A Few Frames of Huck and the Gang

One of the fun parts about the Hanna-Barbera shows for Kellogg’s was the little cartoons in between the cartoons. Various characters got to interact and promote the next cartoon. It was special back in the ‘60s; today there endless cross-overs, mash-ups and artificial “universes.”

Originally, it was cut-and-dried. The various shows had certain characters, though it appears The Yogi Bear Show was rushed into production and not all cartoons were ready when it debuted on January 30, 1961 (the same held true for Yogi’s replacement, Hokey Wolf, on The Huckleberry Hound Show; he finally appeared on the week of March 13, 1961, according to TV listings of the day).

Things started changing in the 1966-67 TV season. Mattel purchased licensing rights to the Huck show from Screen Gems and worked out a rather convoluted co-op ad agreement with Kellogg’s that meant Mattel ads on the Kellogg’s-sponsored Yogi Bear and Woody Woodpecker shows. It would appear, based on a story in Television Age of April 24, 1967, the individual cartoons were made available to stations as well.

But the half-hour Huck show carried on in one form or another into the 1970s and ‘80s. Reader Austin Kelly points out a 16mm reel of the show is being sold on eBay. The unusual thing is it does not contain a Huck cartoon. It has reruns of shorts starring Yogi Bear, Hokey Wolf and Yakky Doodle.

This mean the opening/closing animation had to change. The original from 1958 featured an assortment of Kellogg’s cereal mascots, eg. Tony the Tiger. It was reanimated to include Yakky and Hokey. It would appear the lettering card was re-used from the original closing.

Instead of Tony Junior getting his head bashed leaving the circus tent, Yakky gets the honour. Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle.

There’s not a lot I can remember about these re-worked Huck mini-cartoons. The Kellogg’s rooster still appeared, even if Huck’s door is not in a circus tent any more.

Unfortunately, these frame-grabs from the mini-cartoons are a little ho-hum. Hanna-Barbera and/or Screen Gems didn’t seem to care that Pixie and Dixie weren’t in this cartoon; I couldn’t tell you if they were in the re-worked series.

Oh, the character on the Hokey Wolf title card below isn’t Yowp. It’s 1961 and Hanna-Barbera is already borrowing from itself. In the actual cartoon, some of the dog’s poses look like they came from Snuffles. While the hunter is English like Yowp’s owner, Daws Butler gave him a little faster delivery.

How many of these mini-cartoons are in the Hanna-Barbera archives is, I imagine, anyone’s guess. And I still hold out no hope we’ll ever see future volumes of Huckleberry Hound Show DVDs, including the ones featuring Hokey Wolf and the frames you see above.