Bong-Bong-Bong!

Everyone’s heard them. Back in the ‘60s, they came from speakers of TV sets while the letters ‘N’, ‘B’ and ‘C’ snaked onto the scene at the end of a programme.

The NBC chimes weren’t new then. They went back to the days of network radio, in fact, before network radio.

It’s likely we’ll never learn where the idea of using chimes to signal radio programming came from. There are too many conflicting claims and have been for 90 years. But it certainly wasn’t NBC, founded in late 1926. WSB in Atlanta claimed to have invented the idea. In the September 5, 1925 edition of Radio Digest (page 7), there are pictures of the chimes and an article which reads:

When one once hears the famous three-note chime of WSB it is not forgotten. Its three-note mellow tone chime is known most everywhere. The station has used this instrument as their call and signing off symbol ever since broadcasting was started more than three years ago.

Indeed, included in a squib on radio station identifications found in the Baltimore Sun of November 19, 1922 is the revelation: "When listening to Atlanta, you can either recognize it by the three gongs or else the Southern drawl of the announcer."

But there was a competing claim in the magazine’s edition of December 26, 1925 (pages 6 and 10). WOR in Newark, New Jersey, owned by the Bamberger Department store, began broadcasting in 1922. The pertinent part of the Digest story:

The WOR chimes are a well known trade mark of the station. They are the original chimes used in broadcasting, and have been copied by a number of stations in one form or another for signing off and on....
J. Seabeck is the announcer. Listen to him some time and you are sure to come back for more. His clear enunciation and the tone of his voice are pleasing to the ear. It is seldom that Radio fans can listen to such a wonderful announcer. And when he sounds the chimes and you hear: "One of America's Great Stores," you know you are in for a treat.

When exactly either of the two NBC networks began using chimes to signal network cues is unclear, but the use of the chimes is referred to in this Boston Globe feature article of February 3, 1930. At the time this story was written, NBC was using seven chimes, not three. Most of this article has little to with chimes, but it is notable the writer talks about F.D.R’s infirmities. The chief announcer of WEEI at the time has a fascinating history you can read at this web site. Eddie Gisburne left the station in 1936 just before management changed hands. The old “quit-before-you-get-fired” move has evidently been going on in radio for some time.

HOW RADIO TALKS ARE TIMED TO THE EXACT SECOND
Announcer’s Task to Keep Them on Schedule not an Easy One—With Programs Shooting in From All Sides Ingenious Devices Are Needed to Keep Them on Time BY JOHN BARRY
The radio announcer glanced at his timed program sheet as the orchestra was swelling to a final crescendo. Mary Whoozis was scheduled to follow the orchestral number with a solo. The announcer looked across the room for Mary. She was gone.
Ten seconds more and the orchestra number would finish. An allowance of two to five seconds’ pause had been made between the finish of the orchestral number and the introduction of Mary Whoozis.
Where was Mary?
Just two to five seconds to get her to the microphone. The announcer knew where she was. It was a habit of hers to step out into the ante room and watch the program through the plate glass window until her presence was required. But she was not at the window. The announcer could not signal to her with a wave to come in.
What to do?
Back to Dulcet Tones
There is a provision for that in the studio. Just as the last note of the orchestra was sounded the announcer bellowed, “Mary Whoozis, get in here quick. You’re on the air.”
And Mary rushed in. In dulcet tones again, the bellow forgotten, except for a bit of a glare in his eyes, the announcer introduces Mary Whoozis.
And though you listeners were tuned every minute to the program, every second, you didn’t hear the announcer shout at Mary, and you couldn’t know there had been any slip in the program.
It was done with a little push button known as “Artists Call,” placed at the announcer’s desk for just that purpose. In the midst of a program the announcer can press that button and as long as he holds it down with his finger nothing can go out on the air. He can say anything he wants. There is no interruption of the carrier wave, so that you set does not sound “dead,” or anything like that.
Many Gadgets Needed
It is one of the gadgets necessary to keep radio programs on time. And with programs shooting in from all parts of the compass today they must be on time. The two central broadcasting points of the National Broadcasting Company are now synchronized so that a local station such as WEEI can jump from Red to Blue net work and back—providing the jump is made on time.
When the WEEI announcer says, “And now the voice of the press,” and the Globe man goes on the air, how many realize that for five minutes before that introduction the Globe man has been sitting with a telephone receiver glued to his ear, waiting for the word “Go,” so there will be no interruption in your enjoyment?

