Clue Club
Raise your cereal spoons in salute; it’s time, once again, to go back to a September when Saturday morning cartoons ruled the networks.
Continuing a tradition that began five years ago here on Cartoon Research and has been part of each fall, here is a look back at what the “Big Three” networks offered up from the early mornings to lunchtime, when Bowling for Dollars, American Bandstand, and other shows would signal the end of Saturday morning cartoons for another week.
Here, we travel back fifty years, to the Saturday morning line-ups of 1976. The Bicentennial had just passed that summer, and Laverne and Shirley were debuting in prime time.
Against that backdrop, here is what was being watched on Saturday Mornings:
ABC
ABC debuts saw the return of Hanna-Barbera’s Scooby-Doo, who remained popular and returned in an hour-long format that introduced a new character in The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour. The latter character was a mechanical dog (voiced by Frank Welker), who served as a sidekick to the superhero Blue Falcon (Gary Owens). Despite Blue Falcon being an earnest hero, Dynomutt was pure comic relief, as his automated abilities, such as extending his neck and motorized gears, usually landed in disaster.
The massive popularity of Jaws from the year before helped inspire Jabberjaw, another Hanna-Barbera show that debuted this fall. Set in an underwater world, where cities exist under domes, the show used the Josie and the Pussycats/Scooby-Doo formula. The title character was a massive shark (voiced by Welker, imitating Curly from The Three Stooges), who is a drummer in the human band, The Neptunes. Each episode revolved around the band getting involved with a nefarious criminal and a subsequent mystery.
Hanna-Barbera also brought us Mumbly this fall. A blue carbon copy of the snickering Muttley (both voiced by Don Messick), this version sported a Columbo-like trench coat and solved mysteries. The character debuted as part of The Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape/Mumbly Show.
Also debuting on ABC this fall, The Krofft Supershow, a live-action series from Sid and Marty Krofft that combined elements of a variety show with comedic and adventurous segments like Wonderbug, Dr. Shrinker, and Electra Woman and Dyna Girl. This fall also included the live-action kids game show Junior Almost Anything Goes.
CBS
On CBS, two new animated shows debuted. Hanna-Barbera’s Clue Club followed another mystery-solving group of teenagers, assisted by their two dogs, Woofer the bloodhound (Paul Winchell) and Wimper the basset hound (Jim MacGeorge). Watch the opening titles below.
Filmation brought back one of the most famous fictional characters with Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle. Based on the stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs, this was the first animated series based on the character.
CBS also debuted the live-action series Ark II, a science fiction adventure, and the game show Way Out Games.
Returning shows included the animated The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour and Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, and the live-action Shazam!/Isis Hour, from Filmation.
NBC
NBC’s debuts in 1976 were mainly live-action shows: Monster Squad, where the classic movie monsters team up to fight crime (not to be confused with the much different 1987 movie of the same name).
There was also the live-action Big John, Little John, about an adult man (Herb Edelman) who drinks from the Fountain of Youth and can periodically transform into a twelve-year-old version of himself (Robbie Wrist). The series was created by producer Sherwood Schwartz (Gilligan’s Island, The Brady Bunch).
Muggsy, another live-action show, focused on a young girl named Margaret “Muggsy” Malloy (Sarah MacDonnell), who lives with her older brother Nick (Ben Masters), a cab driver, in a truck converted into an apartment as they face the challenges of living in the inner city.
The live-action series The Kids from C.A.P.E.R. also debuted. It was about the title team of teens who solve crimes, produced by Don Kirshner, the man behind The Monkees and The Archies. And there was McDuff, the Talking Dog, a self-explanatory series about the ghost of a 100-year-old sheepdog (voiced by actor Jack Lester) who can talk to a veterinarian (Walter Willison).
Some new animation debuted on NBC this fall. Part of The Pink Panther Laugh-and-a-Half Hour-and-a-Half Show featured a new segment entitled Misterjaw that, like Jabberjaw, reflected the popularity of Jaws. These cartoon shorts, centered on a shark (voiced by Arte Johnson) who sported a top hat, vest, and bow tie, and would leap out of the water and surprise bathers by yelling, “Gotcha!” He was assisted in his adventures by a small, bowler-hat-wearing fish (Arnold Stang).
Additionally, The Woody Woodpecker Show, a mainstay for years on NBC Saturday mornings, returned this year.
And so, as Elton John and Kiki Dee sang “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” on the radio, and we prepared for a big-budget remake of King Kong that would arrive in theaters that December; we bid farewell to a reflection of these shows from fifty years ago, and an era now past, when cereal-filled Saturday mornings were a part of our lives.
