What Went Right: Pinwheel and Primitive Nickelodeon
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- Опубліковано 15 жов 2024
- Do you know where Nickelodeon came from? Take a few minutes to learn the history of the first cable television channel for kids and the forgotten show that started it all...
Theme music is 'Reading Rainbow ROCKS' by TheHumanTim, used with permission, please see www.youtube.co.... for the full video.
This video contains footage owned by Nickelodeon Studios and our use is not meant to challenge that ownership or copyright. We present it solely on an educational basis. If you'd like to watch more classic Nickelodeon, please visit their UA-cam channel at / nickelodeon .
The most notable Pinwheel skit was *PLUS TO THE MOON*
Though not shown in the clips here, I believe Plus had a thing that was a recurring segment of him wanting to go to the moon in a rocket ship but kept missing it at the last minute as someone was always tying him up with one extra thing for him to take with him to space. These always showed a rocket off i the foreground that would be standing there and once it took off, you could see it rise up and off camera leaving smoke behind it, a rather neat feat for what was essentially a cardboard cut-out.I loved these ones simply for Plus' frustrations with everyone stalling him and being upset that he never got to go to the moon.
Dude, I remember that! I always felt so bad for him that he never got to go!
Omega Geek Oh, we all did. I can just picture that tower thing with the light on top being lowered down and the rocket immediately taking off without him!
@@omegageekreviews I believe there was one episode where he actually did get to go.
I miss the pre-Nicktoons era of Nickelodeon.
Are you kidding? The Nicktoons era was also awesome!
Loved pinwheel as a kid
A lot of the charm of Pinwheel was from the European cartoon shorts that were shown, shows like The Magic Roundabout, Charlie, Mustafur, Simon, shows that we may never have heard of if Pinwheel had never existed.
Those were the days! We upgraded to cable in early summer 1982. I was 6 & fondly recall the
" silver ball" & pinwheel!
One thing I love about pinwheel is that it has episodes of one of my favorite TV shows, The Magic Roundabout
This rocks. Thank you for doing this.
I remember watching Pinwheel when I was a kid. I remember getting up early in the morning, getting my bologna sandwich and milk out of the fridge for breakfast (I was a weird kid, preferring that over Lucky Charms or Cocoa Puffs for breakfast) and eating it in the kitchen, then going into the living room to watch Pinwheel. I remember learning how to tune to channel 34, which was the broadcast channel for Nickelodeon in our cable company at the time.
I think my favorite character was Silas the Snail, because he made me think of my great-granddad. When I was looking up some information about Pinwheel several years ago, the website I found mentioned Silas and said he often reminded kids of their grandfathers.
As for comparing Pinwheel to Sesame Street, that's like apples to oranges. Yes, they were both kid's shows. Yes, they were both meant for the same demographic (toddler-Kindergarten-age). But that's probably where the similarities end.
I'd say the biggest difference between Sesame Street and Pinwheel is that Sesame Street is more directly educational. I haven't seen any episodes in a long time, but I remember how the show would open and close by saying, "Today Sesame Street was brought to you by the letter 'Q' and the number '3'." The featured letter and number would appear in a handful of shorts that *were produced specifically for Sesame Street*. Pinwheel, meanwhile, might have used one particular part of Sesame Street: The live actors and puppets interacting, and all participating in a common event, and perhaps them breaking off and doing their own thing, like Plus and Minus doing something that brothers would do, Arelia Ball doing something, Koko miming some actions to music or sound effects, and so on. But those were segued with the animated or live-action shorts. Some, as mentioned, were produced elsewhere like in Canada, the UK, or other parts of Europe, and others might have been produced specifically for Pinwheel (mainly any live-action shots of kids playing).
If Sesame Street was like school, involving learning, Pinwheel would have been more like after-school, when you would come home and played if you didn't have homework.