We found Ed Gisburne, veteran radio man and announcer of Station WEEI, one morning this week in the State House, sitting with a telephone receiver at his ear, a microphone before him. He was about to introduce a speaker of the Department of State and was waiting for the signal. We waited until the broadcast was over and asked Ed Gisburne how all this timing was achieves. How, for instance, did the speaker who had just been on the air finish his talk in time for the next program?
Speakers Without Sense of Time
“That one was easy,” said Ed, “he was just reading a speech. Whenever a new speaker comes to the microphone we always tell them that it takes about two minutes to read over the air one page of double spaced typewriting. Sometimes a speaker appears with several pages too many. They must be edited down to the required length.
“A new speaker has no sense of time, or the time requires to read his speech, so here at the State House I have a signal for the man at the microphone. Two minutes before his time is up I hold up two fingers. One minute before the time is up I hold one finger. It usually works.
Speakers accustomed to the microphone have no trouble. Most of Boston’s politicians are able to keep within their time, although many have a tendency to say too much, rather than to say emphatically and understandably, a little.
“I have seen Senator David I. Walsh step up to the microphone without a note and ask how much time he had been allotted. I told him 11 minutes. He took out his watch, held it in his hand and started to talk. On the dot of 11 minutes he completed his peroration, and no one would know he was without the usual written preparation.
“Mayor Curley can do the same thing. But there are few with such a sense of time and command of the language as this and most speakers need a carefully prepared manuscript.
“This hasn’t much to do with timing, but here’s an incident that made time hang as heavily as anything I ever saw behind the microphone. It was the time Gov Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York spoke here for the Massachusetts First Voters League.
Gov Roosevelt was badly crippled at the time and could not stand without assistance. He gripped a bar at the microphone on that occasion and literally hung by his hands for 50 minutes while he made his speech. It was one of the grittiest things I had ever seen in radio.”
Edward A. Gisburne could well appreciate Gov Roosevelt’s position. Gisburne wears the Congressional medal of honour for his bravery at Vera Cruz, where he lost a leg. You ought to see him play golf on his good leg. He belongs at Wollaston and breaks 90 any day.
At the present time Gisburne is in charge of the new State House studio of WEEI. It has only just opened, but will be one of the special features of radio within a few months. Through the Boston Globe’s radio news service, arrangements have been made to broadcast State news direct from the State House as it happens in some of the big events of the Winter.
Joining New York

