In the Center Ring (Part 16)

Just for fun, emphasis this week (with a few exceptions) is on some of the more obscure early television animation featuring circus themes. For balance, one major force in kids’ TV (Total Television) is included – but their output of episodes relating to circuses turns out to be surprisingly sparse. Other subjects of discussion include a studio practically no one has heard of, plus the frequently irregular “quality” of Sam Singer, and budget-cutting Cambria Studios.

Cambria Studios is most remembered today for its ultimate cheater in saving on budget for television animation – the “synchro-vox” – a device to superimpose the lips and mouth movements of live actors over the blank jaw of a cel drawing, removing all need to animate dialogue. The effect was downright spooky, and in early instances awkwardly executed, but allowed numerous shots to be presented with just a single still drawing. (The technique has been parodied by other studios, most hilariously in a shot where a fake Daffy Duck clone appears with human lips in the Warner television short, Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers.) The first series in which this device was used was Clutch Cargo (1959-60), a series of five-part action-adventure cartoons that feels like a primitive precursor to “Jonny Quest”. The animated serialized “cliffhanger” was a popular format for early television, beginning with Crusader Rabbit and continuing through most of Jay Ward’s career, and would also be followed by Hanna-Barbera’s first television adventures of “Ruff and Reddy”. It was thus no surprise that Cambria and several other small companies would follow in this trend. Cambria, however, seems to have stood alone in its day by attempting to write its story-lines with some degree of seriousness, while all other early serial producers aimed for comedy with a twinge of peril. These scripts are perhaps the most positive aspect of these productions.

The two story arcs here reviewed seem to make better use of the synchro-vox than usual, the mouths seeming better-proportioned to the size of the painted characters than in many, and with less seams visible between live and drawn image. In Sky Circus, Clutch, an adventurer and ace pilot, along with his junior ward Spinner and his comic-relief dachshund Paddlefoot (any resemblance of the later Bandit was probably intended), are on route to participate in an aerial stunt show. An unseen pilot in a strange rickety pusher-prop plane with a painted smile on its forward fuselage repeatedly crosses their path in near-misses as they approach the airport, seeming to have it in for them, and forces Clutch to make an emergency landing at a nearby farm. There, he meets a young French woman named Fifi (whose mouth seems to fit her character quite realistically) and her Uncle Henry, who are about to lose the farm to one Slade, owner of the airport and holder of the mortgage they can’t pay. $5,000 is needed, and Clutch realizes this is the same amount offered to the best stunt performer at the air show. He asks if Fifi can perform, and discovers she was a circus tightrope walker in France, before the circus burned down, forcing her to emigrate to America. Clutch asks her to join with him, to come up with an air act to win the prize.

Clutch again tries to get his plane to the airfield, and experiences another near-miss from the mystery flier. However, this time, he observes some skywriting left behind him, reading “Putt-Putt”. The mystery plane lands, but only after performing a barnstorming loop through an open hangar, and Clutch lands too – to find himself greeted at the airstrip by the mystery craft’s pilot – a former barnstormer Clutch knew in his early days of air training. The pilot, now known as Putt-Putt, is employed as the Sky Circus’s resident clown, and apologizes for the erratic flting, claiming he kept getting smoke in his eyes while crossing the T’s in skywriting his name. Clutch prepares for his own act, to be performed from a hot-air balloon, from which he plans to make a dive dressed in an eagle-suit equipped with fabric wings and tail to glide like a flying squirrel, then use a concealed parachute for last-minute landing. He meets Slade, who forewarns him that he’s facing some real competition for the prize in the form of a rival pilot known as the Masked Marvel. Spinner and Paddlefoot check out the gondola of Clutch’s balloon, and we discover that Slade has unscrupulous financial motivations, seeing the kid and dog in the balloon as a golden opportunity for a publicity stunt. Unseen, Slade severs the balloon’s mooring rope with a hatchet. Spinner and Paddlefoot are set helplessly adrift, while Slade sounds a distress call. Clutch ascends to the rescue in Putt-Putt’s plane. the clown manning the plane’s controls while Clutch grabs hold of the balloon’s trailing rope, and daringly climbs to the gondola. Clutch is tall enough to reach the air release valve of the balloon, allowing it to descend slowly to the ground.

