If you are unfamiliar with The Littlest Hobo (we shall dispense with any pointless remarks about the American film or brief 1960s TV program that preceded it), it was a Canadian live-action television show from the late-1970s to mid-1980s aimed at children in which the title character, a dog, roamed solo from town to town solving crimes. He cannot talk. That’s a real thing that happened on television. Here was the intro:
I would now like to share some Wikipedia episode summaries, without commentary.
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Tags: canada, canadian content, dogs, something something canada, television, the littlest hobo
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That theme song…
It still makes me want to cry! the end of every episode where he trots off by himself!
Maybe tomorrow, I’ll want to settle down
Until tomorrow, I’ll just keep moving on…
I’m wondering the logistics of how exactly he was going to help open an orange juice stand?
Also, this dog has managed a disco control panel and forced a homicide confession out of a hit-and-run driver
Today I ate a bowl of oatmeal and replied to two emails. Hobo makes me ashamed of myself.
omg we’ve had the same morning
Hobo mans a disco control panel and helps the victim of an underworld frame-up.
And that’s where I stopped reading and lunged for YouTube.
Oh my god the part where he takes the cigarette out of the dude’s mouth!
1. oh my god the cutest
2. in my mind, not knowing anything about this show, i was thinking it was going to be some sort of terrier, perhaps wearing a bandana.
I made a gif.
Just say “arf!”
Hobo hops on board a train and befriends an old railroad bum and a runaway boy.
Hobo (dog) makes friends with a hobo (human) played by Bones from ST:ToS. At least that’s what I assume.
Dogs love Bones. It is known.
I literally sent a friend a list of excerpts from this Wikipedia page once because so many of them are so beautifully absurd. Right now, Nicole is my mind twin. But only right now.
Also, I sing the theme song to myself surprisingly often. There’s a voice…
I don’t think it’s that surprising. I sing it to myself fairly often and I am never surprised when I start.
omg, haha! I like the summaries that don’t mention Hobo, eg Mystique: An unethical hypnotist influences a model’s behaviour. Guess Hobo’s just having a day off.
I’m so very sad that this is the first I’m learning of this show, because little CaroWR, with her ever-present German Shepherd, would’ve loved the shit out of this.
“Double Trouble” sounds like the episode for me! It’s got horses and a description of hobos as “gentlemen of the road!”
Seems kinda harsh that the guy in Double Trouble is “a gentleman of the road” but Willy from Willy and Kate is dismissed as “a tramp.”
Yes, I am curious about the gentleman of the road too, especially if it’s another animal. I’m voting for racoon.
Two episodes featuring ballerinas, including one trying to defect? And the other one stars Karen Kain? Sign me up!
MICHAEL IRONSIDE?? DEFORREST KELLEY???!!!
Don’t forget CANADA’S WONDERLAND!
BARBARA GORDON!!
I mean, not that one, but still.
“A family is trapped on a deserted island. Themes include cold war tensions and the early stages of the digital age.” What the what?
I am imagining it is like Gilligan’s Island and they have created coconut computers or something, and they accidentally got on a government computer like in War Games. Then the littlest hobo shuts the whole thing down.
The logistics of all of these are amazing. Hobo marshalling evidence! Hobo manipulating the mechanics of a ruse! Hobo appointing himself a child’s guardian!
For reasons of pure Can-con though, I love “Hobo helps a young boy prove to his mother than you don’t have to play a rough sport like hockey to have courage,” because “you don’t have to play hockey to have [X desirable quality]” is a theme to which MANY Canadian kids can relate.
“You don’t have to play hockey to be on the five dollar bill…okay, maybe you do.”
The fiance of an old coworker of mine swears up and down one of his friends is in the hockey scene on the five dollar bill. He is not the type to lie, but he’s also so good at deadpanning/being convincing in general, I can’t figure out if it’s a trick or not.
I’m looking at a $5 Canadian bill right now. You actually have to be either Wilfrid Laurier or an astronaut to be on it.
But, I think we can potentially all agree, that Canadians who don’t even know how to SKATE are in for some well deserved scorn. I mean, c’mon.
And you don’t have to wear a Montreal Canadiens jersey, either.
