I hope I won’t offend anyone by saying this: Columbia may have worked harder promoting Scrappy cartoons than it did making Scrappy cartoons. There were Scrappy clubs and educational aids and clothing and comics and toys and other tie-ins of all sorts. And I’ve always assumed that if there wasn’t a Scrappy radio show, there should have been one.
Now Scrappyologist and radio scholar Andrew Leal has the first definitive evidence that Scrappy did hit the airwaves — or tried to do so, at least. The July 15, 1937 issue of Broadcasting featured the following news tidbit:
“Presentation series” means that the Biddick company created (or intended to create) a pilot for a Scrappy program. I don’t know whether anything it produced survives. I have no idea whether it led to anything. Whatever happened or didn’t happen, it’s good to get confirmation that Columbia made a good-faith effort to put Scrappy on radio. And further research is warranted.
When I read this, I thought for a moment that it was saying that the proposed Scrappy show was sponsored by America’s furriers. Nah — Andrew explained that was a totally different Biddick program. But it’s still a delightful idea.
At first glance, I thought they were half-minute transcriptions for furriners. Dang ‘em! They come over here and demand their own radio cartoons!