- Garfield Goose and Friends
Infobox Television
show_name = Garfield Goose and Friends
caption =
aka = Garfield Goose and Friend
genre = Children's program
creator =Frazier Thomas
writer =
director =Ron Weiner
presenter =
starring =Frazier Thomas
Roy Brown
country =USA
language = English
num_seasons = 24 (2 on WBKB/WBBM, 1 on WBKB (now WLS), 21 on WGN)
num_episodes =
list_episodes =
runtime =
channel = WBKB-TV/WBBM-TV (1952-1953)
WBKB-TV (now WLS-TV) (1953-1955)WGN-TV (1955-1976)
picture_format =
audio_format =
first_run =
first_aired =September 29 ,1952
last_aired =October 1 ,1976
related =
website =
prod_website =
imdb_id = 0322367
tv_com_id = 19343Garfield Goose and Friends was a
children's television show produced byWGN-TV inChicago ,Illinois ,United States during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. The host of the show wasFrazier Thomas , who did all of the talking. The show centered on a clacking goosepuppet named "Garfield Goose", who considered himself "king of the United States." There were many other puppet characters such as "Romberg Rabbit", "Macintosh Mouse", "Chris Goose" (Garfield's nephew who was born on Christmas, hence "Christmas Goose") and a sleepy bloodhound called "Beauregard Burnside III" (whose name happened to be a mix of twoAmerican Civil War generals). The show used a "Little Theater Screen", upon which the camera would zoom before cartoons such as "Clutch Cargo " and "Space Angel " were broadcast.History
Cincinnati
Thomas created Garfield Goose for a local program called "Meet the Little People" on
WKRC-TV (CBS ) inCincinnati, Ohio . Thomas, who was anIndiana native and had worked on Cincinnati local radio since beforeWorld War II , said he got the idea when he sawCatholic nuns with a sock puppet in the form of a goose, with which they invited children to "feed the goose" with donations for charity. "Garfield" was WKRC-TV's telephone exchange. In Cincinnati, Garfield Goose lived in acuckoo clock , since he'd always wanted to be acuckoo bird .Chicago and WBKB
In 1951 Thomas and Garfield Goose moved to Chicago and CBS affiliate WBKB-TV, which was then on Channel 4. At first, the goose was a character on "Petticoat Party", a variety show hosted by Thomas. Later, when the character was thought to have enough appeal for a show of its own, "Garfield Goose and Friend" debuted on September 29, 1952 with Chicago puppeteer Bruce Newton.
Newton had Garfield Goose communicate with Thomas through an off-screen
typewriter but Newton was soon replaced by the show's graphic artist Roy Brown as puppeteer, who also created the rest of the show's puppet characters. Thomas began calling the program "Garfield Goose and Friends" and Romberg Rabbit began "translating" for Garfield. Since only Thomas could understand what Romberg and the other characters communicated, Thomas would repeat what the puppets "said" for viewers to understand.WGN
WBKB-TV was sold in February 1953 and became
WBBM-TV , theCBS owned-and-operated station, which moved to channel 2. Meanwhile "Garfield Goose and Friends" stayed on the new WBKB-TV, an ABC owned-and-operated station which jumped to channel 7 a year later. During this period, the show was briefrly carried nationally on the ABC network. Then the show nested on WGN-TV (channel 9), which bought the rights in 1955 and stayed there for over two decades, for most of this time running in the late afternoon after children had come home from school. During the early 1970s, the program slowly lost viewership to competition and was moved to weekday mornings. The show's long run ended onSeptember 10 ,1976 .Bozo's Circus
Frazier Thomas had taken the role of "circus manager" on WGN-TV's longtime hit program "
Bozo's Circus " after the retirement of RingmasterNed Locke in 1976. Thomas cleverly kept his puppets on the air with a storyline in which Garfield "bought" "Bozo's Circus". The puppets made daily appearances until 1981. Thomas worked on "Bozo's Circus", later retitled "The Bozo Show", until his death in 1985. In 1987, the puppets were donated to TheMuseum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago. The display initially included Garfield Goose, Romberg Rabbit, Macintosh Mouse, Beaureguard Burnside III, Christmas Goose, and Ali Gator (the latter a character who appeared only briefly in a serialized adventure during the show's early years). Ali Gator was later removed from the museum's display.Aftermath
As often happened during the 1950s and early 1960s (such as with "
The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson " or the firstSuper Bowl game), "Garfield Goose and Friends" aired live for much of its history. WGN did not keep many tapes of its local productions, including "Garfield Goose And Friends". Rather, since the reels ofvideotape were very costly, they were thriftily recycled. Station management did not foresee how valuable recordings of these broadcasts would have become. Only four episodes were preserved: March 14-15, 1974, and September 9-10, 1976 (the latter two being the final two shows aired in the series).Against Frazier Thomas and Roy Brown's wishes, Bruce and Claire Newton mounted a live, traveling "Garfield Goose Telepuppets" show at neighborhood events for many years after the series had gone off the air, alongside other non-Garfield Goose puppets built and performed by the pair for other shows. To Thomas and Brown's chagrin, WGN-TV management chose not to pursue the matter. Although Bruce Newton would later claim his traveling show featured the first Garfield Goose puppet used on WBKB-TV, Roy Brown denied Newton's claim. [Confirmed by WGN-TV Programming Dept. [http://www.wgntv.com/contact_us "WGNTV.com Contact Page"] . Accessed
October 10 2008 .]In December 2005, WGN-TV ran a primetime special called "", which carried the earliest known saved clip of the show, wherein Garfield Goose had "luckily" gotten hold of tickets to the
1959 World Series at Chicago'sComiskey Park . As it happened at the time of this 2005 broadcast, the White Sox had won the 2005 World Series, which moreover was their first World Series appearance since 1959. Additional color kinescope footage from 1965 came from a vintage WGN-TV sales film which also includes some scenes from "Bozo's Circus". The broadcast garnered #1 ratings in the Chicago market and is rerun annually during the holiday season.References
External links
* [http://chicagotelevision.com/frazier.htm Many thanks to www.chicagotelevision.com for info on the show and Frazier Thomas]
* [http://www.tvparty.com/lostgarfield.html TV Party's Garfield Goose site]
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