With his balloon returned, Clutch prepares for his act as the show nears, and also rehearses Fifi secretly in an act of her own. We discover, however, that Slade has the fix in for the Masked Marvel, with whom he intends to split the prize money and pocket half for himself. As Clutch waits in his eagle-suit for the moment of his balloon’s ascension, Slade carefully sprinkles a shaker of acid-salts upon the fabric of Clutch’s suit from behind. When Clutch reaches an altitude of 2,000 feet, he jumps from the balloon – only to find the wings and tail surface of his costume ripping to tatters. He plunges too fast, uncontrollably toward the ground, and is forced to abort the act by a nick-of-time pull of his parachute without the glide. Clutch does not know who sabotaged his suit, yet repairs it with new fabric, in spite of wondering if he will be afforded any chance to use it again.

The Masked Marvel is next to perform, successfully accomplishing a spectacular feat of dangling by his feet upside down from a trapeze fastened to his plane’s landing gear, then diving into a tank of water below. But, there is still the matter of the secret act of Fifi. Clutch has rigged up his own biplane with a thin wire stretched from one wing tip to the other across the top, upon which Fifi prepares to perform a mid-air high-wire act. Slade is again busy sabotaging, and has tampered with the wire, thinning it to the snapping point on one side, to ensure that Fifi will not win the prize money to save the farm. The wire snaps as Fifi crosses, and she falls, without a parachute. Clutch leaps from the cockpit in his eagle-suit for a desperate dive (fortunately having brought along Putt-Putt as co-pilot to save the plane). Fifi attempts to use her balancing parasol as a chute to slow her fall, but the umbrella soon turns inside-out. This brief slowing is all that Clutch needs to catch up with her, swoop under to catch her, then engage his own parachute at the last possible second to glide them in for a safe landing. The prize money is theirs to share. Slade and the Marvel unwisely choose to make an incriminating exit in Clutch’s balloon to avoid detection for the sabotage. They are forced down by a well-placed shot from Putt-Putt, who improvises a slingshot from his clown suspenders and launches a fountain pen to puncture the balloon. The villains parachute to land just past a mountain ridge, not realizing their landing point is upon a forest of desert cactus – from which they are easily caught up with and brought to justice. Clutch relinquishes his half of the prize money to Fifi, putting her worries at an end, and it’s on to a new adventure.

The Circus is a sequel to the preceding episode. Without much explanation, Fifi has turned an inheritance from Uncle Henry (the $5,000 value for the farm?) into a successful investment in starting up her own big top circus. However, she has fallen on hard times, as a series of mishaps threaten to close her show. A lion got loose, scaring away the crowds from coming. Other mysterious accidents continue. Clutch hangs around to investigate. We are introduced to two of the circus’s remaining performers, Tiny Tom, world’s smallest magician, and tall-man Slim. No sooner are they informed that Clutch will be checking around, than a high-diving platform collapses, nearly crushing Clutch, but sparing him as it remains propped-up just above him by falling atop a nearby circus wagon. Again with little explanation as to how they intend to acquire ownership, Tiny Tom and Slim are revealed to the audience as behind the foul deeds, including the platform collapse (sawed through), in a scheme to acquire the show cheap. Thus begins a series of nefarious events, including a fire in the hay tent that nearly envelops the circus elephant Jumbo. A red-headed boy is seen last at the scene of the fire, causing Tom and Slim to point accusing fingers at Spinner. But Clutch’s discovery of remnants of a gasoline torch at the fire scene absolve Spinner of the crime. In an improbable setup, Tom and Slim tie helium balloons to Jumbo, setting him aloft, and again attempt to lay blame on Spinner. Clutch and Spinner take to the air in Clutch’s plane, Spinner using buckshot and an improvised blow gun to pop one balloon at a time until the elephant begins to drift downward. Below, Tom and Slim try to speed things up, by having Slim pop all the balloons with a rifle from the shooting gallery. The elephant, however, luckily falls into the high-diving tank, unharmed. Clutch has done some investigating, and discovers information that Tom was formerly a master impersonator, and the identity of the mysterious red-headed lookalike for Spinner is discovered. Clutch and Spinner give chase, and seem to have cornered the villains in a tent, but can find no one inside. Just outside the rear of the tent, all they can spot is a funny-walking giraffe. Paddlefoot (the one character besides the elephant traditionally animated without a superimposed mouth) is not fooled, and rips at the skin of the “giraffe”, revealing the villains in a costume. The circus is saved, and Paddlefoot appears in the last shot, wearing a clown hat and riding a unicycle, hoping he too can join the circus.

