1980's Saturday Morning Historical Preservation Society

The Heathcliff And Dingbat Show (1980 Saturday morning at 11am on ABC) was a Ruby-Spears show that mainly featured Heathcliff (or as he was known in our house, "Not Garfield") This season ran for 13 episodes and included backup segments with Dingbat and the Creeps, who were created for the show. "Dingbat and the Creeps" revolved around the adventures of three monstrous characters who were self-employed as "Odd Jobs, Inc." which consisted of Dingbat, a vampire dog who used a bat-shaped novelty straw to eat most foods, Sparerib, a strangely rotund skeleton with the ability to change himself into useful items (such as a floor lamp, which he did in the opening credits), and Nobody, a gravelly-voiced jack-o-lantern who led the team and often found them various work.

This show had no chance in my household. My Brother was a die-hard Garfield fan, and Batman was on another channel. Sure it had Thundarr as a lead-in, but it was easy to change the channel :)

Heathcliff (aka "The Poor Man's Garfield") had a pretty good run on Saturday mornings in the 80's, this is the fan page dedicated to the programming block that he shared with "Dingbat", a vampire dog (not as cool as it sounds).

Feel free to leave your memories or personal opinions on this cartoon in the comments below, and be sure to go and vote for it in our Best Cartoon of 1981 Poll if it was indeed one of your favorites :)