I grew up on Pinwheel. Never really watched Sesame Street. Pinwheel was THE BEST! Also loved Belle and Sebastian and David the Gnome . Thank you for this video❤️
Who was your favorite Pinwheel character? Mine's Aurelia. What were your favorite episodes/moments of Pinwheel?
Well done , wow brings back such great thoughts . It was a amazing. I also was the right age and time for pinwheel. I really loved all those mini shows in it ,hattytown , Simon. It was so good. That I didn't like sesame st. Then you could watch today's special . Nick was so special then .
I remember this being one of the first shows I ever watched as an 80's kid. I completely forgot about most of those characters, with the exception of Plus, Minus and Ebineezer. Cannot remember there being a mime at all. But I do remember a lot of those cartoon shorts especially the hat characters. There are compilations of just those cartoons and I'd probably watch it all.
I have a few vague memories of earlier Pinwheel, without Smitty, Sal, Kim, the Admiral Bird, the Hobo Bugs, Silas, or Molly. Instead, there was a female artist named Francie and two weird alien-types called the Wonkles. (Jake, Ebenezer, Luigi, and a rather different-looking Plus and Minus were still there. After the retool, Plus and Minus became more childlike characters under Aurelia's care.) But it was all the cool British and European cartoons that really grabbed me. I knew Crystal Tipps and Alastair and Simon in the Land of Chalk Drawings from Captain Kangaroo (the latter dubbed over by the good Captain) but this show is where I fell in love with Paddington Bear and learned to appreciate Europe's cool animation. I even remember some of the musical scores for these cartoons.
What I have been focused on over the last few days is the prevalence of the use of Moog synthesizers in the shorts. Chapi Chapo, and Simon are two. I'd like to be able to get some more information about who these composers were. I know, for instance, that Francois de Roubaix did the Chapi Chapo shorts. This show had a profound impact on me as a child.
It would be cool if more footage of pinwheel came on UA-cam all 260 episodes
I remember watching Pinwheel as a child. Not as much as Sesame Street, but I could still tell the difference enough.
I love pinwheel, I think it’s really cool. When I was a kid I would watch it when I was off from school or in the summertime. I noticed that when all of us are kids, we really don’t pay attention to how good we have it on television. But then when we grow up, we soon realized just how good we had it back then, because today’s television is nothing but garbage most of the time. Now I miss the old nickelodeon kids shows. I wish I could find all the seasons of pinwheel onDvd,and today’s special, and things like that. If they can have old shows on DVD like the Cosby show and other things like that, then why can’t they have pinwheel, that doesn’t make any sense.
I loved Sesame Street, The Electric Company and Pinwheel but Pinwheel by far was my favorite! I adored the European cartoons and skits. Charlie & The Climbing Tree was my favorite. Pinwheel was magic.
I know I’m only 14 but we used to have a vhs player at my house and pinwheel was one of my favorite things to watch. We would always get tapes of it at my public library. It really hit home for me setting wise because I have always lived in a suburban area. I actually prefer it over Sesame Street. It’s amazing to watch pinwheel episodes on UA-cam even though they’re far and few in between. Love your videos and keep up the good work:)
I miss the old stuff from when I was a kid I wish they would make a nick classic channel were they played all the old stuff would love for my kids to have this
They do
I always found looking at older shows from childhood as adults tends to leave a sour taste. Probably best to look at retrospectives and remember the music of that time.
Wow. Amazing little documentary. Thank you for making this. Took me back in time.
Coco the mime is my favorite Pinwheel character
I miss your look at Early Children's media and all of the things that were done right from a social and psychological viewpoint. I love that you are still doing it under other titles, I am just curious if you checked out Nick Knacks by PopArena. cuz he goes in deep with examining Nickelodeon's history, talking about things from a 'warts and all' perspective regarding something works or doesn't in terms of its overall importance and presence on Nickelodeon from its formative years all the way up to today.
Awesome!!!