Cambria’s later efforts after synchro-vox was abandoned included numerous episodes of The New 3 Stooges (1965-66), a series whose credit sequence just happened to depict the Stooges marching in a circus parade, with Curly-Joe carrying a big bass drum for Moe. These very-short cartoons were of quite inconsistent writing quality, despite the strength of the actual voice-overs of the Stooges, and frequently failed to satisfy despite delivering a few verbal chuckles. A somewhat-superior episode is You Ain’t Lion. The Stooges, lowly behind-the-scenes workers at the circus, are finally given the chance to make the big time, as new animal trainers. They confidently presume that this job will be a “snap”, and Curly-Joe remarks that he’s almost ashamed to take the money. The boys are introduced to “Big Red”, a lion just shipped in from Africa, and left to train him. Curly-Joe calls after the boss that ‘We’ll have him eating off your hand in no time.” Larry fiddles with a pistol, remarking to Curly-Joe that these guns only have blanks in them – then proceeding to sever Moe’s whip at the handle with one shot. Moe takes Curly’s whip, and enters the cage. A fight cloud quickly rises, and a partially-mauled Moe emerges to hand the whip to Larry, stating that he has softened the lion up for him. The lion slaps down a circus platform over Larry, then plays the old shell game with three platforms, making the other two Stooges guess which one Larry’s under. Moe and Curly repeatedly misguess, and Larry is finally forced to scamper away with the platform still on top of him. Moe disappears too, handing the whip to Curly-Joe. Curly decides to also use the pistol, firing the gun repeatedly around his own feet to scare the lion – until he perforates a round hole in the ground and falls in. But Curly rises from the hole, with the pistol pointed in the lion’s face, and orders him to march. They encounter a large ball, which Curly order the lion to stand upon. “You gotta be kiddin’”, remarks Big Red. Curly attempts to fire another intimidating shot, but finds himself out of bullets. The lion rolls the ball back at Curly, sending him for a ride and a crash into the cage bars. The Stooges gang up on Red, all with pistols in hand, and demand Red do as they say, since they have him outnumbered. Red is standing upon a platform, from which a hatch door opens, revealing a surprise. Red is now armed too – with a small naval cannon inside the platform, that fires repeated cannonballs at the boys. The Stooges try a mass approach with their whips, but Red is again one-jump ahead of them in armament, producing a dueling sword to chop their whip strands away at the handles. The Stooges produce the guns again, and they and the lion disappear into a fight cloud. The circus manager reappears, believing the sounds to be the boys taming the lion real good. He asks to see the boys put the lion through his paces. Instead, the lion emerges in pith helmet with whip and pistol, while the Stooges, at the crack of a whip, balance atop rolling balls, balance the balls on their noses, play musical seal horns, and bark and slap their hands together like trained seals. The only thing missing as the film closes is no one tosses the Stooges a fish.

An entire story-arc of cartoons – and nearly an entire series – remains unavalable for review from a long-forgotten studio. Spunky and Tadpole (1958-61) was another serialized cartoon from television’s early days, originally distributed by Guild Films and produced at the virtually-unknown Beverly Hills Productions. “Circus Craze” was a 10-episode story arc, in this Crusader Rabbit/Rocky and His Friends wanna-be about the adventures of a small boy and what appears to be his oversized teddy bear come-to-life. Only a handful of episodes out of the total 150 produced have to date appeared on the internet, none of which are from this story-line, for which there is also no synopsis. Perhaps the strongest point about surviving episodes is the voice work of Don Messick, who apparently was not under exclusive contract with Hanna-Barbera at the time. Anyone with information about this story arc – or with whereabouts for the missing films, is invited to contribute.

