning and all-new Hanna-Barbera
characters. The program was comprised of four unrelated segments that shared
some of those characters. It failed to perform on the struggling NBC and was cancelled halfway through its sole
season. In order to make it more maneuverable on their schedule, all of the
segments were broken up into three separate programs.
The Goof-Ups: Yogi, Huckleberry, Quack-Up and Scare Bear.
Galaxy Goof-Ups featured Yogi
reunited with his old pal Huckleberry Hound (Butler) in the future as intergalactic
patrolmen known as the Galaxy Guardians. Joining them were the new characters
carried over from the Space Race segment, the eternally-frightened Scare
Bear (Joe Besser) and the crazy Quack-Up (Mel Blanc), as their partners.
Exclusive to the series was Captain Snerdley (John Stephenson, impersonating Joe Flynn) as their commanding
officer, and his superior, General Blowhard (also Stephenson). Yogi and his
friends were the ineptest officers on the force and often slacked off on the
job; much to the chagrin of Snerdley who often bore the brunt of their foul-ups
from Blowhard. However, things always managed to go their way in the end and
the criminals always managed to end up in the clink.
The Goof-Ups crash to the rescue.
Galaxy Goof-Ups debuted with
the rest of Space Race on NBC September 9, 1978. As it was the most
popular segment out of the four, it was the first to be broken off into its own
program when NBC cancelled Space Race. The independent Goof-Ups series
debuted on November 4. The segment was written by Haskell Barkin,
Chuck Couch,
Mark Fink,
Ray
Parker and Jim Ryan,
with Parker serving as story editor. Music was composed by Hoyt Curtin and Paul DeKorte, with character
designs by Willie
Ito.
General Blowhard and Captain Snerdley.
Despite its popularity, Goof-Ups was
the second portion of the Space Race bunch to leave the air; with fellow
spin-off Buford
and the Galloping Ghostlasting until the new season schedule that
September. In the following years, it has been seen in reruns on USA Cartoon Express,
Nickelodeon, TNT, Cartoon Network
and Boomerang.
Clips from the show are also available on Boomerang’s YouTube channel.
Beyond that, Scare Bear and Quack-Up have largely disappeared from the
Hanna-Barbera stable.
EPISODE
GUIDE:
“The
Purloined Princess” (9/9/78) – A princess is kidnapped and used as bait to trap
the goof-ups, but it ends up backfiring on the villains instead.
“Defective
Protectives” (9/16/78) – The goof-ups set out to capture the Space Spider so
that the General can get a good night’s sleep to present the plans for foiling
the Spider’s plots.
“Whose
Zoo?” (9/23/78) – Sagar the hunter wants the goof-ups for display in his
interplanetary zoo.
“The
Space Pirates” (9/30/78) – The goof-ups are tricked into handing over the gold
they’re transporting to space pirates.
“The
Clone Ranger” (10/7/78) – Tacky Cat wants revenge against Snerdley, so he
steals a cloning machine and kidnaps Snerdley to operate it.
“The
Dopey Defenders” (10/14/78) – Zangra tricks the goof-ups into loading
top-secret equipment onto her ship, but then they accidentally take off with
her ship.
“Tacky
Cat Strikes Again” (10/21/78) – Constantly being nagged by his wife because of
how they live, Tacky ends up abandoning their evil plan and surrendering to the
goof-ups.
“Space
Station USA” (10/28/78) – The goof-ups are assigned to bring an ancient ship to
the museum, but the richest man in the galaxy will stop at nothing to make it
part of his collection.
“Hai,
King Yogi!” (11/4/78) – Investigating a new jungle planet leads to Yogi being
worshipped—and courted by their queen.
“Dyno-Mite!”
(11/11/78) – Tiny space villain Dyno-Mite steals a new weapon, the
Stretch-Shrink Ray.
“Vampire
of Space” (11/18/78) – Count Vampula plans to take over the galaxy and decides
to turn Snerdley into his slave to trap the goof-ups.
“The
Treasure of Congo-Bongo” (11/25/78) – The goof-ups race a pair of villains to
retrieve a crashed computer that can produce precious metals and gems.
