On October 1, 1956 the first Hardy Boys serial "The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure" debuted on Walt Disney’s The Mickey Mouse Club. Composed of ten minute segments the serial ran for 19 days, gaining popularity and excitement with each subsequent episode. Little buccaneers from all across America scurried home from school each day to see what new clue the Hardy Boys had discovered.
Old Silas Applegate’s fabled chest of golden treasure had been missing for ten long years but when young Perry Robinson finds a solitary doubloon lying beneath a bush on Applegate’s creepy estate, the search begins anew!
The first season of The Mickey Mouse Club had featured a serial called “Spin and Marty” about two boys ( Tim Considine and David Stollery ) who spend a summer at the Triple R dude ranch. It was enormously popular, so in the wake of its success Walt Disney launched “The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure”, a mystery serial based on the popular Hardy Boys story The Tower Treasure by author Franklin W. Dixon.
The Studio considered reteaming the two young actors as the Hardy sleuths but instead chose to search for a younger actor to play Frank Hardy’s impetuous kid brother Joe. Tommy Kirk was the lucky lad chosen after dozens of applicants were scoured, and he went on to make many more films for Walt Disney in the upcoming years, becoming one of the Studio’s most famous child stars. Tim Considine was a natural to play Frank so no recasting was necessary there.
Iola Martin, the spunky little neighborhood girl who likes to join the Hardy’s in their sleuthing, was played by Carol Anne Campbell, and Sarah Selby and Ross Conway, two veteran television actors were cast as papa Fenton Hardy and worrisome Aunt Gertrude. Florenz Ames pranced around waving cutlasses as old man Applegate and Robert Foulk and Arthur Shields ( Barry Fitzgerald’s brother, and a man with just as fine an Irish brogue ) played our two “thugs”.
In 1957 "The Mystery of the Ghost Farm", another installment in the Hardy Boys series, premiered but alas, this one was much tamer due to some complaints from parents that the dangers encountered by the Hardy boys in the Applegate mystery were too exciting for their wee ones. Such a shame, because that triggered the end of the series and it would have been so nice had a few feature films been made in addition to them. At least “ The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure “ is available on DVD and on these cool and colorful October days we can sit back and enjoy a good mystery done in classic Disney fashion…..wholesome, humorous, and thrilling.
I have a great fondness for Tommy Kirk (and Kevin Corcoran) thanks to watching lots of classic Disney movies while I grew up. I also read every Hardy Boy book I could find (which was a lot, as my dad had about 50 of them), and I would love to see these! One of these days, maybe. Thanks for the fun review!
ReplyDeleteThose Hardy Boy stories sure would good - and so were the Nancy Drew books. I always wished that Walt Disney had made a feature film about the Hardy Boys in the late 1960s...with Kurt Russell as Joe Hardy. This series is good but it is a bit long, unlike some of Walt Disney's other television series ( such as Dr. Syn ), the studio did not release a feature film version of the show. So you'll have to watch 19 ten-minute segments instead. If you can't find the series on dvd at least be sure to check out the opening credits on Youtube...it's one of Disney's best!
DeleteI loved this as a kid. Still do today. I especially like the Victorian house. I love big Victorian houses.
ReplyDeleteIf Disney had any brains, they would start this series as a movie ensemble like they did with Pirates. A whole new generation of kids are out there to watch.
ReplyDeleteGreat idea..Nice way to get kids out of the house and outside!😃
DeleteWhat film is used for the opening of Mysteries of Applegate. The pirate ship sequence?
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