The Low, Low Price of Two Million Dollars

Jay Ward made funny cartoons.

Jay Ward made other funny things, too.

If you’ve read Keith Scott’s essential book The Moose That Roared, you’ll know Ward had a promotional department that sent out ridiculous news releases, twisting current events to get attention.

It worked. Newspaper columnists with a sense of humour loved getting anything other than the same staid announcements. We have reprinted their bemused reportage in previous posts and we do so again.

This one is from the Pittsburgh Press of May 26, 1961. Ward, Scott and his release writer (Alan Burns?) made fun of the concept of a Book of the Month Club or Record of the Month Club.

'Film Series Of Month'
Bonus Selections Lampooned
By FRED REMINGTON
The economic slump has "saucered out" now as they say, and you may have $2,000,000 to spare that you didn't have back there a few months ago when things were tighter.
Well, you might want to look into the TV Film Series of the Month Club.
"Remember," states the Club's monthly bulletin, "as a member you agree to buy six Jay Ward TV series within the next 12 months at our list price. After buying six series, you are entitled to a bonus series of your choice WITHOUT CHARGE! Join now!”
Jay Ward and his partner, Bill Scott, produce the "Rocky and His Friends" cartoon series. Their trade paper advertising and periodic mailings are delightfully funny.
The TV Film Series Of The Month Club Bulletin is a sample of their humor. Like the book club bulletins, this one lists the monthly selection, plus the various available bonus selections, with capsule descriptions. For example: This month's selection—
"BEAT THE PRESS." Frank Sinatra and Anita Ekberg pound, maul, pummel, hit, scratch, claw, kick and bite four well known members of the press each week for 28-action packed minutes on a bare stage! In show No. 1 alone, Frank destroys over $6000 worth of press camera equipment! Guests: May Craig, Walter Lippman, Lawrence E. Spivak and Hedda Hopper.”
The bonus selections includes—"HUM ALONG WITH MITCH." Jay Ward offers a solution to those who want to participate but can't remember the words.
"YOU ASKED TO SEE IT." Persuasive Jay Ward has made it possible for the home viewers to see such off-beat footage as lovely screen star Audrey Hepburn eating a live chicken.”
"THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.” Thoughtlessly turned down by the Prudential Insurance Co., this fascinating re-examination of a marvelous era is now available to you. Host-narrator is Robert Welch of the John Birch Society.
"CHAMPIONSHIP MAHJONGG.” Exciting action series with world's great players competing for weekly jackpot of $100. Host Lenny Bruce provides wholesome fun to relieve between-match tension. Fun for the whole family!
"TOUCH FOOTBALL HIGHLIGHTS." From Washington D. C., Palm Beach, Fla., and Hyannis Port, Mass.
On Mothers Day weekend, Ward and Scott ran trade paper ads offering: Free—Make a long distance phone call to your mom anyplace in the USA. All you have to do is buy a Jay Ward TV series, 39 weeks. Just $2,000,000.
This novel promotional campaign is prompted by the fact that the Ward enterprises have 20 unsold cartoon series, including "Super Chicken" and "Watts Gnu?"
"We're not discouraged about our big backlog of unsold shows," Scott told the United Press International the other day. "When one sells, they'll all sell, and we'll be rich. Rich. Rich. Rich."

Watts Gnu was a puppet show that Ward couldn’t interest the networks in picking up. The concept of Super Chicken was revived a few years later as a segment of George of the Jungle. Some like it better than George.

However, Ward’s major stars, Rocky and Bullwinkle, took advantage of the rush by the networks in 1961 to have their own “Flintstones,” i.e. a successful night-time cartoon comedy. That’s even though, according to this story by Jim Scott in the Berkeley Gazette of Sept. 23, 1961, NBC didn’t want it.