Sam Singer was a notoriously low-budget producer in TV’s early days, with a wavering sense of how to present a story (often terribly misguided, with plot and timing holes galore). His first televised efforts, The Adventures of Paddy the Pelican were short-lived and a technical disaster. It would be several years before he would venture into the luxury of color, starting with Bucky and Pepito (1959). This obscure series about two Texas boys, one a junior cowboy and one Hispanic (the latter’s “gimmick” being a sombrero three sizes too bug, which droops down over half his face, forcing him to drill holes above the brim for his eyes to occasionally peer out), was played strictly for laughs, but seldom got any. Some of its drawings suggest an effort at character design and a bit of personality (Shamus Culhane and I believe Sid Marcus are known to have sometimes moonlighted for an extra paycheck with Singer here and there), but budget restraints and general poor timing/writing often kill the final effect of these films. Oddly, though produced in color, the two films submitted for your perusal here have been passed down to us only by black-and-white home movie prints, one of them abridged and silent.

The Lion Tamer features a character I have not otherwise encountered in the relatively small number of episodes available which I have to date accessed from the show, an old sourdough named Cactus Dan, seemingly the type to tell tall tales anf boast about his bravery and exploits. Dan is found reading a book, about which our title heroes inquire. The book is on lion taming, and Dan boasts that he intends to capture one and tame him. Bucky points out that the book’s illustration depicts an African lion, and that no such animals inhabit these parts. Dan dismisses the skeptical boys, claiming no one can tell him about hunting skills, at which he also claims to be an expert. The boys leave laughing, and Bucky recalls that his Dad has an old lion head mounted on the wall as a trophy back at the ranch. Adding a horse blanket over the two of them, the boys don the stuffed head, intending to put a scare into Dan. As Dan sleeps, Pepito provides him with a rude awakening, pulling the trigger of Dan’s rifle for a loud shot, then faces Dan with the lion head eye-to-eye. Dan retreats into the bunkhouse, but returns armed with a whip and chair, vowing to tame the beast. He is only met by laughter, as the kids reveal themselves, then duck behind some rocks as the frustrated Dan approaches.

Nearby, at the edge of a highway, a hitch-hiker attempts to hail passing cars. It is, of all things, a real circus lion, who regrets having escaped from his wagon, and is trying to get a ride to catch up with his old circus and the comforts of home sweet home. (The lion’s design seems strangely familiar to some Walter Lantz models of a few years later, suggesting that the character design and animation may be from Sid Marcus). Suddenly, someone has the drop on the lion. It is Dan, who has sneaked up on the lion from behind a rock, still armed with his whip and chair. The lion is quite pleased at this sight, remaking that it looks like he has a new boss. Eager to please, the lion goes through a full routine, as Dan commands him to roll over, stand on his head, then dance, faster and faster, until the lion staggers exhausted. Still, the lion remains truly happy to be working again, and remarks, “You’re so good to me.” Dan orders the lion to follow him, with intention to “scare a couple of kids”. Writing begins to falter here, as Bucky and Pepito, despite their ruse already being known to Dan, return to their lion suit, thinking they can scare him again. Dumb Dan doesn’t even recognize them when they walk face-to-face into the real lion, and thinks now he has two cats to tame. The real lion thinks this strange competitor is after his job, and gives chase to scare the newcomer away. At one point, the lion makes a swipe with his paws to catch the boys in their suit, but grabs nothing, then remarks that this is one strange cat, with no tail. The boys lead the lion toward a cliff edge, but swing around a large rock to reverse direction at the last second, while the lion sails momentarily over the cliff edge, and has to claw at the air to scramble his way back to the cliff. Grabbing the boulder, the lion sets up a bowling shot at the fake lion. It is a direct hit, knocking the boys into the side of a cactus, which springs them back in the opposite direction. They roll over the real lion, knocking him down, but keep right on rolling – straight into the rear of a circus truck that is in search of the escaped lion. The circus men assume they’ve got the real Leo, and drive off with the boys captive inside. We never see what becomes of the boys, and instead end the show with Cactus Dan reprising putting the happy lion through his paces in tricks, for the fade out.

