When it comes to television specials during the traditional holiday season, Thanksgiving gets the short shrift. How the Grinch Stole Christmas, with Boris Karloff’s mellifluous narration; Rankin-Bass’s Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer; and A Charlie Brown Christmas have become annual Yuletide events. But the folks who produce those kinds of TV specials never seemed to bother with Thanksgiving.
Except once. It was in 1965, and you might have missed it, if you hadn’t been born yet, or if your father had changed the channel to the football game. (There’s always a football game.)
The creation of this one-time Turkey-Day offering can be traced back in a straight line---from the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to a Saturday-morning cartoon to a Manhattan advertising agency, and finally to actress and television legend, Lucille Ball!
Among her laundry list of accomplishments, the titian-tressed comedienne ensured herself a place in the cultural history of comic books one Monday night, with the 14 January 1957 episode of I Love Lucy, titled “Lucy and Superman”.
The plot was typical Lucy shenanagans: she brags that Superman will appear at her son’s birthday party, and when Ricky’s status as an entertainer fails to procure the Man of Steel’s attendance, the impetuous redhead takes matters into her own hands. The episode guest-starred George Reeves and required some delicate crafting by the writers. The script kept the Ricardos firmly rooted in the real world, but at the same time, preserved the mystique of Superman for the sake of the children watching.
Not a small contribution to this episode’s timelessness is the fact that the dènouement led to Reeves’s most memorable line as television’s Man of Steel:
“Lucy!” bellows Ricky. “Of all the crazy things that you’ve done in the fifteen years that we been married----“
“Wait a minute!” imposes their caped guest-star. “Mr. Ricardo, do you mean to say that you’ve been married to her for fifteen years?”
“Yeah, fifteen years!”
“And they call me Superman!”
Thanks to the artistic brilliance (and business savvy) of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, I Love Lucy has never stopped airing since the date of its initial broadcast. When the series ended production in 1957, local networks immediately re-broadcast the original shows and they have run in perpetuity ever since.
It was certainly running on TV one evening in the spring of 1964, when Chester Stover got home from work. Chet Stover was one of four men---the other three were W. Watts Biggers and Treadwell Covington and Joseph Harris---who moonlighted from their jobs with Dancer Fitzgerald Sample, a Manhattan-based advertising agency, and operated Total TeleVision, a studio producing animated cartoons.
One of Dancer Fitzgerald Sample’s largest clients was General Mills, the cereal manufacturer responsible for such kids’ favourites as Cheerios and Wheaties. Sales of its cereals, though, constantly lagged behind those of Kellogg’s, and “Big G” wanted to make a move on its Battle Creek competition. “Buck” Biggers was the agency’s account executive for General Mills, and one day, the boss handed Biggers an assignment that played right into Total TeleVision’s wheelhouse: create a cartoon show that General Mills could exploit as a vehicle to sell more cereal to the children of America.
Biggers’ TTV colleagues had all the talent necessary to produce such a thing. Chet Stover was a copy supervisor, while Tread Covington had experience as a director of animated shorts. And Joe Harris could certainly handle the actual animation. He was the art director for Dancer Fitzgerald Sample. In fact, back in ’59, he was responsible for one of General Mills’s most popular mascots---the Trix Rabbit (“Sorry, rabbit---Trix are for kids!”)
Their creative juices percolating, the four of them brainstormed ideas for a cartoon series that would serve as a thirty-minute commercial for General Mills cereal. After several days of this, Biggers, Stover, and company had come up with exactly . . . nothing. None of their ideas promised to deliver the hook needed to hold the attentions of the youngsters General Mills was trying to reach. They were still beating their heads against that wall when Chet Stover got home that evening in early 1964, switched on his TV set, and sat through another rerun of I Love Lucy. It happened to be “Lucy and Superman”.
Chet watched in amusement as Lucy Ricardo embarked on her scheme to impersonate the Man of Steel with a cape, boxer shorts, and a football helmet to conceal her red hair. The plan called for her to make her entrance through the window of their upper-floor apartment. As “Super-Lucy” eased out onto the building ledge, Stover idly thought, “Wouldn’t it be funny if that were a dog?”
Suddenly, the copywriter bolted upright in his easy chair. He grabbed the phone and called Joe Harris. “I got an idea,” Chet told him. “We’re going to do a dog and he’s going to be a super-dog, and we’ll work out the details.”
And work out the details, they did.