Right now the State House studio is being used in a campaign of education, telling the people of Massachusetts about the business of State, a very forward-looking step in radio.
Ed Gisburne’s voice brings to the listeners of station WEEI the first local program each morning, “Good Morning, E.B.,” and Mr Rideout is on the air. “Joining New York” brings to the local stations one of the biggest problems in timing, according to Gisburne. Orders are not to let a local program run over its time limit when a New York program follows. And to obey that order the local program and the New York program preceding the hook-up must be synchronized, if possible.
This is the way it is usually done: The Boston WEEI announcer sits in his own studio with a Boston program going out on the air. Clamped to his head is a pair of earphones, through which he hears the New York program going out in New York, but not in Boston. On the stroke of the hour another New York program begins. Boston’s own studio goes silent and the New York program is broadcast over WEEI.
The Boston announcer has the disconcerting problem of listening to two different programs from two different studios at the same time and he must announce one of them. It is something like that stunt of patting the top of your head with one hand and rubbing your stomach with the other at the same time.
But it works. Just as the Boston announcer hears the New York announcer begin his final statement, the Boston man begins his. They finish together. The Boston announcer pulls a switch. Boston is off the air. The chimes from New York are sounded and Boston has joined New York.
By the way, one man in the National Broadcasting Company’s studios in New York has the exclusive job of sounding the seven chimes. That is all he has to do. He listens to both N. B. C. programs, the one originating in WEAF and the one originating in WJZ. They are synchronized so that the seven chimes at 15-minute intervals, as is customary in both programs, are heard by two great radio audiences.
How would you like that job? Bell ringing. The New York announcers used to do the chime beating, but the problem of timing became so acute it required one man in a room fitted out with ship’s chronometers and split-second watches, to keep the programs on time.
New York programs are very carefully rehearsed and timed in sections and then in full—a regular dress rehearsal. It is an expensive proposition, but necessary to keep the chain on time.
Boston, on the other hand, has its rehearsals by sections, but not many full-dress rehearsals. The sections are rehearsed, such as the song, the musical number, the playlet. Each is timed. The times are added, leaving two to five seconds’ pause between numbers and announcements. If a scheduled half-hour program adds up to 32 minutes, a bar of music is cut here or perhaps a second chorus there.
The timing applies to most professional programs. Amateur entertainers and speakers have different treatment. The biggest program in radio history, that which preceded the Legion convention and included pick-ups from all parts of the United States, ran about 12 minutes overtime because of amateurs, speakers who insisted on adding a word of two, despite instructions.
Announcers don’t rave a great deal about some of the amateur speakers. If the speakers follow instructions, everything is all right, but many, according to Ed Gisburne, lose their heads the minute they are told to go ahead.
“Please don’t touch the microphone,” Gisburne always tells a newcomer, “it is very sensitive and might be broken at the slightest touch.” “No, of course not,” the nervous speaker wouldn’t think of touching it.
And then he is introduced. With a death clutch he grabs for the “mike,” invariably. Perhaps you can explain it?
“Women are much more nervous than men,” said Announcer Gisburne, “they generally sit before the mike waiting to be introduced, thinking of the size of the audience. Women of 10 [often?] say, ‘If WEEI has an audience of 3,000,000 and only a small part of that number are listening in now there are probably 500,000 listening to me.”
Here is Ed Gisburne’s advice to these speakers, and it applies equally as well to some of the ranting, shouting politicians of the air.
“Your largest audience is probably five persons, a family of five. In most homes there is only one person listening, perhaps two. Talk to those groups and not any bewildering mob of millions. They don’t exist as far as you success on the air goes. It is up to you to attract, entertain, instruct, convince just one or two persons. Talk to them.”
Long before you are awake, the radio day of Station WEEI begins, down in Weymouth, where an engineer starts up the rectifiers and amplifiers, checks voltages and currents, and listens over the permanently operated telephone lines to the NBC studio in New York.
The first sound of the day is a test tone, 1000 cycles, from New York. It sounds like a long whistle. Only the operator in Boston hears it. The program is about to begin.
Over the telephone comes a warning to be ready. The WEEI announcer gives his station call. The switch is pulled and New York is on the air with the Tower Health exercises at 6:45. When New York is on the air, operators and announcers at WEEI hear it on a loud speaker in the operating room.
Time, tide and radio wait for no man. If you’re on the air, you must be on time.

Redundant Squirrel

It would seem logical to escape from a mental hospital, you would saw the bars off your cell door. Or you would climb over a gate at the outside wall. That’s what Screwy Squirrel does in Happy-Go-Nutty (1944). Except he doesn’t need to. The door and gate are both open. But one must follow the routine for the sake of following a routine, mustn’t one? That can be a definition of insanity, can’t it? No one wonder Screwy was locked away.



Some dry brush strokes help Screwy in his getaway.



Ray Abrams, Ed Love and Preston Blair are the animators in this one.

Dog Eat Dog

Hot dogs aren’t usually emotional, but they are in the hands of Walt Disney and his gagmen.

In the silent short All Wet, Oswald the rabbit sells a hot dog to a dog. But the hot dog is alive. It’s silent, but the animators can easily get across all the necessary emotions without a lot of elaborate drawing.



The internet says the animators of this cartoon were Ub Iwerks, Ham Hamilton, Friz Freleng, Ben Clopton, Hugh Harman, Paul J. Smith and Norm Blackburn.

Buck Benny Interviews Again

Westerns giveth and Westerns taketh away.

In the late 1930s, Jack Benny rode his Western serial parody, “Buck Bunny Rides Again,” from a series of parody sketches on his radio show to a feature film, enriching his bank account along the way. In the late 1950s, TV Westerns were all the rage, and Maverick ate into the Benny TV audience. For example, Variety reported on March 11, 1958 that the Trendex ratings had Maverick at 27.1 and Benny at 19.7. Television columnists started raising the question of whether this was the beginning of the end for Jack Benny. Jack got a little testy when asked about it in some interviews.

There was one interview, though, where Jack seems to laugh off the competition. The interviewer was...himself. Or so we are to believe in this feature story in the New York Herald Tribune of May 4, 1958. He’s in character for the first part of it until he gets to the questions about Westerns. His responses about young comedians were repeated in other interviews. And he almost seems to try to placate Mary Livingstone with his “answer” about her forcing him to practice his violin in the bathroom (she did) by making light of it.

