Sprout's Special Valentine Delivery

 

Madeline Fretz - In 2007, Sprout celebrated Valentine's Day. Not with cards and chocolates, but with Mr. Mailman. You see, Sprout was celebrating the Season 2 premiere of its first original series The Many Adventures of Mr. Mailman, which premiered in July last year. From 6AM to 6PM on Valentine's Day (February 14th), Mr. Mailman would deliver both on-air wishes from characters like Barney, Elmo, Caillou, The Hoobs, and the Teletubbies and virtual cards from Sproutlets and their Big Sprouts. (source)

Image from the Wayback Machine

The following year, The Sunny Side Up Show celebrated Valentine's Day by inviting Sesame Street's Prairie Dawn to join the fun. It was around this time that viewers could get a chance to call Kelly and Chica LIVE! from 9AM to noon.

Sprout described this opprotunity(sp?) as:

"Join Kelly, Chica and special guest Prairie Dawn from 9am-noon and again at 3-6pm ET for Sprout's Special Valentine's Day Delivery Celebration LIVE during The Sunny Side Up Show. Call Kelly, Chica & Prairie Dawn LIVE today from 3-6pm at (877) 91-CHICA - your call may be on Sprout! And don't forget to send us your preschooler's Valentine message for the one they love -- it may be on TV! Click below to submit your message:"

Click here to send in Valentine's messages to the Parents and Kids Share Together forum!

The Many Adventures of Mr. Mailman

 

Madeline Fretz - Mr. Mailman was a character created by Sprout who debuted on The Birthday Show in 2005. Mr. Mailman originally delivered birthday cards to host Kevin, a trait he later did on The Sunny Side Up Show, which launched in 2007.

In a December 2005 article, it was announced that Sprout executives were developing four interstitial series about geography, healthy eating, music, and creative storytelling (source). The geography series would later become The Many Adventures of Mr. Mailman. 

Many Adventures would follow Mr. Mailman as he would deliver letters, packages etc to his Sproutlet friends' relatives and other people like their teachers. The show premiered in July 2006, making it Sprout's first original series. The channel wouldn't make a full-length one until 2010.

The show also had an online presence on Sproutletsgrow.com (later SproutOnline.com). Here, you could download a personalized passport and cutout of Mr. Mailman, join Mr. Mailman's Travel Club, and play games such as dressing Mr. Mailman for the weather.

The show also got a Sprout Diner recipe, Mr. Mailman's Pita Pocket.

The show later aired on Musical Mornings with Coo and The Sunny Side Up Show, and continued to air as late as 2010.

Sprout Might-Have Beens

 Madeline Fretz - Here is a list of Sprout material that was going to be made, but never was.

ZOOM was a PBS series made by WGBH Boston that ran from 1999 to 2005, based on a 1970s children's show of the same name. The show was cancelled in 2004, but in 2006, series producer Marcy Guthner emailed a fan, telling him that WGBH was thinking of putting ZOOM on the then-fledgling new Sprout channel. There was one problem though - Sprout was aimed at two to five year olds, ZOOM was aimed at six to eleven year olds, so I think that's the reason why plans backfired. However, the show was promoted online as being a part of PBS' PBS Kids GO! block, but never aired. (source)

In 2014, Yummico made appisodes with possibility of a series for Sprout called Edison the Invention Detective, about a mystery-solving girl. Edison never came to fruition. (source)

Similarly, once Sprout launched in 2005, it was announced Andrew Beecham, Meredith Halpern-Ranzer, and Susan Karden were making interstitials about geography, healthy eating, music, and creative storytelling. The geography series would obviously become The Many Adventures of Mr. Mailman, and the healthy eating one would obviously become Sprout Diner. As for the music and creative storytelling interstitials, it is unknown if they came to fruition or even exist.

According to this article on SproutOnline.com, The Chica Show was going to take place in a farmers' market and focus on healthy eating and nutrition.

According to president Sandy Wax, Sprout was going to have an aquatic and marine animal-themed programming block sponsored by SeaWorld (source). I don't know why this failed, as SeaWorld was one of Sprout’s sponsors at the time. The article was published a few months before the launch of The Sprout Sharing Show, so I assume the SeaWorld block might've became the Sharing Show.

Anyways, I think that's it. If I find any more possibilities that never were, I'll post them here.

Click here to make interstitials on the Parents and Kids Share Together forum!

Weekly Character Wednesdays: Mr. Mailman

Here's something new I'm trying out. Each Wednesday, I focus on a different Sprout character, talent, or executive in a series I like to call "Weekly Character/Talent/Executive Wednesdays." Don’t worry, this won't affect My Week. My Week will still keep going. I’m a big Muppet fan, so just as My Week was inspired by the Muppet fan site ToughPigs, Weekly Character Wednesdays is inspired by "Weekly Muppet Wednesdays" from former fansite The Muppet Mindset, which is now owned by ToughPigs.

Who will I focus on first? Well, first we're focusing on Sprout's resident postman - Mr. Mailman!

Image from YouTube

Mr. Mailman began on Sprout's The Birthday Show, in which he would tell the date and hand host Kevin Yamada the birthday cards.

In 2006, he was the star of Sprout's first original series, The Many Adventures of Mr. Mailman. In the series, he would deliver letters and packages to real kids' (animated) friends or family in different parts of the world. Despite the series' removal on TV in 2009, it still had a podcast on iTunes and episodes were available on the Sprout Player app.

Image from YouTube

In 2007, he moved to The Sunny Side Up Show when it premiered, and once again delivered cards to the hosts in the Sunshine Barn. Here, he rode a tractor, a double decker bus, and a helicopter. Mr. Mailman was dropped during the Sunny Side Up refresh in 2015.

Well, Sproutlets, that's all the time I have! Stay tuned for more Weekly Character Wednesdays in the coming Wednesdays! But I gotta catch a helicopter now! Bye!