Crusader Rabbit

If you grew up in the 50's and were close enough to a big city, like I was in New York, then you were treated to Saturday morning cartoons. As a Baby Boomer, I watched Crusader Rabbit on WNBC Channel 4 From NYC. It was the first Cartoon on Saturday Morning. The theme to this show was found on AudioGalaxy. They were fun in black and white whith Crusader Rabbit and Rags the Tiger. Jay Ward gave us many fine Cartoons that were remembered by many, but Crusader Rabbit was one of his first and best. I agrre with the other writer that it would be nice to have them on DVD or even tape. Kids today don't have what we had in the way of good wholesome cartoons.

What a pity that "Crusader Rabbit," Jay Ward's first wild and wacky TV animation series is all but lost to the modern world. Only five-minutes long, each segment was a splendid combination of humor, satire and comedy that was a delight for 1950's children and adults. "Crusader Rabbit" is the seminal work that led Ward to go on and produce such memorable series as "Rocky and Bullwinkle," "Dudley Do-Right," and "George of the Jungle." Can't someone get this material back into circulation on video or dvd? It is a gem in its own right as well as an important first step in the evolution of TV animation and satire.

Ah Yes, the fantastic days of early New York TV, let see, what channels were available?? Ch 2, 4, 5,9, 11, and 13 before it was a Public Station.

Thank, gawd, I wasn't the only child to get up early to watch Modern Farmer, ha ha ha ha There was another farm related program which I can't remember the title, about an old geezer and his daughter. Then of course Crusader Rabbit, fantastic, some of the episodes can be seen on Youtube. I'm trying to figure out the theme music to Crusader Rabbit. I watched as a very young kid and then as a teenager, does anyone know if the 2nd version in the 60s used Swedish Rhapsody as the theme music or am I remembering wrong?

For some reason, the great hour-long Crusader Rabbit cartoons are unavailable. They had "punny" titles like:

If Anyone Can Yukon Sahara You Nothing Atoll Gone With the Wind-up Gullibles Travels Schmerwood Forest

And there were a few others. I would love to purchase this entire collection but they seem to be totally missing!

I have great memories of this show, and thought I was the only person who remembered it. I didn't know there was a color version made in 1957 (until the mid-sixties, ALL my shows were in B&W!).

So when is somebody going to come out with a collection of this cartoon classic?