TV Premiere—
There's a Lot Of Berkeley In 'Bullwinkle'
There's a lot of Berkeley in Bullwinkle, who could be hottest thing on television this fall.
From a supporting role in "Rocky and his Friends," Bullwinkle, a moose, goes in his own show—"The Bullwinkle Show," of course—at 7-7:30 p.m. Sundays on NBC's 60-city network starting Sept. 24.
The pixie behind Bullwinkle, who'll be done in color, is J. T. (Jay) Ward, a onetime Berkeley sports buff who still heads the J. T. Ward (realty) office on Domingo across the street from the Berkeley Tennis Club.
Actually, NBC doesn't care much for old Bullwinkle but big General Mills, Inc., likes him even better than Wheaties. After paying Jay an estimated $3,000,000 for Bullwinkle, it used its great weight to force NBC to show the moose at the prime time.
Already Bullwinkle's creator, Ward, has become a legend in Hollywood though he's been there only two years. A brilliant organizer with a light, Jay achieved success by hiring only top talent. This goes double for his co-producer, Bill Scott.
Besides his former associates, Rocky, a flying squirrel, spy Boris Badenov and his cohort, Natasha Fatale, Bullwinkle will have to deal this season with one Dudley Do-Right of the Mounties, a meat-head who smells of the Nelson Eddy influence. BULLWINKLE is far from being the only star in Jay's stable. He's now ready to go with several other shows, including the "Fractured Flipper" [sic] and "Hoppity Hooper."
Operating in three buildings on Sunset Ward is never too busy to talk to Berkeley friends, particularly if they're hep to Cal athletics.
On a recent visit with Jay, this writer found him and Scott relaxed over cool drinks. (“We can think up ideas better than this," said Jay). Around and about them worked 25 (temperamental) artists.
In addition, Jay maintains a unit in Mexico City, where more than 100 cartoonists ink out the bulk of his work. In his Sunset studios, artists come and go as they please. Some do the work in their homes.
Ward is one of the few Hollywood producers who realize the vital role of the writer. "The writer is more important than the animator," says Jay. "Many producers are so intrigued with the novelty of the moving drawing that they forget the prime factor—the story. Cartoons, like the comic strip, have a basic appeal. But an audience will tire if they present only action and no plot. Some cartoon makers have perfected animation to a life-like reality. But the story suffers. We try to use animation to tell a story."
WARD was first exposed to the entertainment field while attending the University of California here. As chairman of the Radio Committee, he wrote many of the scripts. After service in the Air Force during World War II, he enrolled at the Harvard Business School. He returned to Berkeley following graduation to operate the real estate business he had inherited from his father.
Jay had been in his office just one day when a runaway truck smashed through his building. Ward's leg was broken. While convalescing, he turned to writing.
It was then that Jay conceived the revolutionary idea of animated cartoons for television. At the time the seven-inch screen were offering only tired vaudeville acts.
Jay and Alex Anderson in 1948 produced "Crusader Rabbit," which ran for two years on ABC. But they lost the valuable property when the sales agency which had taken it over went bankrupt.
But the Crusader's financial romp was a gnawing challenge to young Ward to do it again. To do it right, he went to Hollywood, started hiring the best talent. Yet he made his pilot film for only $5,000. His voices included such well-known names as those of Edward Everett Horton and Charles Ruggles.
THE INTEREST evinced at once in Rocky prompted Jay to expand fast with the aid of investors from Berkeley.
But his enterprise almost came a cropper at the outset. Flying home from New York, his plane hit a rough pocket that really jolted the passengers. Ward was stricken.
Since it appeared that he was suffering a heart attack the plane made an emergency landing in Salt Lake City. Physician there couldn't determine Jay's trouble but they didn't think it was his heart. He had difficulty breathing, feared he couldn’t take his next breath. He suffered claustrophobia. But, even though working at a slower pace, he met with nothing but success in his venture into animation.
Today Jay has completely recovered. Recently he drove his own car to Berkeley, from where he left his office manager, Dave Carr, on a fishing trip to the High Sierra.
"If that boy will just stick with me—and watch his weight—he'll go far," said Bullwinkle with a wink that TV watchers have come to love.

After The Bullwinkle Show premiered, Ward and Scott spent time ridiculing NBC’s apathy toward their series, worked on getting Hoppity Hooper and Fractured Flickers on the air (the latter in syndication). Oh, and there were nutty promotional events to grab more media attention.

Here we are, 60-plus years later, still laughing along with them.