“Captain
Snerdley Goes Bananas” (12/2/78) – Lozar disguises himself as a doctor to poke
around Snerdley’s mind when the General sends him to a sanitarium.
For the history of Yogi the Bear, check out the post here.
Yogi’s
Space Race was Yogi Bear’s (Daws Butler) second ensemble series with him as
the title character after Yogi’s
Gang, and the first to be comprised of several different segments. The
titular Space Race was a reworking of
Hanna-Barbera’s
earlier Wacky Racesconcept that tried
to latch onto the popularity of Star
Wars(as evidenced by the font used for the series’ title). However,
instead of being comprised entirely of all-new characters like Wacky Races,
Space Race mixed in some returning
classics to go with the rookies.
Promotional pamphlet about the show.
Yogi traded in his hunt for picnic
baskets in Jellystone Park for racing through space. However, his partner
wasn’t frequent sidekick Boo Boo. Rather, he was given the new partner of Scare
Bear (Joe Besser); a small bear scared of practically everything, as his name
implied. Huckleberry Hound (Butler) was partnered with Quack-Up (Mel Blanc),
who was crazy and clumsy and served as their team’s pilot. Musical shark Jabberjaw
(Frank Welker) was partnered with Buford (also Welker), a lazy bloodhound
belonging to the mystery-solving Cindy Mae (Pat Parris) and Woody (Dave
Landsburg). Their ship included a speed-boosting track powered by Burford
running on it (which, naturally, was seldom-used).
The Space Racers in their ships.
Newly-created for the series was the
trio of Nugget Nose (Welker), the gold-obsessed ghost of a prospector who was
very protective of his partners, Wendy (Marilyn Schreffler) and Rita (Parris).
There was also the racing quartet of Captain Good and his pet cat sidekick,
Clean Kat (both Welker). No, that’s not a typo or a case of seeing double. See,
Captain Good and Clean Kat seemed to be the ultimate personifications of
good sportsmanship and defenders of everything right, but with the push of a
button the pair became Phantom Phink and his pet dog sidekick, Sinister Sludge.
In their dastardly dual identities, the pair would stop at nothing to achieve
victory in the race. And, unlike with Dick Dastardly and Muttley in Wacky Races—whom they were clearly modeled after—they actually won some
races. Although they never went out of their way to make everyone believe their
dual identities were separate people, none of the racers or the narrator (Gary
Owens) knew they were the same. Other Hanna-Barbera characters made
appearances, such as the gigantic Grape Ape (Bob Holt),
Fred Flintstone (Henry Corden) and Barney Rubble (Blanc). Bob Singer and Willie Ito served as the show’s
character designers.
Jabberjaw activating Buford power.
Yogi’s
Space Race debuted on NBC
on September 9, 1972 as a 90-minute program. Along with the Space Race segment, the show included Galaxy
Goof-Ups, which saw Yogi, Scare, Huckleberry and Quack-Up as inept
intergalactic police officers; The
Buford Files, starring Buford and his owners solving mysteries ala Scooby-Doo;
and The
Galloping Ghost, highlighting the adventures of Nugget and his friends.
The running gag of Space Race was
that the prize the race’s winner won was usually terrible in some way; such as
a self-massaging bed that beat the stuffing out of whoever used it, winning a
trip somewhere where they actually had to work, or a trip with less-than-ideal
travel accommodations (makes you wonder why they kept racing). Despite being
the title character, Yogi only won two races. In fact, the winningest racing
team was Captain Good and Clean Kat with three victories (five if you count the
two from their alter egos). Although, considering the prizes, maybe it was no
mistake the series’ villain was the ultimate “winner”.
A tale of split personalities: Captain Good and Clean Kat vs. Phantom Phink and Sinister Sludge.
Nugget Nose re-evaluating why he hangs out with a couple of teenagers.