BENNY DOES A “double-take”
The multi-talented Jack Benny can even interview himself!
Jack: Q. Tell me Mr. Benny, to what do you attribute your legendary success in show business? (The book said to always begin an interview with a pleasant question to get your subject in a pleasant mood.)
Benny: A. Well, my natural modesty makes that question a little difficult to answer, but since you asked, I have to be honest. Talent, what else!
Q. Do you feel that if you had not entered show business you would have been as successful in another field, for instance, banking, or finance?
A. Now that’s a ridiculous question. Banking is a hobby with me. Why just this morning I was discussing a loan with the head of one of the nation’s big banks. Incidentally, I had to refuse them.

Q. Many times on television reference is made to your blue eyes. Tell me, Mr. Benny, are your eyes really blue?
A. Bluer than the winner of a bathing beauty contest in Nome, Alaska.
Q. Recently you celebrated your 40th birthday on Shower of Stars. Are you really 40?
A. Well, age is a relative condition and I’m not sure. I don’t feel 40, and you must admit, I certainly don’t look 40. Many of my fans don’t believe I’m 40, and besides I feel when a person reaches 40 he’s entitles to forget a year or two. I may go back to begin 39—out of deference to my fans, of course.
Q. You are often depicted as something of a tightwad on your television programs. Are you really cheap?
A. Of course not. It’s just that I detest ostentation in anyone, particularly myself. Check grabbers and spend-thrifts are such show-offs. I have always felt that being a celebrity anyway, I should allow someone else the limelight given the flashy spender who makes a big thing out of picking up a check.
Q. Are you really as devoted to money as your writers would have the public believe?
A. Certainly not. True, I like money. Who doesn’t? As a matter of fact, you might say I collect money. But, after all, lots of people collect things. Stamps, valuable paintings, first editions, things like that. When you examine a dollar bill closely, it is a work of art. The engraving, the ink colors, even the texture of the paper. It’s a fascinating and practical hobby, and you don’t have to buy frames, or books in which to keep your collection.
Q. That brings up another question. Do you really have an underground moat around your vault?
A. Of course not. Moats went out with the middle ages. It’s true I have a sunken fish pool—but not by any stretch of the imagination could it be called a moat.
Q. Do you keep tropical, or gold fish in your pool?
A. Neither. I tried both, but the alligators kept eating them.

Q. Do you feel that Western television programs have really hurt comedians?
A. Not at all. As a matter of fact some of the Westerns are pretty funny.
Q. Not that many comedians feel that way about Westerns. How do you find them funny?
A. Well, the hero for instance never gets his hat knocked off in a fight which usually puts at least three men in the hospital and leaves the saloon in a shambles. Another instance is where the hero, after chasing the dirty villain all over the badlands for days, finally catches him, gets the drop of him, and then throws away the gun and finished the villain off in a fist fight.
Q. Do you feel that the Westerns portray an important segment of American history?
A. Yes they do. The Western towns, complete with wooden sidewalks, old sideboard buildings with gaslights, these things all recreate an era in history. I find no fault with Westerns. How can anyone criticize something the public so obviously likes. As a matter of fact, I like them.
Q. Since you decided to be serious for a moment, do you see in the current Western craze any threat to comedy or comedians?
A. No, I don’t. History will prove that comics have been around almost as long as civilization itself. Clowns, court jesters, and the like, were important factors in the earliest civilizations, which I am sure, you will admit, predates the cowboy era. Humor however is where you find it. A cowboy named Will Rogers managed to combine comedy and the old West into a pretty successful career.
Q. As long as we are on a serious note, let’s continue for a minute. Do you feel the chances of young comedians breaking into show business today are as good as the time that you started?
A. I don’t feel young comics have much the same chance. In the old days you could be terrible in vaudeville and no one knew it but the handful in the audience. Today, if a comedian is bad his first time on television, the whole country knows it at once.
Q. Your mention of a place in which to be bad brings up another point—your violin playing. Is it true that Mary makes you practise in the bathroom?
A. Of course not. I practise there from choice. The colors are restful and besides I can practise there without being interrupted by the doorbell or the telephone.

