Lost Boomer Classic "The Space Explorers" - Rediscovered after 70 years!
April 8, 2024 2:09 PM Subscribe
"The Space Explorers" was a series of animated, educational Sci-Fi shorts shown on morning kids' TV in the US, around 1961. Astronomy enthusiast Jimmy Perry stows away on the Polaris II, flying to rescue his Dad who crashed on the moon on his way to Mars, in the Polaris 1. Set in 1978, each episode had little bits of this story padded out with educational lessons about astronomy. A very few sequences from the show are available at the Internet Archive, but there's much
According to Wikipedia, director Fred Ladd hastily cobbled the series together (to "capitalize on the Sputnik craze") from three foreign films. Most of the material came from the 1953 Polet na lunu (Flight to the Moon), by Soyuzmultfilm. In this original, Jimmy is Kolya, who has a dog and two friends, a Ukrainian, and a Black(!) American. Professor Nordheim is actually Professor Bobrov, and his pilot Smitty is female cosmonaut Sofya Andreevna. Although "The Space Explorers" was black and white, this original cartoon is in color and Jimmy/Kolya's red scarf clearly indicates he's a Young Pioneer. No subtitles in that Internet Archive version linked to above; although this poor transfer of highlights on YouTube has some (and the complete film is also available there). The best part is the exhilarating final minute, when they get back to Earth (both ships landing together in downtown Moscow?)
The exterior shots of Polaris in flight and its launch came from a much earlier film, "Weltraumschiff 1" (Wikipedia.de) from 1938 Germany. Coincidentally interesting is how similar the Polaris in its hanger are to a zeppelin. Two photos of that I scanned from a forgotten book are available here (not used in "The Space Explorers"). The third source, for more views of space, was "Universe" by Pavel Klushantsev, from 1951 (which I found on Bilibili, without subtitles).
A sequel series was also produced, "The New Adventures of the Space Explorers," with the same crew encountering an alien object out there which looked suspiciously like Hayden Planetarium's Zeiss Star Projector.
TheSpaceExplorers.com web page displayed stills from the program, and a promise of a DVD of the whole series soon; but now, that domain is available. However, here's a Wayback Machine capture from 2009 with even more information about these shows.
According to Wikipedia, director Fred Ladd hastily cobbled the series together (to "capitalize on the Sputnik craze") from three foreign films. Most of the material came from the 1953 Polet na lunu (Flight to the Moon), by Soyuzmultfilm. In this original, Jimmy is Kolya, who has a dog and two friends, a Ukrainian, and a Black(!) American. Professor Nordheim is actually Professor Bobrov, and his pilot Smitty is female cosmonaut Sofya Andreevna. Although "The Space Explorers" was black and white, this original cartoon is in color and Jimmy/Kolya's red scarf clearly indicates he's a Young Pioneer. No subtitles in that Internet Archive version linked to above; although this poor transfer of highlights on YouTube has some (and the complete film is also available there). The best part is the exhilarating final minute, when they get back to Earth (both ships landing together in downtown Moscow?)
The exterior shots of Polaris in flight and its launch came from a much earlier film, "Weltraumschiff 1" (Wikipedia.de) from 1938 Germany. Coincidentally interesting is how similar the Polaris in its hanger are to a zeppelin. Two photos of that I scanned from a forgotten book are available here (not used in "The Space Explorers"). The third source, for more views of space, was "Universe" by Pavel Klushantsev, from 1951 (which I found on Bilibili, without subtitles).
A sequel series was also produced, "The New Adventures of the Space Explorers," with the same crew encountering an alien object out there which looked suspiciously like Hayden Planetarium's Zeiss Star Projector.
TheSpaceExplorers.com web page displayed stills from the program, and a promise of a DVD of the whole series soon; but now, that domain is available. However, here's a Wayback Machine capture from 2009 with even more information about these shows.
What a great find! Thanks for putting this together.
posted by evilmomlady at 5:53 PM on April 9
posted by evilmomlady at 5:53 PM on April 9
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Also note there's 5 other much shorter clips at that first Internet Archive link, the Weltraumschiff sequence is the last one.
posted by Rash at 5:53 PM on April 8 [1 favorite]