It was up to Joe Harris to design their new canine hero. He came up with the baggy costume with the loose sleeves and oversized cape. He deliberately chose the colours of red and blue to evoke an impression of Superman, but reversed them, to blunt any charges of plagiarism from the Man of Steel’s owner, National Periodical Publications.
The name of their star came from their perception that, next to such heavyweight animators as Warner Brothers and Hanna-Barbera, the folks at Total TeleVision were the “underdogs” of the industry.
As Stover and Biggers envisioned it, their cartoon series would take place in a universe where human beings and anthropomorphic animals coëxisted, similar to that of The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, by Jay Ward. When danger threatened, a hominid hound, “humble and loveable” Shoeshine Boy, would change into Underdog and fly to the rescue. Filling the Lois Lane rôle in this super-hero pastiche was television reporter Sweet Polly Purebred, whom Underdog was constantly saving from peril.
Underdog’s arch-enemy was mad scientist Simon Bar Sinister, a Lionel Barrymore clone (think “Mr. Potter” from It’s a Wonderful Life). Another regularly appearing foe was gangster Riff-Raff, a wolf in a pinstripe suit. And during the times when Simon and Riff-Raff were locked up in the local hoosegow, Underdog stayed busy fighting any number of super-villains and alien invasions.
At least, that’s the way Biggers and Stover saw it. The ideas were coming fast and furious, and they were getting them down for Joe Harris to put on storyboards and create the animation. Meanwhile, Covington lined up the voice talent. TTV scored a major coup when it was able to hire character actor Wally Cox as the voice of Underdog.
Cox’s mild-mannered delivery proved fortunate, in light of an unusual characteristic the TTV team had decided to give its canine star: Underdog would speak in rhyme. As Joe Harris explained in a 2007 interview, “We needed something to differentiate this character from other super-hero-type characters.” An overly dramatic voice would have made the rhyming sound ludicrous. But Cox so perfectly conveyed the understated personality of their hero that the quirk sounded almost natural.
That was an important---even, necessary---quality. This wasn’t going to be simply Superman in a dog suit. Underdog was going to be a satire, in the same vein as Rocky and Bullwinkle, but of a gentler sort, without Jay Ward’s acerbic wit. Most of the humour was directed at sending up the super-hero conventions that had been cemented by decades of comic books.
Underdog wasn’t an incompetent buffoon. No, he was smart enough and generally capable. But he approached his good-deed-doing with a single-mindedness that usually made him obtuse to the villain’s sneakier ploys, or even to the consequences that befell the public. Underdog left a lot of collateral damage in his wake, and a bystander who’d just had his house demolished or his car smashed by accident during the big battle didn’t get much sympathy from the baggy-caped crime-fighter:
“I am a hero who never fails;
“I cannot be bothered with such details.”
Humble and loveable Shoeshine Boy followed the customary practise of changing identities in a telephone booth (which would be inexplicably destroyed in the process). The spoofing of Superman was even more direct in the closing that marked the end of every adventure. As Our Hero flew off in victory, a crowd would gather, and a man would cry out, “Look! In the sky! It’s a plane!”
“It’s a bird!” would shout another.
This was inevitably followed up by a lady in thick eyeglasses insisting, “It’s a frog!”
“A frog?!”
Overhead, the couplet-spouting canine would reply: “Not plane, nor bird, nor even frog! Just li’l ol’ me”---then, distracted, he would collide with a skyscraper or billboard or some other obstruction, and finish, sheepishly---“Underdog.”
Buck Biggers composed a bouncy two-stanza theme song to wrap it all up. Then, the moment of truth---a screening of the five-minute pilot, titled “Safe Waif”, for the suits at General Mills. They ate it up like bowls of Trix. The biggest selling point was the gentle approach to the satire. This wasn’t That Was the Week That Was. The kids would laugh at Underdog, but not make fun of him.
Total TeleVision now had a product and a sponsor to purchase the air time.
“This has all been interesting and fun, commander, but what’s it got to do with Thanksgiving?”
I’m getting to that, gang---honest. Just hang in there for a few more paragraphs.
On 03 October 1964, at ten a.m., The Underdog Show became part of NBC’s Saturday-morning line-up. It was the only new cartoon series offered by NBC that season. The network hoped it would stand out, since most Saturday-morning fare was still re-runs of old theatrical cartoons and dull-as-dishwater live-action shows.