NBC cancelled the series before it
concluded airing its only season. To make it more maneuverable on the schedule,
Galaxy Goof-Ups was broken off into its own series on November 4,
reducing Space Race to a 60-minute program for the remainder of its
initial run. When the series entered the rerun cycle, it was further broken up
into the half-hour Yogi’s Space Race and Buford and the Galloping
Ghost that February. Space Race left the NBC schedule that March,
with Goof-Ups following shortly after. Buford and the Galloping Ghost
lasted until the debut of the 1979 season. Beginning in the late 1980s, Space
Race was seen in on USA
Cartoon Express,
Nickelodeon,
Cartoon Network and Boomerang. Although it hasn’t been
released to DVD, the entire Space Race segment is available to stream on
Amazon
Prime Video.
“The
Saturn 500” (9/9/78) – Yogi Bear and Scare Bear win a trip to Mars where a snow
bear keeps chasing them.
“The
Neptune 9000” (9/16/78) – Captain Good and Clean Kat win a ship that converts
into a bag for easy storage—with Captain Good inside of it.
“The
Pongo Tongo Classic” (9/23/78) – Yogi and Scare win dinner at the Ritz for the
low, low cost of having to do the dishes after.
“Nebuloc
– The Prehistoric Planet” (9/30/78) – Phantom Phink and Sinister Sludge win a
chance for a famous artist to paint them. Literally.
“The
Spartikan Spectacular” (10/7/78) – Captain Good and Clean Kat win a cruise,
however they have to travel with the cargo.
“The
Mizar Marathon” (10/14/78) – Jabberjaw and Burfod win a self-massage bed that
just a little too rough.
“The
Lost Planet of Atlantis” (10/21/78) – Huckleberry Hound and Quack-Up win
tickets to an amusement park where they have to be the dunking clowns.
“Race
Through Oz” (10/28/78) – Captain Good and Clean Kat win a computerized date and
end up matched with the Wicked Witch of the West.
“Race
Through Wet Galoshes” (11/4/78) – Captain Good and Clean Kat win floor tickets
to a concert—as in they have to lay on the
floor.
“The
Borealis Triangle” (11/11/78) – Phantom Phink and Sinister Sludge win a trip to
a ski lodge where they have to pull a sleigh.
“Race
to the Center of the Universe” (11/18/78) – Nugget Nose, Wendy and Rita win a
vacation at the very dude ranch where they work.
“Race
Through the Planet of the Monsters” (11/25/78) – Phantom Phink and Sinister
Sludge win roles in a movie where they had to perform the most dangerous
stunts.
“Franzia”
(12/2/78) – Huckleberry and Quack-Up with tickets for a ride on a luxury jet;
however, nobody ever said the seats were inside
of it.
Notable Roles: Composer, music producer, musical director
Curtin was always
musically inclined. He began playing piano at age 5, and in high school had his
own orchestra while playing in a jazz band. After serving in the Navy during WWII, Curtin studied
music at the University of Southern California on the G.I. Bill. Initially he wanted to be a composer and arranger for movies, but found
himself instead being highly-demanded in the field of radio and television
commercials due to his ability to write quick and memorable jingles. He did
manage to do some theater work, scoring music for a variety of animatedtheatrical shorts such as Mr. Magooand Tom and Jerryand some minor movies like Mesa of Lost Womenand Jailbait. He met William Hanna and Joseph Barbera in 1957
while they were working on a commercial for Schlitz
beer. At the same time,
Hanna and Barbera were working on their first independent television series for
their new studio, Hanna-Barbera Productions, after having lost their jobs when MGM shut down their animation division. Needing
a theme song for The Ruff & Reddy Show, they provided Curtin with their lyrics and 5 minutes later he provided
them with the song. They signed him right then and there. Curtin would serve as
their primary composer, producer, and musical director for most of his tenure. Hanna-Barbera
would contact Curtin with the description of the shows in production, and he
would proceed to write the songs, hire the musicians, book and conduct the
orchestra. There would be times when Curtin was single-handedly writing and
recording the scores for up to 9 series at a time. Curtin retired in 1992,
turning to his love of gadgets to invent and license a design for an
underground lawn sprinkler. In 1995, Rhino Records
attempted to put together a tribute album in his honor featuring the various
songs he had composed over the years. Unfortunately, due to the methodology
Curtin employed in making his music, there were hardly any masters of the songs
he composed; existing only on the actual film stock. Curtin died in 2000 after
a brief hospitalization.
