(From left) Dora Winifred “D.W.” Read, Allen “The Brain” Powers, Arthur Read, Muffy Crosswire, Jane Read, and Sue Ellen Armstrong celebrating Arthur and Muffy’s birthdays from “Happy Birthday Arthur” in 1996.
WGBH Educational Foundation, WildBrain and Marc Brown Studios
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WGBH Educational Foundation, WildBrain and Marc Brown Studios
This is part of a special series in which NPR looks back at its coverage of major news stories from the past.
Which long-running cartoon features this protagonist: he’s got round ears, an iconic yellow sweater, and a snarky little sister?
If you immediately pictured an animated, 8-year-old aardvark, you’ve likely heard of Arthur Read, a character who made his TV debut 30 years ago on Oct. 7, 1996.
But before the bespectacled third-grader made his way onto our screens and into our hearts, Arthur’s first home was in the world of books.
Here’s a look at the beginnings of Arthur.
A Bedtime Story
The author of the Arthur books is Marc Brown, a writer and illustrator who was raised in Erie, Pa.
Although Brown was interested in art from a young age, after graduating from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1968, he pursued a string of different jobs working as everything from truck driver to to short-order cook to assistant professor.
Brown says he got the inspiration for Arthur when his son Tolon asked for a bedtime story about a “weird” animal. The first weird animal that came to mind? An aardvark. From there, Brown wrote and illustrated his first picture book depicting an aardvark named Arthur. This animal, with its long anteater snout and small ears, starred in Arthur’s Nose, published in 1976.
While working on the next book, Brown made a pivotal change to the character’s design. The second book titled, Arthur’s Eyes, featured Arthur getting a new pair of glasses. As Brown drew the glasses, he realized there was a problem.
Speaking to NPR’s Linda Wertheimer in 1997, Brown said, “I was drawing Arthur, and I wanted him to face the viewer in the book. And I could not show his mouth because his — his nose was so long. And so I shortened it a little bit. And I thought to myself, gee, if there are two books about Arthur, well there might be a third book. Now how do you really want this character to look?”
So Brown spent more time redesigning Arthur’s visage, making his face “a little rounder” and “a little more lovable looking.” The result, Brown said, made Arthur “more human-like.” As Brown published and sold more Arthur books, he was able to make a living writing books. Though they were not an immediate commercial success, Brown’s picture books resonated with families, including Carol Greenwald’s.
Like Brown, Greenwald was no stranger to bedtime story pleas from her two children. When her son was 3 years old, their neighbor gave them an Arthur picture book. After reading it a few times, Greenwald realized it was unique.
“After reading it for the seventh time,” Greenwald told NPR in 1997, “I realized I wasn’t tearing my hair out … There are so many books you read to your kids that they love to read, and you read them over and over again, and it makes you feel like you want to scream. But this particular book was not making me feel that way.”
Greenwald also said she liked the way Arthur dealt with problems involving school, personal relationships and activities like reading. As a TV producer at the Boston-based public media station GBH, Greenwald raised the idea with her colleagues in the early ’90s.
“We have a lot of research that tells us that a kid who watches a TV show based on a book is more likely to want to read that book, is more likely to want to read other books, and is even more likely to go to the library.”
In the first episode of Arthur, the titular character (center) tries on a pair of brown glasses.
WGBH Educational Foundation, WildBrain and Marc Brown Studios
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WGBH Educational Foundation, WildBrain and Marc Brown Studios
From books to television
Although Greenwald believed Arthur was ready to make his public television debut, Brown was less sure. Brown said he was hesitant to allow Arthur to make the multimedia leap, stating that he wanted to keep “control of the character.”
But GBH’s offer and the subsequent jump in book sales made Brown reconsider.
“I went from, you know, maybe selling two million books over a period of several years to selling two million books in a month,” Brown said. “And to me, that happening is just unimaginable…”
He worked closely with the show’s writers and artists to preserve the essential little kid that is Arthur.
Produced by GBH and the Montreal-based animation studio Cinar, the first episode of the series premiered on PBS Kids on Oct. 7, 1996. Its storyline draws directly from the second picture book, “Arthur’s Eyes,” as Arthur “re-tells” the story of wearing glasses to school for the first time.
The premiere also brought the rest of the Elwood City animal community to life with sound and emotion. Every character is an animal, from Arthur’s aardvark parents and sister D.W. (short for Dora Winifred) to the students in Mr. Ratburn’s Lakewood Elementary class, including an athletic chimpanzee named Francine and Arthur’s best friend, a bunny named Buster. One of the show’s underlying themes of getting along with others in your community is present even in its joyful, reggae theme song, “Believe In Yourself” by Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers as Arthur bops around Elwood City, interacting with family, friends, and trusted neighbors.
Shortly after the series premiere, Brown was asked whether Arthur would remain in third grade or be allowed the opportunity to grow.
“I don’t think of Arthur as ever leaving third grade,” Brown said. “I sort of think of Arthur as having this portrait in the attic that’s aging. (laughs) But Arthur will stay forever in third grade.”
The legacy of a wonderful kind of day
True to his word, Arthur and his friends remained third-graders throughout the entire series’ 25 seasons. As reported by the Los Angeles Times in 2022, Arthur aired over 250 episodes and seven television specials. The critically acclaimed series also won four Daytime Emmy Awards for outstanding children’s animated program and one Peabody Award.
Although Arthur began as the star, the series evolved to focus on a diverse cast of other characters and their lives as they navigated relatable milestones for 8-year-olds such as developing asthma, learning with dyslexia, and living with diabetes. The principles of believing in yourself, valuing family and friendship, and loving reading carried from season to season.
But not all the characters’ stories were celebrated. In 2019, Alabama Public Television refused to air an episode featuring a same-sex wedding between Arthur’s teacher, Mr. Ratburn, and his partner, Patrick. As reported by the New York Times in 2006, when an episode of the spinoff “Postcards from Buster” featured a Vermont family with two moms, then-Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings wrote a letter to the then-president and CEO of PBS, Pat Mitchell, reminding her that the show received funding from the Department of Education. She added, “Many parents would not want their young children exposed to the life-styles portrayed in this episode.”
When speaking to NPR in 2022, Brown said, “We, as adults, owe children the truth. They’re trying to make a foundation on which they can build their lives, and if there isn’t truth in that foundation, things get pretty shaky.”
For 26 years, Arthur helped families build a foundation of truth and belonging with the animated, animal residents of Elwood City. The series finale titled, “All Grown Up,” aired on Feb. 21, 2022. The characters were no longer children, but adults, each aged up 20 years and settled into their respective careers. And of course, Arthur became an author of graphic novels.
