Captain Noah and His Magical Ark | |
---|---|
Genre | Children's television series |
Starring |
W. Carter Merbreier as Captain Noah Patricia Merbreier as Mrs. Noah |
Opening theme | "Overture" from the 1958 movie Windjammer, composed by Morton Gould |
Ending theme | "I Can Sing a Rainbow" by Arthur Hamilton |
Composer(s) | Larry Ferrari |
Country of origin | USA |
Original language(s) | English |
Production company(s) | Philadelphia Council of Churches |
Release | |
Original network | WPVI |
Original release | 1967 | – 1994
Captain Noah and His Magical Ark was a television program for children and was generally broadcast around the Philadelphia area. The series aired from 1967 to 1994. It was filmed and produced at the WPVI-TV, Channel 6 (then called WFIL when the program began) studios in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Captain Noah and His Magical Ark, was created by W. Carter Merbreier, an ordained Lutheran minister and former Philadelphia police chaplain, and produced by the Philadelphia Council of Churches. The show initially aired as a religious program beginning in 1967 before switching to a children's program in 1970. The show starred Merbreier as Captain Noah and his real life wife, Patricia Merbreier, as Mrs. Noah.
At its height, Captain Noah and His Magical Ark was syndicated to twenty-two television stations in markets throughout the United States. During the early 1970s, Captain Noah and His Magical Ark attracted a larger local audience in the Philadelphia region than Sesame Street and Captain Kangaroo combined.
Started as a religious-oriented program, Captain Noah and His Magical Ark became a daily children's program in 1970. The show aired from 7:00 a.m. to 9 a.m. on weekdays and for 30 minutes on Sunday morning leading out of ABC Sunday-morning cartoons and into the Al Alberts Show. The show also featured four cartoon shorts per day during the week. These included Gumby, Popeye (the made for TV cartoons from the 1960s only), Porky Pig (pre-1940 and post-1947 episodes), and Bugs Bunny (post-1948 episodes).
In 1975, when ABC began their morning show Good Morning America, WPVI-TV opted to preempt that in favor of Captain Noah and His Magical Ark. Starting in September 1976, WPVI began running the 7:00 a.m. hour of Good Morning America and scaled Captain Noah back to the 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. slot. The format remained the same.