The Tennessee Teacher

Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales was one the first made-for-Saturday-morning cartoon series, but unlike the old theatricals and refugees from other time slots, they weren’t altogether entertainment cartoons.

There was an education component that fit completely with the plot of the cartoon, so kids didn’t realise they were being taught something (or perhaps, in some cases, it was something they already knew).

Critics have bashed Saturday morning shows for so long, it’s hard to believe there was a time where they applauded programming. The reviews of Tennessee were favourable.

Here’s a syndicated story from May 17, 1964.

Children Learn By Talking Penguin
BY DON ROYAL
NEW YORK—Why aren't there more good and popular educational television shows for children? Thousands of parents and television critics—to say nothing of the Federal Communications Commission—would like to know.
Not that the networks have completely abdicated their potential, the power to disseminate education and encourage the development of curious young minds. They have tried, but apparently have, for the most part, failed to find a workable formula.
One children's educational show that seems to have found one is "Tennessee Tuxedo," seen on CBS-TV Saturday mornings. When the program came on the air last fall, it was given only average chance of success.
That it did better than average is indicated by the fact that it has been renewed for a second 52-week season. It will not leave the air all year, even for the usual summer hiatus. "Tennessee Tuxedo" dominates all network viewing when it is on the air, with an estimated 10 million plus viewers weekly.
By this time you may be ready to ask: "Who—or what—is Tennessee Tuxedo?"
Tennessee Tuxedo is the name of a hyperthyroid penguin with the native curiosity of a five-year-old and the brash, know-it-all bravado of a young teenager.
Along with his yes-man, a chumpy (what else?) walrus named Chumley, he walks out of the zoo each week only to become helplessly— and hilariously— involved in the complex human world around him.
For instance, the penguin's sheer brashness lands him a job as an automobile mechanic. But he doesn't know a carburetor from a cardinal.
In the process of learning, he—and his young viewers—are given a beautifully simplified explanation of the workings of an internal combustion engine.
In another episode, the penguin makes an effort to link all the cages in the zoo by phone so the animals can chatter sociably with one another.
He works himself into a series of embarrassing situations while discovering the essentials of telecommunication.
And so it goes, like when Tennessee and Chumley manage to wreck the zoo's huge clock. In a do-it-yourself repairing spree, they illustrate the principles of Einstein's relativity theory so graphically that its basics can be grasped even by 5 to 10 year-old minds.
In similar fashion, the perky penguin and his pals explore the fields of farming and irrigation, astronomy, space, physics, photography, sculpture and music, bridge building, ancient history, marine navigation, party politics, democratic electoral systems, and others.
Their frequent companion is a Frank Morganish genius named Mr. Whoopee, the proprietor of a magic blackboard with the tremendous power of reducing complex subjects to easily comprehensible essentials.
The program is the brainchild of Cyril Plattes, cereal marketing chief of the vast General Mills corporate empire, which spends some $45,000,000 on advertising annually.
Public Service
Plattes figured some of this money should be spent in furthering television's potential as a medium for uplift and public service.
" 'Education' has always been a dirty word in show business," he says. "Attach it to a movie or television show and it's the kiss of death.
"The networks haven't been entirely delinquent about educational shows: they have tried with such laudable efforts as 'Exploring' and 'Discovery,' but too many viewers stay away.
"It was my contention these and other shows did not fail because they were educational, but because they did not properly cultivate and maintain an audience."
"Education is easier to digest if you think your swallowing something else. "It's like an exotic foreign delicacy say, stewed butterfly wings or chocolate-coveted ante. I'm told they taste great if you don't know what you're eating."
Plattes knew his projected series had to entertain if it were to educate, and it had to win a large audience and help sell cereal if it were to survive.
If he were to please the youngsters, he had to discover what appealed to them most. Instead of consulting a team of psychologists, he consulted the kids themselves.
"We employed a firm to question thousands of children of all social strata across the country. They told us that of all entertainment forms they like animated cartoons the best. And they liked to laugh.
"So we decided to use comedy as a teaching tool and animation as our medium."
Plattes enlisted the aid of a long-time New York manufacturer of video programming, Peter Piech and a creative animation firm, TTV (also known as Teaching Television).
Inborn Hunger
Together, they realized the best way to hold a child's wandering interest was to involve him in the adventure at hand, to bait him with his own inborn hunger for knowledge.
With this in mind, they tabulated a set of questions kid most frequently ask. How big is space? Why do airplanes fly? How does steam move an ocean liner? What is fire and how is it fought? What is electricity, and how does it produce light?
The questions and their answers form the basis for each of the weekly half-hour shows. Subjects are very carefully researched and the nation's schoolteachers were even invited to submit suggestions.
The voice of Tennessee Tuxedo is provided by Don Adams, a nightclub comedian and the father of a nine-year-old girl. He is never seen on the show, only heard.
"One recent Saturday," reports Adams, "my daughter came running into the bedroom, woke me up and hollered, 'Daddy, there's a bird doing an imitation of you on television.'
"I asked if the bird were a penguin and she said yes. I told her to relax—it was me imitating the penguin."
Adams enjoys doing the show. He and his associates, including mimic Larry Storch, assemble in a New York recording studio once a month and are given four new scripts. They rehearse a while, then record the dialogue. The resultant soundtrack is then shipped to the cartoonery where animators draw the many thousands of individual full-color sketches that make up each program.
Educators have been lavish in their praise of "Tennessee Tuxedo," and recognized authorities claim the program has pioneered new techniques in visual education.
Reduction of inherently complex matters to easily understandable premises can be difficult, but this program manages it.
What makes the show all the more remarkable is that it doesn't deal with sex, violence, hillbillies or cowboys and Injuns.
It is, however, an adventure series—an adventure in learning so subtly executed the viewer doea not know he's learning anything.
The sponsor is happy with the results. The audience has built steadily and remains loyal.
Surveys indicate youngsters look at the program of their own volition—parents do not drive them to the set.
But a surprising number of parents look in, too.

While Adams gets mentioned, it should be pointed out the voice work overall was solid. Larry Storch does my favourite Frank Morgan impression and, here, he becomes a character rather than an imitation of someone. His Mr. Whoopee easily holds the interest of young viewers. Brad Bolke is likeable as Chumley. Mort Marshall's Stanley Livingston is amusing (he used the voice elsewhere at TTV). And I've always been a fan of Kenny Delmar, who never seems to get credit for his versatility (everyone thinks of him as Senator Claghorn on the Fred Allen radio show but he did much more than that).

Add to that stories that don't pound things into kids' heads (unlike any didactic TV cartoon from the '80s) and you have a fairly entertaining series that deserves a look even today.