Home movie abridgement of The Wandering Elephant is not completely self-explanatory, and, in spite of being a silent print, contains no captions for dialogue. Since the series is set in Texas, the presence of an elephant from a zoo would seem unlikely, so it may be presumed that the title character is an escapee from a traveling circus. The abridgement opens with Pepito attempting to enjoy a peaceful day of fishing. His peace is interrupted by a bop on the head, then another, then another, as a baby elephant is revealed to be sitting next to him at the riverbank, sucking up a goodly day’s catch of fish one by one with his trunk, and tossing each fish over his shoulder to cast onto the land, but making direct hits on Pepito instead. The playful elephant then jumps into the stream for a swim, splashing Pepito with such force, he too is knocked into the water. Pepito rises partway from the water, with only his eyes visible from the eyeholes of his sombrero, the hat seeming to resemble the silhouette of a floating naval vessel. Suddenly, the elephant’s trunk rises like the periscope of a submarine, then squirts a jet of water into Pepito’s eyes. The elephant then picks Pepito up upon his trunk, and lets him slide down the trunk’s length like a waterslide, back into the river. The two swimmers come to a quiet face-off, as the elephant playfully creates a fountain of water from his trunk between them.

After a fade out, the next sequence finds the two having become fast friends. Pepito has found the pachyderm to be useful, as a portable bed for a siesta upon which he can sleep while they travel. The elephant gets a whiff of something strange – a small cloud of smoke. To alert his friend, he blows a puff of it over the face of the sleeping Pepito, who awakens within the cloud with only his eyeballs visible peering out. The smoke is from a brush fire that has broken out, first ahead of them, but when they turn to retreat, found to have also circled round behind them. They are trapped, and Pepito climbs the highest tree, which disintegrates in flames below him. The elephant breaks Pepito’s fall by sucking him in with his trunk, then attempts to battle the flames by blowing upon them. His trunk’s force is not enough to extinguish the flames, and the fire regroups and surrounds them. Fortunately, a small access to the riverbank is within the encirclement of the fire, and the elephant dives in, taking Pepito. The film ends with little visual explanation, as Pepito emerges from the woods unharmed, returning the elephant to a stranger man whom Bucky has brought with him in search of the elephant, presumably from the circus.

More successful for Singer was Courageous Cat and Minute Mouse (1960), a sort of Batman sendup reputedly created by Bob Kane (probably for some quick cash without much participation or commitment). However, it is odd among Singer productions, as Singer’s name has been removed from nearly all syndicated prints, which rarely appear with complete credits. Whether Singer chose to deny connection to the series (unlikely), or whether the edits are the choice of distributors to shorten running length of these already short cartoons, is unknown.

The Case of the Carnival Capers is a rare instance where Courageous and Minute are themselves the victim of crime. Despite the film’s title, action takes place at a circus, most of it occurring in the side show. Robber Rabbit and an assistant who is referred to as “the Squirrel”, but is actually drawn as a chipmunk (!!??!!), run an “old shell game” booth, suckering-in Minute Mouse, who just happens to have a sack full of money to spend at the event. (How convenient the writing gets when you really don’t care.) Taking no chances on this game, the Rabbit has holes in the table under not just one shell, but all three, with the Squir—let’s just call him Chipmunk – waiting under the table to gobble up the fallen pea. (This booth must fritter away a good deal of its profits, in requiring a new pea for every game.) Minute’s sack of money is taken, and as he demands his money back or threatens to call in Courageous Cat, the Chipmunk lands a blow on Minute’s toes with a mallet. Rabbit and Chipmunk make an escape through the sideshow performers, upsetting a sword-swallowing turtle and a weight-lifting gorilla strong man (whose weight turns out to be light enough for even the Chipmunk to lift). The two swindlers duck into a small gypsy tent, outside of which stands Courageous. Curious what their hurry is, Courageous steps inside the tent. Rabbit is already dressed the part for another ruse, posing in a turban as a gypsy fortune teller. His crystal ball reading foretells that Courageous will suffer a great financial loss. The prediction comes instantly true, as the Chipmunk picks Courageous’s pocket from under the table, handing the Cat’s wallet to the Rabbit. A chase is quickly on, with Rabbit climbing a rope ladder into the big top, climbing out onto a high wire. Courageous chooses not to fly, instead activating a propeller attachment to his all-purpose Cat-Gun to fly him up to the wire.