I never thought of Pinwheel as a knockoff of Sesame Street because it had its own very different vibe to it. It wasn't as pedantic as SS and was a lot more abstract. That appealed to me , like other early Nick shows, because it didn't treat kids like dummies.
Well said -- I agree. :) Even as a young child, I instinctively knew that Nickelodeon and Pinwheel weren't "talking down" to me. Sure, I knew it was children's television made by adults, but I never felt like it was intentionally dumbed down. In fact, I learned quite a bit watching Pinwheel, Mr Wizard's World, and What Will They Think of Next. Heck, I think even You Can't Do That on Television was educational its own kind of way. This was a huge reason that I loved early Nickelodeon so much, and had so much loyalty for the network, even up until my early teens.
a j yea
I liked Against All Odds (a sort of junior A & E Biography, hosted by Bill Bixby) and Standby: Lights, Camera, Action, a making-of-movies show hosted by Leonard Nimoy.
Yes! Pinwheel was much better! Loved all the imported shorts! Charlie and his climbing tree might be my favorite.
I wish someone would help me find that showing of Alladin that came on Nickelodeon in the mid eighties. It was a play type version, and I remember when it started the narrator told the audience to not pay attention to the set movers dressed in black.
this is 1984 they have 2 logos in this version
I considered Pinwheel to be a high-brow and sophisticated version of Sesame Street. Better programming, more intelligent.
I am 9 and Pinwheel looks TERRIFYING
I remember watching VHS tapes at my cousin's house, cause they had cable and we didn't. My aunt would look after me, cause both of my parents worked, and I'd watch it with my cousins. I actually liked Coco the Mime... I dunno why, cause I don't like mimes usually.
" GOTCHA LAST! "
The puppeteers from pinwheel also created the former pbs show shining time station
Friday July 6th 1990 pinwheel aired for the last time on nick jr when noggin became a network in 1999 2000 pinwheel was shown on the network when noggin started
I can see where people think this is a "Sesame Street" knock-off, but there were subtle differences. The animated segments in between the cast segments were longer, and they never focused on numbers and letters (at least not that I remember). My favorite part of Pinwheel was "The Rabbit With the Checkered Ears" cartoons (aka "The Bunny in the Suitcase"). To be perfectly honest, while I do enjoy watching the old clips that have been uploaded, I don't think "Pinwheel" has the staying power that "Sesame Street" did. Another interesting story from my childhood, in 1987 or 1988 (five going on six), my mother took me to the mall while my sister was in school (I did morning kindergarden at the time), and I swear Coco the mime was in one of the department stores handing out balloons (though I was never bothered by her, but that's just me). Sorry for the long comment, I just wanted to throw in a little more of my two cents. One thing you have to admit, without "Pinwheel," you might not have Nickelodeon today.
Does anyone know the name of the segment the cartoon cat shown at 10:52 is from?
+SaintPetersburgFL Look up "Balanel si Miaunel". It's a romanian cartoon series from the mid 70's. There's a few of them here on youtube.
Thanks!
Thank you for making this video and pointing out that fact that Pinwheel was NOT just a Sesame Street knock off! That’s the biggest problem I find with the younger generations who only watch the show in short clips here on youtube. They didn’t watch it so they have no point of reference but I do!
I was about 12 and my Mom use to babysit so while she was busy I would play with the kids and watch TV with them and we always watched Pinwheel. I watched a lot of Nickelodeon in those days and still love ‘80’s Nick to this day. Here is the link to my blog if you’d like to learn more Classic Nick.
Classic Nickelodeon Fan Blog
classic-nickelodeon-fan-blog.blogspot.com/
Hi! I'm a 2000s kid, yet I love Pinwheel! Aurelia is my favorite, and I want to know more about each of the puppets. Do you have any specific memories of each character and their segments? I know Plus and Minus were mischief makers, that's for sure.
