-->

• Sesame Street is a long-running children's educational series that features live actors, Jim Henson's Muppets, and film shorts. It premiered on November 10, 1969, making it the longest running television program aimed for children.

  Its format is intended to provide both education and entertainment for preschool-age children, and has received high acclaim throughout the world, spawning many regional versions.http://www.cpb.org/pressroom/release.php?prn=291

  
  

• Fast Facts

  1. Network: PBS (1969-present)
  2. First aired: November 10, 1969
  3. 4,160 episodes
  4. Seen in 120 countries
  5. Created by: Jim Henson
  6. Won 109 Emmy Awards
  7. One of the longest running U.S. television shows
  8. Celebrates its 40th Anniversary: November 2009

• History

  Sesame Street was created in the late 1960s by the production company, the Children's Television Workshop (now Sesame Workshop), under the direction of Joan Ganz Cooney and Ralph Rogers. The publicly-funded show debuted nationally in late 1969 on the NET, or National Educational Television network, which was renamed the following year to PBS. By the second season, the characters and formula were refined to recognizable form (Oscar the Grouch was originally orange, while Grover was originally a nameless brownish green entity). The show changed relatively little for decades, although film shorts were periodically rotated in and out of circulation, characters added, and actors replaced. In 2002 a major revamping took place, such that older segments of the show were no longer interspersed with newer ones.

• Memorable Characters

  Early sensations among the show's Muppet characters included Bert and Ernie, Kermit the Frog, Cookie Monster, and Big Bird, as well as the canonical blue Grover and green Oscar the Grouch. In the 1980s, Elmo emerged as the muppet of greatest influence, first gaining a separate segment at the end of the show, and then a spin-off show (and DVD empire) with Elmo's World.

  Cookie Monster

  Cookie monster, according to the official Sesame Street web site has a birth date of November 2. He is a googly eyed blue furred monster who loves to eat cookies. Cookie Monster is also known for the simplistic diction he uses when speaking.http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Cookie_Monster

  The Jim Henson creation of Cookie Monster started as a puppet used on a cereal commercial for General Foods in 1966 and was later used in 1967 as the computer eating monster in an IBM training film, before gaining fame on Sesame Street staring in 1969.

  Big Bird

  Big Bird was one of the original characters to make his debut in 1969. He is an 8 foot 2 inch tall bird covered in yellow feathers.

  The actual puppet contains over 4,000 white turkey feathers dyed yellow. The operation of the puppet was originally designed by Jim Henson and follows the sketch below.

  

• Grover

  The character of Grover first appeared on Sesame Street in 1969, appearing as an unamed monster. At the start of the second season he was named Grover.http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Grover

  The puppet used made its first appearance in 1967 on the Ed Sullivan Show. Originally the puppet used for the character had a dark green shade of fur along with a slightly menacing look. The blue furred Grover we know today made its first appearance at the start of the second season.http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Grover

  
  Grover in his original design along with Kermit.

• Sesame Street Episode Guide

  Through the end of the 39th season of Sesame Street, there have been 4161 episode of the show produced. Currently it is in its 40th season.

  The links below will provide you with a synopsis of all episodes aired thus far of Sesame Street.

  Season 35-40
  
  Seasons 1-34

• Related Mahalo Pages

  Jim Henson | The Muppet Show | Backyardigans | Hi-5 | The Doodlebops | The Wiggles | Fraggle Rock | The Electric Company | Muppets | Lily Tomlin | Muppets Christmas Letters to Santa | How to Make Puppets

Categories

• View History
• Discuss on the Message Board
• Embed this Page
• Share this page