Courageous points his weapon at the Rabbit, but the Rabbit remarks, “Who are you threatening?”, and produces a pair of shears, cutting the wire. However, he forgets that Courageous is not the only one standing on the wire, and shouts, “WHAT AM I DOING?” Thank goodness for cartoon physics, as both he and Courageous are able to defy gravity long enough for Courageous to explain the operation of his steel knitting needles attachment to the Cat-Gun, which knits the severed ends of the cut wire back together to avert their fall. But the Rabbit has one more trick up his hat, in the form of the Chipmunk, who is inside the Rabbit’s turban, armed with the mallet again, to bop Courageous on the head and cause him to fall to the ground. Heroes are made of sterner stuff, and Courageous rises only a little dazed, but unhurt from the same perilous fall he just tried to avoid. While his assailant remains unseen and offscreen, Courageous suddenly finds himself the target in a knife-throwing act, we assume at the hands of the Rabbit. Courageous escapes through a silhouette-shaped trap door in the back panel of the knife-throwing board, and decides it’s time to call in the Chief of police. Meanwhile, the Rabbit and Chipmunk also have need for a phone, seeking to call the airport for some plane tickets to make a quick getaway. Courageous searches in vain for an unoccupied phone booth, then encounters Minute Mouse, who has the last phone booth lassoed with rope. He claims he has caught the crooks with a wrong number. The meaning of this remark remains unclear, as we are not told whether the crooks for some reason asked Minute for the airport’s number (despite having just robbed him), or whether the crooks accidentally dialed a wrong number by themselves, but inside the booth are the two villains, arguing with the operator to return their dime for the previous call. As the Chief arrives, Courageous tows the crooks’ phone booth over to him with the Catmobile. Rabbit is still threatening the telephone operator that if she doesn’t return his dime, Rabbit will call the police. Finally looking out the booth window, to discover the face of the Chief staring him down, Rabbit changes to an apologetic mood, ending the phone conversation with the words, “Er, uh, never mind.”

The Case of the Great Circus Mystery is another standard tale of circus sabotage at the J.P. Farnum circus. A net is cut under a trapeze artist. His fall merely leaves him rising from a silhouette crater in the ground, to ask. “Who’s the wise guy?” Cement is poured into the tank of the high diver. And the elephant’s balancing ball is filled with helium. Courageous is called in on the case, just as a lion is let loose. Courageous, without the aid of the Cat-Gun, battles the beast single-handed, and emerges from a fight cloud with the lion’s feet hogtied, as Courageous asks, “Where do you want him?” Minute Mouse spots someone sawing at the bars of the gorilla cage. It is Mad Moe, the Clown. Courageous appears to already know this villain, and his reputation for being dangerous – inconsistent with the wrap-up which follows. Minute pursues Moe onto a high wire, but the clown leaps off to one platform, then shakes the wire to produce vibrations under Minute, causing the mouse to fall into a bucket of water below. Courageous fires an electric shock ray from his Cat-Gun, paralyzing Moe, and causing him to also fall, into the mouth of a cannon. Farnum asks Moe why he tried to ruin the circus, and Moe answers, to get even, for not getting a raise in twenty years. (If Moe has been working for the same circus for 20 years, why did Courageous not seek to capture him before?) Farnum supplies Moe with the “raise” he desired, shooting the cannon to fire the clown into Earth orbit.

Sinbad Jr. and His Magic Belt is unaccounted-for as to Sam Singer-produced episodes (if any) dealing with circuses, none of the suspect titles being available for viewing on the internet. Two possible subjects, “Killer Tiger” and “Monkey Business”, may bear investigation. (A third title, with confirmed circus subject matter, was produced later by Hanna-Barbera, and will be dealt with in a later article on such studio.) Anyone with information on these lost shorts is invited to contribute.

