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Originally Posted by Randy Korstick
I'm not quite old enough to have seen the original run but I watched the reruns in the 70's and the original song/credits were used then and I could swear I have seen them on Boomerang but not positive on that one.
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I too did not see the show in its original run, but did watch the reruns on Channel 32 in Chicago.
Yes indeed, the opening and closing did indeed air on Cartoon Network and Boomerang in pristine quality, even down to the "dancing sticks" Screen Gems closing logo.
Here is how the syndicated package was put together: all the cartoons from the "Magilla Gorilla" and "Peter Potamus" shows were syndicated together in one package of 150 cartoons; they did the same thing for Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear, which were syndicated together. Channel 32 in Chicago ran the package under the "Magilla Gorilla" title. From the way Channel 32 aired it, I am
guessing that what Screen Gems/Columbia Pictures Television actually sent out was a package of individual 16mm prints of the cartoons, plus the openings, closings and whatever interstitials they included (if any), and a manifest listing the titles in sequence. Channel 32 then spliced the cartoons into half-hour episodes, three cartoons to a show, in sequence. (This is the way Channel 32 did things in the early 1970s. They handled the theatrical Fleischer/Famous "Popeye" cartoons in a similar way, but those were instead spliced together in
alphabetical order!) Channel 32 had the opening and closing transferred to tape, with their own station logo superimposed on it along with the title "Magilla Gorilla." I remember that when I first saw the show on Channel 32, the version of the opening they used had Breezly & Sneezly in it; later on, they redid the taped opening when their station logo changed, and the new tape used the other version, with Ricochet Rabbit in it. This is also when they started showing the closing at the end (prior to this, Channel 32 just ran the opening again at the end of the show). One day, the show would feature Magilla Gorilla, Punkin Puss and Ricochet Rabbit, in that order. The next day, they would air Peter Potamus, Breezly & Sneezly, and Yippie/Yappie/Yahooey (on those days, the titles still said "Magilla Gorilla" even though this was actually the "Peter Potamus" show). Because of an uneven number of cartoons for certain characters, a few of the last half-hours would have two Magillas and a Potamus, etc. Channel 32 never aired any other bumpers or "curtain calls," but prints of them have gone around and I assume they were sent out with the package. Now, this is what was done in Chicago. In other cities it could have been completely different. (The DVD set will only have Magilla Gorilla/Punkin Puss/Ricochet Rabbit; still waiting for Peter Potamus to get a DVD set.) In fact, by 1980 or so Channel 32 started splitting up the cartoons, airing them in a random order and stopped showing the show opening and closing altogether. In fact, they even started cutting off the titles of the individual cartoon shorts. (Ironically, ABC did that too.)
Huck/Yogi were on WGN-Channel 9 in Chicago. They also had the Quick Draw package, and they'd run them all over the place, on "Bozo," on "Ray Rayner," on "Garfield Goose," and buried in a 6 AM Saturday timeslot with other cartoons no one watched. I imagine WGN had access to a lot of that other material (openings, closings, bumpers) but chose not to use them, just running the shorts "stag," so to speak. I have heard that in other cities, a station might have a "Huckleberry Hound" show with the HH opening and closing, and then for instance, a Huckleberry Hound, a Yogi Bear and a Quick Draw Mc Graw. But that was up to the discretion of the station.
