Digitizing the Berenstain Bears

Many of our younger fans are familiar with our Television Series on PBS, but did you know the Bears have been on the small screen since 1979?

Here at Berenstain Studios we recently received all of our tape reels, beta-max tapes, DVDs, and VHS tapes of our TV Specials, and TV episodes from our 1985 Television series. These had previously been housed at an outside storage facility. This meant it was time to make some room in the archives!

Our studio archives house all of the original art from the Berenstain Bear books from the beginning as well as many of Stan & Jan’s comics from before the Bears. We also keep at least 5 copies of each of our books published, and now it is home to all of the original tape reels. Here’s a look at all of the space needed just for books:

Below you can see all of the tapes, DVDs, Digital Beta-max tapes, as well as all of the 1″ tape reels. You may even recognize some of the VHS tapes from your own childhood.

While this may not look too exciting, we at Berenstain Studios were looking forward to seeing some of the cartoons  – some of which have not aired on TV in over 30 years!

Many of the more familiar episodes from our 1985 series can be found online, as they are easily pirated from DVDs, but there were quite a few episodes that only existed on the 1″ reels. Here at the studios we mostly deal in writing and illustrating the books, so we do not have the equipment to see what condition the reels were in, or to digitize them. This task required an outside service to take what was on the reels and make it up-loadable for all to see. For these special episodes,  we ran into quite a few issues. Some were internationally formatted which required a more niche and not as universal equipment, while other reels were partially damaged, or improperly labeled.

Example Reel package and reel:

 

Through all this we are happy to say we were able to digitize each of the episodes from our 1985-87 Television Series on CBS as well as the 5 Television Specials that aired on NBC from 1979-1983. All of these are now available in full on our Youtube Channel, even what seemed to be our most elusive episode, “The Berenstain Bears and the Super Duper Bowl”!

you can watch all of the episodes on our Youtube Page, and find information on each episode and TV Special Below.  To Learn more about how the Berenstain Bears were first animated, check out our previous blog post: You Can’t Animate a Plaid Shirt.

NBC TV Specials

Title	Air Date
The Berenstain Bears’ Christmas Tree	12/2/1979
The Berenstain Bears Meet Bigpaw	11/20/1980
The Berenstain Bears’ Easter Surprise	4/14/1981
The Berenstain Bears’ Comic Valentine	2/13/1982
The Berenstain Bears Play Ball	5/6/1983

 

CBS TV Series

Episode	Season	Ep	Air Date
The Messy Room	1	1	14-Sep-85
The Terrible Termite	1	2	9/21/1985
Go Fly A Kite	1	3	9/28/1985
The Trojan Pumpkin	1	4	10/5/1985
The Spooky Old Mansion	1	5	10/12/1985
The Fly Away Pizza	1	6	10/19/1985
The Giant Bat Cave	1	7	10/26/1985
The Wild Wild Honey	1	8	11/2/1985
The Neighborly Skunk	1	9	11/9/1985
The Missing Pumpkin	1	10	11/16/1985
Too Much Birthday	1	11	11/23/1985
To The Rescue	1	12	11/30/1985
The Soccer Star	1	13	12/7/1985
Shoot the Rapids	1	14	12/14/1985
The Knight to Remember	1	15	1/18/1986
The Superduper Bowl	1	16	1/25/1986
The Not So Buried Treasure	1	17	2/1/1986
The Condemned Backscratcher	1	18	2/8/1986
Kong For a Day	1	19	2/15/1986
Blaze a Trail	1	20	2/22/1986
No Girls Allowed	1	21	5/13/1986
The Missing Dinosaur Bone	1	22	5/13/1986
The Spookiest Pumpkin	1	23	5/13/1986
The Dancing Bees	1	24	5/20/1986
Learn About Strangers	1	25	5/27/1986
The Disappearing Honey	1	26	6/3/1986
In the Dark	2	1	9/13/1986
Ring the Bell	2	2	9/20/1986
Forget Their Manners	2	3	9/27/1986
The Wicked Weasel Spell	2	4	10/4/1986
The Truth	2	5	10/11/1986
Save the Bees	2	6	10/18/1986
Get in a Fight	2	7	10/25/1986
The Bigpaw Problem	2	8	11/1/1986
Get Stage Fright	2	9	11/8/1986
Go Bonkers Over Honkers	2	10	11/15/1986
The Great Honey Pipeline	2	11	11/22/1986
The Great Grizzly Comet	2	12	11/29/1986
The Sure-Fire Bait	2	13	12/6/1986
The Cat’s Meow	2	14	12/13/1986
The Trouble with Friends	2	15	12/20/1986
The Coughing Catfish	2	16	12/27/1986
The Substitute Teacher	2	17	1/3/1987
The Mystery Mansion	2	18	1/10/1987
Bust A Ghost	2	19	1/17/1987
The Ice Monster	2	20	1/24/1987
The Crystal Ball Caper	2	21	1/31/1987
The Raid on Fort Grizzly	2	22	2/7/1987
The Forbidden Cave	2	23	2/14/1987
The Hot Air Election	2	24	2/21/1987
Life With Papa	2	25	2/28/1987
Save the Farm	2	26	3/7/1987