This programme was shown on Irish TV in the late 80s. There wasn’t much home-grown programming in those days so the main channel would buy in shows from the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand (basically just about anywhere English-speaking that wasn’t England). I was so young when I watched it that I can barely remember it, but I still well up a little at that theme tune…
My Dublin-raised husband spent about half an hour just last week insisting that I MUST know about the existence of this show. Fortunately we eventually got out of bed & figured out that it was Canadian, which is why I’d never heard of it & he had. He is DELIGHTED by this piece.
Yes! The Littlest Hobo was a big part of Irish TV in the 80s, I remember it was always on, I think before The Den. I can’t remember much about it apart from the theme tune and the dog, but I do think I saw episode 13 on this list.
Now, I’m dying to know if you got The Beachcombers as well? I mean, if Canada is going to export do-gooding traveling dogs, a show that features unshaven, log-stealing drunk (Relic) is needed just to balance out the pop culture propaganda.
I don’t remember Beachcombers but there’s a good chance we got at least a season of it!
We got The Beachcombers in Oz- serious crush on Jesse as a child!
Jesse! His hair was great. The theme song was also pretty catchy.
We need more purely episodic shows about a kindly stranger* wandering the continent, righting wrongs.
*or dog
Didn’t Michael Landon do that? Highway to Heaven or something like that? I’m too lazy to Google it.
I’d heard of this show, but had no idea that the Littlest Hobo wasn’t a human. Flabbergasted.
I always imagined him as a Precious Moments-style transient, actually.
Let me note that when I looked up “Precious Moments hobo” there were several holiday-themed transients to choose from as well as a general array of hobo magicians and hipster hobos. I picked Christmas over Halloween, because the ghost eyes on the bindle of the Halloween hobo looked into my soul.
Christmas. Precious Moments. Hobo.
Nothing says Christmas like an indigent child wearing a mop on his head and clown makeup on his face. HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
I’m glad he’s got that nice snug flannel shirt to keep him warm as he sleeps on the rails all winter long. Plus a sprig of holly!
“A rival tries to have a harmonica player fired.”
I had no idea harmonica playing was such a hotly contested field full of subterfuge and backstabbing!
When you listen to an orchestra that tries to carry two harmonicas, you’ll see why there’s only room for one.
Still stuck on the first one. A kid wanders around outside, sees some poisoned meat, and thinks “Someone dropped some perfectly good meat on the ground! Well, his loss is my gain!”
Even if it weren’t poisoned, it would not have ended well for that child.
I was so confused by that too. Was it raw meat? Or like, a poisoned pot roast or something?
Anyway, if you want to see a dog pretend to be in a parachute (you do) the clip is here. It’s implied it’s not even his first time jumping out of a plane! What a hero.
I like the part where the man (is he the Forest Ranger?) whispers “good luck Smoke” like he’s reciting some sort of incantation.
The weather seems remarkably sunny and quiet for a thunderstorm that is preventing a plane from landing.
are you shitting me
The first time I saw that, I was high and mistook it for an episode of M*A*S*H*.
I’m so glad I’m currently alone in the house, because the noises I made upon viewing that clip can never be explained.
http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/…
I would very much like a similar article except about Theodore Tugboat:
“Emily and the Tug of War”: George excludes Emily from a game of ‘tug of war’ because she’s a girl tug, which starts a huge conflict between the two. Catherine the Container Ship later arrives with a double load that tilts her to one side while Theodore and George are towing her to her dock. They soon find themselves on a collision course with Owan the Oil Rig. After hearing George call for help, Emily rushes to the scene to help stop the ship just in time. George then realizes that it doesn’t matter whether you’re a boy tug or a girl tug, and they all play tug of war.
“Hank and the Silly Faces”: When Hank first meets Millie the Fishing Trawler, he thinks she is just making silly faces. He doesn’t realize that Millie is squinting because she can’t see very well, but Millie isn’t about to tell him. She thinks that people won’t like her if they know that she can’t see, but when she joins in a game and almost causes an accident, her secret is revealed. Instead of rejecting her, the tugs take the trawler to the repair dock. She worries that no one will be able to fix her, but just as her new friends predicted, the repair is simple. She tells the tugs that seeing with her new glasses is ‘just like making friends with the world all over again.’
How can tugboats have genders????
HOW CAN TUGBOATS WEAR GLASSES
There was one episode summary that said “Several faceless boats have cameos” and I actually felt a little bit creeped out, like oh, boats without faces, I wouldn’t want to run into one of those on a moonless night!… and then I remembered that “faceless boat” is actually the natural order of things.
can’t… type… laughing… help…..
