The Shirt Tales:

This is an old article pending revision.

There are numerous adorable characters that appear in gift shops and on greeting cards. Two of the most well known companies are American Greetings and Hallmark. American Greetings is popular for their line of Care Bears and Strawberry Shortcake products. They were brought to the screen by an ongoing battle between The Incredible World Of DiC and Nelvana. There are also other products such as Pound Puppies and of course The ShirtTales. This goes along with two of Hanna-Barbera's series "The Smurfs" and "The Snorks". In 1980, The ShirtTales greeting card product line was launched, and in 1982, it was brought into animation. 5 of the characters were presented originally. The names of said characters are Pammy Panda, Tyg Tiger, Digger Mole, Rick Raccoon, and Bogey Orangutan. Bogey Orangutan was named after Humphrey Bogart. After 13 half-hour episodes, another character was added named Kip the Kangaroo. The reason why they are called ShirtTales, is because it describes their adventures, and these animals wear shirts that have different messages on them. They do everything to save the day and ride around in their Multi-Purpose Vehicle, the S.T.S.S.T. (The Shirt Tales Super Sonic Transport) which transformed into whatever vehicle that they needed to use. The opening of every episode in the series has flashing "ALERT" signs and then the characters are introduced. In addition to the S.T.S.S.T., they also had other advanced devices such as TV communication watches.


The cast of characters is Pat Parris as Pammy Panda, Steve Schratzberg as Tyg Tyger, Ronnie Schell as Rick Raccoon, Bob Ogle as Digger Mole, Fred Travalena as Bogey Orangutan, Nancy Cartwright as Kip Kangaroo, Herb Vigran as Mr. Dinkle and William Woodson as The Commissioner. Other cast members are Bob Holt of various Dr. Seuss cartoons, Tress MacNeille, the voice of Sarah Ravencroft in Scooby-Doo, Hal Smith of Famous Classic Tales, Frank Welker of Jabberjaw and The Berenstain Bears Show, and John Stevenson of The Flintstones and Famous Classic Tales. Guest stars were Richard Balin, Joe Besser, Joey Camen, Victoria Carroll, Brian Cummings, Walker Edmiston, Marshall Efron, Barnard Erhard, Laurie Faso, Ernest Harada, Buster Jones, Stanley Jones, Sherry Lynn, Sparky Marcus, Kenneth Mars, Joseph Medalis, Howard Morris, Henry Polic II, Tony Pope, Robert Ridgely, Michael Rye, Marilyn Schreffler, R.J. Segal, Michael Sheehan, Andre Stojka, Jimmy Weldon, and Ted Zeigler.


The names of the episodes are: "The Case of the Golden Armor", "Crumblings Circus Caper", "Shirt Napped", "Game Masters", "Elephant on the Loose", "Big Foot Incident", "Horsin' Around", "Humbolt Ghost", "Mission Mutt", "Vacation for Dinkel", "Digger Runs Away", "Wingman", "Figby the Spoiled Cat", "The Commissioner is Missing", "The Terrible Termites", "Raiders of the Lost Shark", "Moving Time", "Back To Nature", "Save the Park", "Pam-Dora's Box", "Hapless Hound", "The Nearsighted Bear", "The Magical Musical Caper", "The Very Buried Treasure", "Dinkel's Ark", "The Duke of Dinkel", "Bogey Goes Ape", "Digger's Three Wishes", "The Rain, the Park and the Robot", "Digger's Double", "Kip's Dragon", "Taj Mahal Tyg", "Double Exposure", "The Outer Space Connection", "Brass Bogey", "The Forbidden Island", "T.J.'s Visit", "Pleasure Valley", "Saturday Night Shirt Tales", "Kip's to Caper", "Dinkel's Buddy" "the Big Setup", "The Ghost Out West", "Dinkel's Gift", "Mayhem on the Orient Express", and "The Cuckoo Count Caper".


After the 1980s the line of The Shirt Tales had closed down. The Strawberry Shortcake and The Care Bears line of products have both been relaunched since then, but so far The Shirt Tales hasn't.