Hello, they were rascals that’s for sure. As far as specific memories, no but I do know a bit. For instance, did you know that Aurelia is Kim’s aunt? She called her “Aunt Aurelia” in the Pinwheel Songbook and, if I’m not mistaken, she’s Plus and Minus’ aunt as well which would make them Kim’s cousins.
I know that Luigi O'Brien was in love with Aurelia but was too shy to tell her and that there were two Molly the mole puppet, one hand puppet and another was a marionette. I know that’s not much but I hope it helps. If you’re interested in reading more about “Jake” I interviewed him for my blog a few years ago.
@@JellicleKat Well, I do know Luigi had sang an entire love song to Aurelia in the QUBE era. I also have fuzzy memories of Plus and Minus taking Luigi's cart on a joy ride.
Does anyone remember (I think it was classic Nick...) possibly a bumper, may have been a recurring segue on Pinwheel or Today’s Special; there was a black background, and white gloved hands miming or signing? It was just the hands, and it did a lot of activities. Painting, I think I remember a trapeze...(The mists of time is probably affecting my memory, and I was toddler/Preschool in the early 80s.)
Thank you!
@@TallOakAcres Hi Sandy, yes, I do remember the white gloved hands on the black background but I don't remember all of the activities they did.
The show had a mime; Sesame street had a deaf woman. Hmmm I never put the two together
didn't Double Dare have a lot of giant sandwiches? Maybe they got that idea from Pinwheel.
It was part of the obstacle course at the end of the show, and I'd be willing to bet it was the same prop sandwich Sal and Smitty were shown holding in the one scene.
I've been watching the few surviving episodes lately. While it's not the Greatest Thing Ever™, it's overall a delightful show and it's just a tragedy that so much of it has been lost to the aether. And what's _infuriating_ about it is that Nickelodeon still has the footage, they're just not interested in letting it see the light of day again despite numerous attempts over the past 28 years to ask them.
Also, I never thought it was a Sesame Street ripoff. There's a huge difference between taking influence from something and ripping it off.
If you rip something off, you try to copy it off note for note, mainly just changing the superficial aspects.
If you take influence from something, you take the basic idea of the concept or format and then do something else with it entirely. It's the difference between The Flintstones and The Simpsons.
They still have the footage? Wow, I had no idea! Now see, that's something I'd love to see released.
As much as it's been tried by others in the past, I've been considering writing to them to try again. The head of Nick Jr. at least in 2005 believed that Pinwheel, and I quote, "should remain a memory", but things have changed regarding Nick Jr. since then and I'm not really sure when the MOST recent attempt was.
Unfortunately, though, there could be another hurdle, even if they did want to acknowledge Pinwheel; because of the various segments, it would probably be a copyright nightmare to release, just like KaBlam! would prove to be seventeen years later. But I guess I won't know until I try.
I'll let you know if I hear back.
PINWHEEL OVER SESAME STREET ANY DAY😊😃😜
qube....its called the internet.
+Gary Burnaska well a real early precurser to the interactivity of satillight tv, which we have now.
Gary Burnaska Yes, but more like WebTV from the late 90s - early 00s. That allowed people to get online w/o having a computer.
Columbus Ohio… I'm from Ohio… I'm nine… I don't know where I'm going with this…
+KoolKat Gaming I've only been to Columbus once but it seemed like a nice town...hope you enjoy the series!
Well, you miss those days.
Columbus is very interesting. One way I can best describe its character is like a strange hybrid of San Francisco and Indianapolis. Still very much a Midwestern town but with a more bohemian and coastal personality.
ACETYGRA I'm sure it does. Only wish Toledo had that reputation.
ACETYGRA OSU gives Columbus a very different vibe. It's a nice town says a Cincinnatian. 🤗
1:03
I NEVER 4 GOT PINWHEEL😘
The channel Nickelodeon is ruined because of SpongeBob square pants and other content they have now today’
100th like
Loved the mime/silver ball era of Nickelodeon. The network lost some of its magic when they changed over to the orange logo.