Q. Do you consider yourself a great fiddler?
A. Well, my concert itinerary should answer that question. Carnegie Hall, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Philharmonic, the Toronto Symphony, the Chicago Symphony, and recently I played a concert in Kansas City—sponsored by former President Harry Truman. That’s no borscht circuit.
Q. True, true, but you still haven’t answered the question. Do you consider yourself great?
A. Well, I’ll admit I’m no Jascha Heifetz.
Q. Then why do you keep giving concerts?
A. Well, if I may be serious again for a minute, I give concerts because for one thing I love good music. I have always been interested in it, and I do study the violin seriously. Granted, I’m a very bad fiddler, but I enjoy giving concerts anyway.
Q. Do you find all of these concerts rewarding?
A. Very much so. They are all done for charity, with the proceeds going to some worthwhile cause.
Q. Last year, in Las Vegas, you played your first nightclub date. Did you enjoy it, and are you planning to do more nightclub dates?
A. I enjoyed playing the Flamingo very much. It’s wonderful to work in front of an audience, and the audiences in Las Vegas are the best in the world. Yes, I do plan more nightclub dates. As a matter of fact I’m returning to the Flamingo for four more weeks this summer.
Q. I’ve heard reports that a lot of entertainers who play in Las Vegas take a terrible beating in the gambling casinos. With your respect for money, doesn’t this cause you considerable concern?
A. Jack, this may come as a shock to you, but the only way I could get hurt in Las Vegas is if an earthquake topples a slot machine over my foot.

How To Make a Good Cartoon Commercial

There was a period when cartoons reigned supreme in the advertising world. Cartoon characters sold beer and gas and just about everything else. They were found on TV commercials, and newspaper and magazine ads. By the 1960s, that all changed. I’m sure cost had a lot to do with it; I suspect at one time it was cheaper setting a cartoon in a magazine page layout than it was a full-colour photo. And on TV, the attitude eventually prevailed that cartoons were for kids. Pretty soon, beer was being sold by athletes in comedy routines, not a cartoon bear or Mr. Magoo. Cartoons were reduced to plugging cereals and kids toys, though Herschel Bernardi lent his voice to an animated fish who was pretty effective in getting housewives to buy a brand of tuna.

Here’s a feature story in Variety from March 19, 1958. Ade Woolery is, basically, selling companies on selling via animation. Woolery was one of the founders of UPA before opening Playhouse Pictures in 1952. He got his start at Disney in 1936 shooting pencil tests; he was not an animator. At Playhouse, he produced more than 2,500 commercials and other short pieces of animation, including the opening to You Bet Your Life, with a cartoon Groucho driving a DeSoto. The company had terrific designers and animators, though I admit I’m biased toward much of the 1950s stylised animation.

I sheepishly admit the frames accompanying this story are not the product of Playhouse Pictures. The were made by Paul Kim at Academy Pictures in New York; Kim eventually opened his own studio. They’re from an edition of Broadcasting magazine that came out around the time as Woolery’s article (you can click on each to make it bigger; the resolution on them isn’t very good, though). Mike Kazaleh has posted some of Playhouse’s commercials at Jerry Beck’s Cartoon Research website.

Case For The Animation Specialist
By ADRIAN WOOLERY
(Pres., Playhouse Pictures)

I believe a good television commercial should entertain while selling to hold an audience and sell while entertaining to hold a sponsor. The animated commercial has proven to be the most effective in accomplishing these tasks. It usually carries a minimum of "sell" copy; it has a proven retention value for its sponsor and his product and more important, its animated characters create a permanent and identifiable impression.
Of course not all products lend themselves to the animated medium. This is one of the reasons why only about 25% of the total film commercial production is animated. There are other factors such as the light versus the hard sell, the advertising techniques of competitive products and the market involved. Popularity certainly is not one of the reasons why there are not more of these cartoons. On the average, six out of the top 10 commercials in the American Research Bureau best-liked tv commercials survey each week are animated and a sales analysis of their cartoon characters show them to be highly effective. Animation studios were founded on their ability to provide better writing, animation and art values through coordinated creativeness in storyboard, character design and the unique execution of the entire film. The specialist studio has become big business. It will continue to thrive, as long as it has the talent and skills to add those extra creative touches under close supervision throughout the entire production that results in an above average commercial.