The folks at TTV and at Dancer Fitzgerald Sample and, perhaps most important, at General Mills didn’t have to hold their breaths very long. From all accounts, The Underdog Show was a hit.
Biggers, Stover, and company had gauged their audience perfectly. The idea of doing a super-hero spoof was fresh---the Batman television series, and its campy progeny, was still two years away---and TTV’s treatment of it was just kooky enough for youngsters to appreciate without it going over their heads.
They also hedged their bets a little by dividing nearly all the Underdog adventures into four chapters---two per half-hour. The first half would end in a cliffhanger, forcing the viewers to come back the next week if they wanted to see how their hero got out of trouble.
The fruits of success started to bloom. There were Underdog plush toys, Underdog puzzles, and Underdog Matchbook toys; Milton Bradley cranked out an Underdog board game and there was the inevitable Ben Cooper Underdog Hallowe’en costume. Oh, and General Mills sold lots of Cheerios.
I didn’t want you to just take my word for it. I looked for numbers---Nielsen ratings or sales figures or something---to document Underdog’s popularity. But for all my searching for stats, I came up empty handed. However, even without figures, there was one unmistakable earmark of Underdog’s phenomenal popularity . . . .
“We had a good feeling about it from the beginning,” said Joe Harris. “You know, sometimes things just work and this one just worked. But the coup de grace came when Macy’s said, ‘We want a balloon for the parade.’”
That’s right---the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. (See? I told you we’d get there.) The necessary lead time meant that Underdog wouldn’t appear until the 1965 event. But that was fine with Harris; he needed the latitude. In addition to his job as Underdog’s main illustrator, he had been assigned the task of designing their canine star’s balloon. Harris had a groundbreaking idea for that.
“I designed the balloon to be horizontal. No-one had done that before,” he related in an interview. “It gave the character more exposure as it went by. The other balloons were feet first and head up. Underdog was headed right for you.”
But that wasn’t the only promotion lined up for their hero’s parade debut. Like any other big star, Underdog was going to get a grand introduction. On Thanksgiving Day, 1965, hosts Lorne Greene and Betty White, along with seven million television viewers, watched as “Simon Bar Sinister” menaced “Sweet Polly Purebred” in the middle of Broadway. The actors lip-synched to lines recorded by their characters’ regular voice artists, Allen Swift and Norma MacMillan, and broadcast over mounted speakers.
As “Polly” cowered from “Simon”, suddenly the speakers boomed with a familiar voice---“There’s no need to fear! Underdog is here!” The television camera made a sharp cut overhead, and the viewers at home got their first sight of the gigantic Underdog balloon. The crowds watching from the sidewalks cheered.
NBC, which was broadcasting the parade, couldn’t have been happier to showcase its one bona fide Saturday-morning star. In fact, the network executives realised, once the parade telecast concluded, at noon, there would be millions of boys and girls sitting in front of their TV sets, looking for more entertainment. Why not, figured head of NBC’s daytime programming Larry White, give them more Underdog?
General Mills was on board with that; it meant more Cheerios flying off the grocery shelves. So Total TeleVision was asked to provide a special Underdog episode, to air at twelve o’clock, immediately following the end of the Macy’s parade. Like the usual Underdog adventure, this one would be in four chapters. But since they had a one-hour block to fill, all four parts would be seen in one show.
And it would be kind of nice, suggested NBC, if they could work in Thanksgiving and a parade.
TTV was more than glad to comply, and thus, for the first time (and only time, as a specific holiday event) aired the special one-hour Underdog episode, “Simon Says . . . No Thanksgiving!”
The timely tale opened with the evil Simon Bar Sinister unveiling his newest plan for taking over the city---with a tiny mercenary army of three aeroplanes, three tanks, and twelve soldiers. A larger invasion force isn’t needed, Simon explains to his henchman, Cad, because he has rigged the buttons of a crosswalk signal on Main Street. Pressing the first button will sound an air-raid siren, sending everyone fleeing to their homes for shelter. The second button has been wired to every door and window in the city. When Simon presses that button, those doors and windows will automatically lock, trapping the people within. With no-one to resist, three planes, three tanks, and twelve soldiers will conquer the city easily.
The attack will begin the next day, at precisely two o’clock in the afternoon.
But the renegade scientist has overlooked that the next day is Thanksgiving. When he and Cad attempt to reach the gimmicked lamppost, they find they cannot cross Main Street. It’s been blocked off for the city’s Thanksgiving Day parade.
