''The Candy Apple News Company'' is a locally produced

children's television series Children's television series (or children's television shows) are television programs designed for children, normally scheduled for broadcast during the morning and afternoon when children are awake. They can sometimes run during the early evenin ...

that premiered on Friday, February 2, 1979 at 8:00pm on

WCAU-TV WCAU (channel 10) is a television station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, airing programming from the NBC network. It is owned and operated by the network's NBC Owned Television Stations division alongside Mount Laurel, New Jerse ...

Channel 10 in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. The premiere was rebroadcast the following Sunday at 8:00am, which remained the show's time slot for the rest of the season. It was rerun early on weekend mornings for many years until the final regular airing on September 7, 1991. Between 2006-2011 WCAU occasionally ran a show called ''Out of the Vault'' that featured Candy Apple News Company, although it's unknown how many episodes were shown. In the show, a small human cast interacted with

puppet A puppet is an object, often resembling a human, animal or Legendary creature, mythical figure, that is animated or manipulated by a person called a puppeteer. The puppeteer uses movements of their hands, arms, or control devices such as rods ...

s in an old-fashioned, small-town storefront office which operated as a feature service distributing items of children's interest to television, radio and newspapers. The principal human cast member was Matt Robinson, who had previously played

Gordon Gordon may refer to: People * Gordon (given name), a masculine given name, including list of persons and fictional characters * Gordon (surname), the surname * Gordon (slave), escaped to a Union Army camp during the U.S. Civil War * Clan Gordon, ...

on ''

Sesame Street ''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) a ...

''., as the Editor-in-Chief. He was joined by his assistant C.B., played by Mary Margaret Myers, and a staff of puppets; a bat (Boris) worked as book reviewer, a mole (Morgan) was a researcher, and a cuckoo (Alistair) was the timekeeper. Other Candy Apple regulars included puppet Sparks O'Sullivan and a vintage 1930s talking radio that acted as show narrator. Each episode was an hour of skits, short educational films, and other produced pieces. The mole, bat, and cuckoo puppets were first used a year earlier in the half-hour WCAU feature ''Yipe! Don't Be Afraid.'' They were built by George Neff, chairman of the art department at Glassboro State College in New Jersey.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Candy Apple News Company 1970s American children's comedy television series 1980s American children's comedy television series 1970s American sketch comedy television series 1980s American sketch comedy television series 1970s American television news shows 1980s American television news shows Children's sketch comedy Culture of Philadelphia American television shows featuring puppetry