I listened to the theme song and I actually cannot FUNCTION maybe ever again. GUESS I GOTTA GO BE A HOBO IN CANADA.
Oh, man. I watched so much Hobo when I was a kid. It’s the kind of insanity that only Canadian content laws could have wrought, which makes me very proud of my country. I didn’t know Bones McCoy was a guest star, though.
The Wikipedia page claims “His origins, motivation and ultimate destination are also never explained”
HOWEVER
I refer you to this episode synopsis (“Second Chance”):
An ex-convict is framed for drug smuggling and with help from Ryan McCallum (played by a young Rob McLeavy) Hobo is able to clear the ex-convicts name but all the drugs go missing.
I’m on to you, Hobo.
A MIME and a DEAF BOY help Hobo prevent a robbery. I AM DEAD.
God, such beautiful Saturday morning memories of The Littlest Hobo (I grew up on the Buffalo, NY end of the Peace Bridge). Does anyone here who watched CBC or CTV in the early-mid 80s remember a collection of eerie cartoons (they might have come from Montreal) with a character named Shrinking Violet? Or another history/science themed cartoon with a couple kids and a wacky scientist-professor type who traveled in a time machine? I know for certain they checked out the Kon-Tiki.
Just a shot in the dark. I’ve been having weird Canadian cartoon flashbacks for 30 years now.
Also, Fred Penner’s Place, anyone?
I bloody loved the Littlest Hobo when I was a kid. They ran it over here in the Uk on endless repeats for years.
Imagine my confusion at the Corner Gas episode that centered around this show and its theme song.
This list finally makes me understand the reference and wonder what else I may have missed.
If there was ever an appropriate time for an I can’t even.
The Corner Gas episode is called The Littlest Yarbo. It’s on Youtube in parts, and also in a version that only shows the scenes with the dog. That’s all you need.
Exercise extreme caution if watching. This was the episode that had me laughing so hard I couldn’t catch my breath. And that never happens.
Another deity in the canine do-gooder pantheon: Rex the Wonder Dog!
Guys. I figured out my halloween costume. http://imgur.com/abhJdjk
“We shall dispense with . . . the brief 1960s TV program” ??? Nooooo!!!! That black and white 1960s show remains dear to the hearts of Canadian baby boomers (of whom I am one). I still know every word of the theme song (a different one from the later version) and would call you up right now and sing it into the phone, if I had your number. So perhaps it is just as well that I do not.
Was there a slightly different version of the theme song at some point? The one that I always sing in my head (really, more often than makes sense) has the line “Until tomorrow, the whole world is my home,” I think at the end.
Am I having auditory hallucinations about cheesy theme songs?
No, I totally remember that line too. Maybe there’s a longer version for the ending credits?
I remember it too – pretty sure it’s the closing one.
The episode were Hobo pulls a rabid raccoon to the centre of a lake in a canoe will stay with me always. The raccoon’s fur was covered in Depp gel and they had some sort of human-voiced “growling” sound effect so as to make it appear “mad.” Just imaging the amount of takes that scene required.
Suddenly, all the bits of “Due South” with the super-intelligent dog make much more sense.
Not, you know, a lot of sense total. But more.
Oh my goodness, The Littlest Hobo! I watched that as a child. Aw, I’m feeling all warm and fuzzy hearing that theme song again.
What never made sense to me about Diefenbaker on Due South was how we were supposed to believe he was a wolf when he was obviously a dog. Why that was the one thing I couldn’t suspend my disbelief about I don’t know, but it was.
Wolfdog!
Roughly 1/3 of Canada’s police force is actually composed of intelligent, civic-minded canines. This is only partly because Mounties kept insisting that it was rude to leave Man’s Best Friend home on his own while Man went out fighting crime.
Diefenbaker was a Wolf, not a dog.
In these comments people keep marveling that such a show could have existed, to which I can only answer:
HAMMY HAMSTER.
“Also starring: Barbara Gordon.” I’ll just leave that there.
Hey it’s still on the air! Check out CTV2 on Sat mornings. It’s ch 20 where I am. Great Can con (CDN CONTENT) never dies on CTV – especially when the reruns are free.
I found the ukulele chord chart to the theme song. I’m going to go memorise it right now.
http://ukulelehunt.com/ukertabs/wp-content/upload…
I made this list in early 2013: http://listsfrommyroommate.tumblr.com/post/408577…
Heart all swollen from this.