Saturday Morning Cartoons: Wacky Races in Real Gone Ape

The Saturday morning cartoon this week is an episode of Wacky Races.

Pre-order these on DVD

Pre-Order Iron Man the movie

At Amazon you can pre-order the movie Iron Man on regular DVD in the two disc special edition or as the regular single disc edition. They also have the DVD two disc special edition in Blu-Ray. Or you can order other Iron Man collectibles. They have comic books, action figures and signed movie memorabilia. So click away and order today.

My Old College Buddy...Kwicky Koala

Recently I was reading an old comic book and I saw an ad for the Saturday morning cartoon show Kwicky Koala. Now why does Kwicky Koala remind me of college? It was 1981 and I was a Sophomore at Northern Kentucky University. I was majoring in Radio, Television and Film Communication and one class said we had to design TV Station for Louisville, Kentucky. I don't know why they didn't give us Cincinnati, Ohio. It was only a half an hours drive from the school and Louisville was about two hours.
Anyway part of the project was to get copies of the major local stations program guides. So one day I drove to Louisville. My friend Chuck came along for company. At the first station I was shocked to get a glimpse of the more seamy side of broadcasting. We were greeted by a very pretty receptionist and waited for the program director. Out came a middle aged balding man. He seemed a bit full of himself. He took us into the meeting room and gave us a copy of the program guide and answered all my questions. At some point the receptionist and another pretty woman came in and while he talked to us both woman caressed him on each side as if he was James Bond. Later when we left I passed the receptionist and thanked her. She said "You're welcome!" Then gave me wink. As I left I made a mental note to not work for that station if I was offered a job.
At the next station the program director was a woman and everything was going fine. That is till I started mentioning some of the network shows I thought they had on TV. I was in such a hurry to get there that I mixed up the shows and was mentioning shows that were on their major competition in town. We got all the information I needed but was very embarrassed when I left.
The last station the program director wasn't able to see us. However, the station engineer said he could get us the information that we needed. He only had a few minutes and we had to get there soon.
Oh! I forgot to mention that we had parked the car and were walking all over the city to the stations.
Anyway Chuck and I checked our watches and noticed that we only had a short time till then and we started running. We started running faster and faster and it started to become a race. Chuck was about a foot or two in front of me. Suddenly, as we came to an alley, Chuck came to a sudden stop. I saw this as a chance to take the lead. As I stepped into the middle of the alley street I saw an armored car barreling down the alley. He came to a sudden stop and it jolted the man in back with the gun. I half jumped away from the armored car. I didn't want to do a full jump as that would have put me in the middle of the busy street and I still could have gotten hit by a car.
I was half in a daze as I walked towards Chuck and didn't realize I walked past the gun port. Chuck had closed his eyes and flattened himself against the building. Later he said he was stunned when I had came over and grabbed his arm. When I jumped to avoid being hit he thought that the car actually did hit me. Later Chuck told me about the gunport and he hugged the building so he wouldn't get shot.
We went our way and joked how about what our families would have thought if we died and made the papers. Headlines would have read "Two Men Die In Daring Armored Car Robbery!"
We had a good laugh at that. Then we checked our direction and noticed we were going the wrong way. We had to turn around and run even faster to make up the time. We made it by the skin of our teeth. As we got there and asked for the engineer he came off the elevator. He asked if we were the two who called him and gave us the information. The three of us were all smiles as we said goodbye. Chuck and I rushed back to the car and headed back home as Chuck had to be at work that night.
Oh! I almost forgot. Why does Kwicky Koala remind me of this college project? While Chuck drove back I looked at some of the program information and for the first time I saw the name of the Saturday morning program "The Kwicky Koala Show." After such a stressful day that name seemed funnier to me then it should have and I laughed as hard as I ever did. Chuck got a good laugh too. To this day I have never forgotten that day and Kwicky Koala has always reminded me of it. I have never seen the show but I may get to one day.

Give A Show

Before you could buy cartoons for the kids to watch on DVD. Before you could buy them on VHS. Even before you could buy them on Beta there was the Give-A-Show Projectors. The item that would take a strip of celluloid and project the images on the wall or a screen. Kids would read the story from the words on the bottom of the strip. Eventually they started to come with a record that had actors telling the story. Well there is a site dedicated to this old art form called The Give-A-Show Projector Blog. It's a fun site that wasn't started by me but by Jon of Random Acts of Geekery fame. Click on the link above and check it out.

Video of the Week: The Beach Boys and Forever

They are preforming it live on July 2, 1971 in Central Park in New York City.

Mail It To Team-Up Blog Head Contest

There is still time to send in your entries to the blog head contest at Mail It To Team Up. Just follow any of these links for a chance to win the DVD set of Filmation's DC Superheroes cartoons that aired on the Superman/Aquaman Hour in the mid 1960's. Some of these were the first time any of the characters appeared on a cartoon like the Teen Titans or the Flash. Contest ends on July 26th. The winning entry will be the blog head of Mail It To Team-Up for 2 weeks and will get the DVD sets. Go to Mail It To Team Up for more specifications.

Comic Book Letterheads Museum

The above letter page letter head is from DC Comics Presents 1979. The book had Superman team-up each month with a different superhero to solve a crime. If you love comic books and the art that use to be on the letters pages then check out Comic Book Letterheads Museum. You'll find more and even better looking ones like these on that site.