It's no secret that Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera earned an impressive list of awards throughout their legendary partnership. They racked up Oscars, Emmys, Annies, and so on. One of the more overlooked awards, however, was in 1983, when the pair were gifted a Golden IKE Award by the Pacific Pioneers in Broadcasting.
Now, a lot of you are probably wondering what the Pacific Pioneers in Broadcasting even is. From what I've gathered, it was a company founded in 1966 with the mission to preserve the Golden Age of radio. It appears to still be active, and since its inception, it's gone on to also focus on preserving the history of classic TV. By the time the eighties rolled around, the company was run by a fellow named Harry O'Connor. O'Connor seems to have had a lot of history with several of the biggest names in classic animation. In the late sixties, for example, filled several roles (the most notable being producer) at Mel Blanc Associates, which dabbled in several business ventures, like the creation of ads for both TV and radio.
In January of 1983, the duo that launched Hanna-Barbera was given a Golden IKE Award in Studio City, located in Los Angeles, California. And let's just say they brought in a lot of friends for the occasion.
Just take a moment to soak in that image. The amount of talent in that room is truly astonishing. Unfortunately, Joe Barbera and Daws Butler didn't seem to be present, though. This photograph was taken by the Daily News, and is dated on the back to January 21st, 1983. Despite my best efforts, however, I couldn't find any articles from this paper during this time focused on the event. I was able to find these two other photos, both featuring Mel Blanc. The first features him alongside Fred and Barney, while the other, a color photo, showcases him standing alongside Henry Corden and Gay Autterson. I imagine this one came from some magazine of the day.
Overall, this is a really cool piece of Hanna-Barbera history if you ask me. How many other photos have you seen featuring so many classic voice actors together? I didn't know him personally (O'Connor passed away in 2013), but Harry really seemed to have respect for all those amazing cartoon voice actors who came from radio. Beyond his relationship with Blanc, shortly after this, Casey Kasem and Gary Owens both became board members of the PPB. He seemed to have a love of these mediums that's rare both back then and especially now. I think I should turn this story over to you guys now. Did any of you see stories about this event in the press back then? If you did, I'd be happy if you left a comment informing me of what you remember!
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