“The only way we could get across this street,” observes Cad, “is to get rid of the Thanksgiving Day parade. And the only way you can do that is to get rid of Thanksgiving.”
So the evil Simon will do exactly that. Heh-heh-heh.
Returning to his laboratory, Simon opens a vault and removes one of his “time-bombs”. With this, he and Cad can go back in time and keep the first Thanksgiving feast between the Pilgrims and the Indians from taking place. He sets the timer for 1621 and when the “bomb” detonates, he and Cad vanish in an explosion of smoke.
However, television reporter Sweet Polly Purebred has overheard the entire scheme. After Simon and Cad vanish, Polly calls for Underdog. When the crime-fighting canine arrives, she fills him in on Simon Bar Sinister’s plot. Using one of Simon’s time-bombs, Underdog and Polly travel back to 1621 to stop him.
Unfortunately, Underdog and Polly materialise right in the middle of the Pilgrims’ compound, scaring the bejeezus out of the locals. With blunderbusses shoved in their snouts, Underdog and Polly claim to be friends, but the sceptical settlers demand proof of that.
Meanwhile, Simon Bar Sinister has had an easier time of it, managing to ingratiate himself with the Indians of the area. With the secret help of Cad and some modern-day firearms, Simon persuades the tribe that the Pilgrims are hostile.
By the time Underdog sufficiently aids the Pilgrims with his super-powers to prove his friendship, the Indian warriors attack the settlement. The Pilgrims offer fierce resistance.
His aims achieved, Simon returns with Cad to 1965. To his glee, the evil scientist finds the streets are open. It’s just another day, now. There is no more Thanksgiving, and no more Thanksgiving Day parade. With minutes to spare, Simon and Cad start across Main Street to activate their gimmicked buttons.
Back in 1621, the battle between the Pilgrims and the Indians rages on---until Underdog uses his X-ray vision to ignite a blaze on the battlefield. Suddenly, the combatants are diverted by a greater concern.
“The fire! It’ll burn down our fort!” shouts the Pilgrim leader.
“Fire! Fire burn’um down red man’s forest!” cries the Indian chief.
Putting aside their hostilities in the face of their mutual danger, the two sides work together, forming a bucket brigade to extinguish the flames. Meanwhile, Underdog repairs the damages to the settlers’ fort and the tribe’s village. Their misunderstandings resolved, the Pilgrims and the Indians sit down to celebrate their friendship with a feast.
Poof! Instantly, the modern-day Thanksgiving parade reappears, sweeping Simon Bar Sinister---and his dreams of conquering the city---away in its wake.
Overhead, the spectators spy the familiar red-and-blue form of Our Hero. And there is the customary “It’s a plane!”/”It’s a bird!”/”It’s a frog!” business.
Only this time, in a departure from the usual coda, the show brings it all back to the Macy’s parade when Underdog states:
“Not plane, nor bird, nor even frog. It’s not even li’l ol’ me, Underdog---it’s a balloon.”
And that, my friends---for those of you who missed it forty-nine years ago---is the story of . . . .
* * * * *
From Cheryl and myself, to all of you, our fondest wishes for a Happy Thanksgiving Day, and many more of them!
Replies
Fascinating as always. I don't remember Underdog being in two parts with a cliffhanger--so did they cut them in reruns (which is when I saw them) or is my memory just flawed? It's easily been 30 years since I saw any.
Burns & Allen is my favorite sitcom from that era of television, but no question Lucy was a genius.
I do remember one other Thanksgiving special, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (Peanuts Thanksgiving?) though it wasn't the series' best work.
Happy Thanksgiving!
A wonderful Thanksgiving post, as always.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours, Commander! Your articles are on their way of becoming holiday traditions too!
May we all give thanks for our blessings, look past the faults of others and ourselves, give and get forgiveness and work to become better people in the coming year
btw, Simon Bar Sinister is one of the greatest villain names of all time!
Happy Thanksgiving.
Y'know, it would make sense only to a supervillain, whose plot is based on being able to cross the street, when faced with a Thanksgiving parade to conclude "I'll eliminate Thanksgiving!" instead of just trying again the next day.
It just sunk in Simon's assistant's name is Cad, not Tad. I never heard it correctly.
It didn't come up often in the show, but his full name was Cad Lackey.
Always wondered why George Reeves' voice sounded so high pitched on I Love Lucy.