Because of the increased costs of television time and talent; a sponsor needs the most effective commercial his money can buy to deliver his message. The commercial in many instances is an integral part of the show on which it appears and specialist treatment is needed to make it dollar-for-dollar the highlight of the program. These same techniques are required in the television spot commercial to assure that it will stand out when run during a station break or when coupled with other messages. With the increasing use of spot saturation, the specialist studio offers many advantages for the local, regional and national advertiser. Among them is the creation of a cartoon character.
Cartoon 'Star'
As pointed out, the sponsor benefits from the animated commercial in many ways but primarily through the development of a cartoon salesman. There are the added factors that the character can be used in newspaper advertisements, on billboards, and in point-of-sale presentations. The animated commercial has made its greatest impact on the graphic arts field in this regard. Some advertisers have even incorporated their animated television characters into their packaging design for further product identification.

The phenomenal rise of the cartoon “star” is one of the most interesting developments in the animation field. His popularity and acceptance is not left to mere chance. In the lightly-knit environment of the specialist studio, careful thought, research and planning go into the creation of every new cartoon “star.” The studio is nearly always requested to create a model sheet showing the proposed characters in different poses and attitudes either from the agencies' rough storyboards or their own story outline. These model sheets allow time and study for the agency and advertiser to make sure that they will have a distinctive character and that their “star” will not be offensive or cause audience dissatisfaction when he sells the sponsor's product.
The full talents of the studio are called into action to find the star: one with warmth, a strong personality, a sense of humor and above all saleability! Conferences ensue with the creative personnel, the designer, background artist (scenic designer), music director, make-up (ink and paint), the director and camera man. Simultaneously, a talent hunt is launched for the proper voice upon which a great part of the character's success is based. With agency approval and the production crew complete; voice, sound effects and music tracks blended; the star is born. Each animator lives the "personality" that has been created as they act out the character in the assigned roles. In the weeks ahead, millions will view the debut of our "star" in the comfort of their living rooms and discuss his or her antics.

This personal attention to the sponsor's cartoon salesman is the added plus the client receives at no extra cost from the animation specialist. It is a necessary "must" if the commercial is to reap its full rewards. Each week our created cartoon characters have far greater audience exposure than the biggest television personality. They must be carefully conceived, thoughtfully designed and professionally executed. Their popularity is a success story in itself and the impressions they make can be lasting and effective.

Uncle Max's Laughing Mailboxes and Sedans

New York City breaks out into uncontrollable laughter in the Betty Boop cartoon Ha! Ha! Ha! (1934), thanks to animation over live action film and still photos.

The cartoon starts out as Betty turning into a dentist to extra Ko Ko’s bad tooth (made painful by biting into a Hershey Milk Chocolate bar). She turns on some laughing gas to help but the gas eventually wafts out the window of Max Fleischer’s drawing room.



The laughing gas affects mail boxes.



People. I wonder if these are Fleischer employees.



A bridge. Can anyone in New York identify this spot?



Cars. Is that a 1933 Chrysler on the left? It looks like a Model T on the right.



Tombstones.



Finally, Betty and Ko Ko escape the gas by jumping back into the inkwell in a time-honoured Fleischer tradition. However, the inkwell succumbs to the gas as the cartoon ends.



Seymour Kneitel and Doc Crandall are the credited animators.

I Reject My Son

Two propeller planes give birth to a jet plane in Little Johnny Jet (1953). How that happened isn’t made clear by writer Heck Allen but we do see the father plane (Daws Butler) rejects his new son when his wife (Colleen Collins) hesitatingly gives him the news.



Tex Avery, his designer and animators manage to successfully turn wings into arms and hands when necessary.

Ray Patterson joins Avery’s usual crew—Grant Simmons, Mike Lah, Walt Clinton and Bob Bentley—in animating this cartoon.

Fun with Rudy Ising's Piggy

You Don’t Know What You’re Doin’! (1931) is a nicely put together cartoon with a stylised drunk sequence, great music from Gus Arnheim’s Orchestra (a band that was broadcasting from the Cocoanut Grove on KFWB at the period this cartoon was made) and some good little takes.

Piggy puts bootleg hootch in his car’s radiator.



This is a really imaginative take. A drainage intake at the end of a sidewalk turns into a monster to scare a drunken dog.



There’s always a butt gag in these early sound cartoons.



And a flatulence joke that turns into an Al Jolson “Mammy” joke.



Poor Piggy and girl-friend Fluffy made their debut in this cartoon, though Fluffy vanishes half-way through, maybe out of embarrassment for being a pig named Fluffy. They lasted one more cartoon.

Norm Blackburn, later an NBC TV executive, and Friz Freleng are the credited artists.