Total Television appears to have produced only two titles making direct reference to circus themes. The Giant Elephant (The World of Commander McBragg) is a brief 90-second interstitial, in which the Commander and his usual unnamed club-member companion look out a window at a passing circus parade. The elephants remind McBragg of a tale of when he was on safari. A charging elephant frightens away his native bearers, leaving him to face the beast unarmed and alone. The mammoth rears up, and stomps a hoof through the roof of McBragg’s traveling chair, where McBragg spots a thorn in the hoof. Following the lead of Androcles, McBragg plucks the thorn out. The elephant becomes quiet, sees visions of loving hearts in his eyes, and gives the Commander a slurping kiss, becoming his fast friend. But the pachyderm will not leave the Commander alone, and follows him wherever he goes. In Paris, the beast crashes into the Eiffel Tower as McBragg passes below it, cracking off the topmost portion of the tower. In London, it charges after McBragg through the doors of Buckingham Palace. In the USA, it smashes into the Empire State Building, crumbling it. McBragg’s club member asks how the Commander ever got rid of him. For once, McBragg scratches his head, having no ready ending for his story, and admits that quite often, the elephant still finds him. The club member suspends belief, stating “Surely you don’t expect me to believe…” Suddenly, there is a crash, as the window is broken through. The club member suddenly finds himself alone, and is left to peer out the hole in the wall, calling after the Commander, as the parade of elephants continues to pass by below.

We’ll finish on a high note, with Three Ring Circus (Tennessee Tuxedo and his Tales, 2/20/65) – Tennessee and Chumley are A.W.O.L. again, having escaped the zoo after reading a newspaper article about a circus in town. Tennessee is determined to get jobs for himself and his walrus pal in the circus, so they can see the world. However, he is left with a hanging question when the circus manager asks them “What do you do?” Looking upwards into the heights of the tent, Tennessee blurts out that they are trapeze artists. Chumley reminds him that they know nothing about trapezes, but Tennessee says he’s seen it plenty of times on television, so how hard could it be. He instructs Chumley to follow his lead, grabbing a trapeze bar and swinging out. But Tennessee cannot reach another bar or platform. Chumley reaches out to grab Tennessee by the legs, but is pulled off the platform by Tennessee’s swinging. Chumley is too heavy for Tennessee to hold by his feet, and the two manage to switch positions, with Chumley dangling by his feet, and Tennessee being held by the wrists. Tennessee tells Chumley to let go, allowing him to fall into a net. Unfortunately, he has no idea how to get off it, and merely bounces back into the air. Twice he passes Chumley, who attempts to grab him, but keeps missing. On the third rebound, Chumley catches Tennessee, but is unable to swing him close enough to the platform to get a grip on it. Chumley’s feet slip off the trapeze bar, and both of them rebound off the net, landing with a thud into the sawdust floor of the arena. The manager thinks their act is decidedly different, but says they already have plenty of comedy routines, so there doesn’t appear to be an opening. At this moment, a uniformed performer submits his resignation, and Tennessee seizes the opportunity to offer to take the performer’s place.

The manager gives them a tryout – as lion tamers. Tennessee and Chumley are the predictable flops at this, the lions destroying their chairs, and merely infuriated by the cracking whips and pistol shots. “Lion tamers you’re not”, says the manager, as he opens the cage door to allow the fleeing duo to escape. Tennessee begs for the chance to do anything in the show. Feeling sorry for the boys, the manager asks if they can handle the circus calliope. Tennessee reflexively answers yes, then they see Mr. Whoopee to figure out what the heck a calliope is. As Tennesse does have the ability to play piano, he figures the calliope will be a snap once Whoopee explains the instrument. But Whoopee cautions to make sure not to use too much steam, in order to keep the keyboard under control. That night, the expected worst happens, as Chumley twists off the handle which controls the steam valve. Tennessee (in a nice luxury for a TV cartoon, in which the Tennessee Tuxedo theme is heard played on an actual calliope) finds himself in a predicament, as the keyboard heats up, threatening to burn his fingers. He plays faster and faster to avoid prolonged contact with the keys, increasing the pace of all the acts in performance to fever pitch, upsetting jugglers, running bareback riders dizzy, and setting tightrope walkers into running paces and danger of a fall. Stanley Livingston and Flunkey arrive at the gate to make inquiries whether anyone has seen a penguin and a walrus, just in time to witness the calliope explode. Tennessee and Chumley are propelled through the tent roof, and zoom backwards through the sky. Tennessee observes that they became trapeze artists after all, while Chumley notes that it looks like they’re in for a downfall, as they land within the gates of the zoo, and are pursued by Livingston and Flunkey into their living enclosure, where wild vibrations and sound effects signal a brutal scuffle within, for the fade out.

Early TV continues its spree, next time.