Christmas Specials and Cartoons

In 1976, Rankin/Bass made a sequel to The Little Drummer Boy. They subtitled it "Book II" in a biblical style reference.

Rankin/Bass were never a group to shy away from the true meaning of Christmas. They tried to present it in a way to kids that would not confuse them, but show that even someone like Santa Claus had a reason beyond himself for doing what he does.

Billie May Richards, the voice of Rankin Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has passed away in her sleep at the age of 89. Click here for the rest of the story.Matthew for the heads up on this story. She will be missed in our world.

In 1969, Rankin/Bass produced an animated feature based on the song written by Steve "Jack" Rollins and Steve Nelson and recorded by Gene Autry. Frosty the Snowman featured the talents of comedians Jackie Vernon and Jimmy Durante.

The story tells of Frosty coming to life and the children's quest to get him to the North Pole before he melts. Frosty and Karen, one of the children, board a train bound for the North Pole and are chased by the owner of Frosty's magic hat, Professor Hinkle - a magician who threw it away because he thought it defective.

The special has remained popular over the years and has spawned a few sequels including Frosty's Winter Wonderland with Andy Griffith and Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is a stop-motion animation special produced by Rankin/Bass for NBC. It first aired on December 6, 1964 and was based on the song by Johnny Marks and loosley based on the short story by Robert L. May who, incedentily, was the brother-in-law of Marks.
The special began airing on CBS television in 1972 and is currently only one of four original CBS 1960's specials still airing annually.

The show's featured star was folk singer Burl Ives who voiced Sam the talking Snowman. It featured a musical score by Johnny Marks and a list of memorable songs by Burl Ives and chorus:
Jingle, Jingle, Jingle
We're a Couple of Misfits
*Fame and Fortune (which replaced Misfits in later versions)
There's always tomorrow
We are Santa's Elves
We're on the island of misfit Toys
Holly Jolly Christmas
Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer


Holly Jolly Christmas became a hit for Burl Ives while Mark's other standard, Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree was used as a background instrumental piece for the show. Rudolph spun off a few sequels including Rudolph's Shiny New Year and Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July.
Here by request, is the opening 10 minutes of this show. Enjoy!

In 1974, Rankin/Bass produced an animated special for Television based on the Clement Moore poem. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas tells the story of Joshua Trundle, a local clock maker who tries to entice Santa Claus to come back to the small town of Junctionville after a letter questioning his existence appears in the local paper.

The special stars Joel Grey, star of such movies as Cabaret and comedian George Goebel, whom some may remember from a series of mattress commercials for Sealy posturpedic. The special ran on CBS until the early 90's and currently appears on ABC family television. ABC family was originally CBN, a christian broadcasting network owned by Pat Robertson. The version I have uploaded here is the one edited by CBN because they felt the song "Give your Heart a Try" held too many references to other fairy tales such as leprechauns and the Easter Bunny. They felt since Santa Claus was based on St. Nicholas, that would still be appropriate. As a christian, I think it's silly because kids can distiguish between fantasy and reality and why show it at all if you deem it inappropriate?

Anyway, I have uploaded the entire cartoon here for your enjoyment.

Before we get started down this road exploring all of our favorite Christmas Cartoons and Specials, I thought it would be important to start out by writing a little about the team that is foremost responsible for bringing us some of the greatest memories from Christmas Past.

That team is none other than Arthur Rankin, Jr and Jules Bass. They started their production company in the early 1960's as Videocraft International. They were famous for creating productions using "Animagic", a stop-motion animation technique. Amongst the stable of contributors throughout the catalog of shows were people such as Romeo Muller who contributed to many of the specials as a screenwriter and Maury Laws, who served as musical director for almost all of the animated films.

Their first holiday special production was Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, produced for NBC and sponsor General Electric in 1965. Based on the song by Johnny Marks, the special featured Burl Ives as Sam, the talking snowman and contained an orchestral score also written by Marks. Rankin/Bass then began producing a string of holiday hits starting with The Cricket on the Hearth (1968) featuring Danny Thomas.

Others that followed were:


The Little Drummer Boy (1968) -featuring Greer Garson and Jose Ferrer
Frosty the Snowman (1969) featuring Jimmy Durante and Jackie Vernon
Santa Claus is Comin' to Town (1970) featuring Mickey Rooney, Keenan Wynn, and Fred Astaire
The Year Without a Santa Claus (1974) - featuring Shirley Booth and Mickey Rooney
The Little Drummer Boy, Book II (1976)- featuring Miss Greer Garson
Nestor, The Long-Eared Christmas Donkey (1977) - featuring Roger Miller
Jack Frost (1979) - featuring Buddy Hackett
Rudolph's Shiny New Year (1976) featuring Red Skelton
Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July (1979) - featuring Mickey Rooney and Ethel Merman
'Twas the Night Before Christmas (1974) - featuring Joel Grey and George Goebel
Frosty's Winter Wonderland (1976) - featuring Andy Griffith
The First Christmas (1975) - featuring Angela Landsbury
Pinocchio's Christmas (1980)
The Leprechaun's Christmas Gold (1981)- featuring Art Carney




Mickey Rooney appeared as Santa Claus in three Rankin/Bass productions making him the most used popular actor of the genre. Two of the most recognizable voices from the specials were voice actors Paul Frees and June Foray. June may be best known as Rocket J. Squirrel from the adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle. She also portrayed Cindy Lou Who in How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

It was in those days that no matter how big a star you were, if Rankin/Bass asked you be in a Christmas special, you did it.

The team of Rankin/Bass are honored here for the tremendous contribution to all of our childhood Christmas memories.

In 1968, Rankin/Bass produced a stop motion animated feature based on The Little Drummer Boy. The film names the drummer boy Aaron and expands the song's storyline to include events before the birth of Jesus. It stars the voices of Greer Garson as "Our Storyteller" and Jose Ferrer as Ben Haramad; it also features the Vienna Boys Chior singing the title song.

It aired for many years on NBC (under original sponsorship of the American Gas Association(AGA) before entering syndication). It currently airs in the U.S. on the ABC Family cable channel. A television sequel, titled The Little Drummer Boy, Book II, premiered in 1976, also on NBC, again sponsored by the AGA, again narrated by Greer Garson, and also currently airing on ABC Family.