Ll Be Your Huckleberry

Home , Daws Butler, Huckleberry Hound, Quick Draw McGraw, Snagglepuss, The Honeymooners, Wally Gator

It is amazing what will spark a memory. I was transferring a client’s film today and the Christmas scene that appeared on the screen was of a young boy who had just received an inflatable punching bag in the image of Huckleberry Hound.

I had one of those. And I certainly remember Hanna-Barbera’s Huckleberry Hound being a favorite cartoon when I was growing up. But my memory played a trick on me. I would have sworn that the Huckleberry Hound Show that I watched as a youngster consisted of three segments: Huckleberry himself; Yogi Bear and Boo-Boo (whose segment eventually became more popular than those of the titular star); and (I thought) Quick Draw McGraw with his sidekick “bing bing bing” Ricochet Rabbit.

But I was wrong. Quick Draw had his own show. The third segment for Huck, as he is familiarly known to his young fans, involved a pair of mice, Pixie and Dixie, and the object of their abuse, the cat Mr. Jinx. Just goes to show how memories can tend to distort and blend together over time.

A few trivia tidbits about this cartoon from my past: Huckleberry Hound debuted in 1958 and featured a slow moving, slow talking blue dog who held a multitude of jobs and always seemed to succeed due to either luck or an obstinate persistence.

Huck was voiced by Daws Butler who also provided the voices for Wally Gator, Yogi Bear, Quick Draw McGraw, and Snagglepuss.

Daws Butler fashioned the voice of Yogi Bear after Art Carney’s portrayal of Ed Norton in The Honeymooners. And, despite the similarities, he always denied using Andy Griffith as the inspiration for the voice of Huckleberry. (And as it turns out, Huckleberry arrived on the scene a few years before Andy Griffith became a household name.)

It was the first animated program to be honored with an Emmy Award (1961).

Edit: Yet another memory failure. I have been reminded that Ricochet Rabbit was not the sidekick of QuickDraw McGraw. He was the star of his own show. Quick Draw’s sidekick was Baba Louey – which I should have remembered on my own as that was also the nickname given to my baby sister.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit www.homevideostudio.com.mtd.