Hokey Wolf is an animated television series produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions as part of The Huckleberry Hound Show. It details the adventures of Hokey Wolf, a con-artist wolf who is always trying to cheat his way into the simple life. He is often accompanied alongside by his young, diminutive sidekick Ding-A-Ling Wolf, both of whom are featured as part of The Huckleberry Hound Show in their own segment.
The initial creation of Hokey Wolf occurred when another follow-up segment was needed, because Yogi Bear's rising popularity in preceding appearances warranted a promotion to his own self-titled show.[1] As a result of the change in schedule, Hokey Wolf had made its debut midway through the third season of The Huckleberry Hound Show[2] and became a regular appearance afterward on this segment. Hokey's theme music for his segment of the show was composed by Hoyt Curtin and used an instrumental version of the refrain from "Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here".[3]
The segment follows the everyday misadventures of its protagonist, Hokey Wolf, and his small companion Ding-A-Ling Wolf, through their typical con-artist routines of getting what they need in their daily lives.[4] Through each episode, Hokey would usually try to fool different characters with food-stealing schemes and/or finding a place to stay without cost, only for most of these tricks to backfire on him in one way or another.[1]
On occasion, Hokey and Ding-A-Ling would run afoul of a farmer when trying to target either his chickens or his sheep.
Both of the cartoon's feature characters were designed by animation artist and character designer Ed Benedict.[5]
Hokey Wolf (voiced by Daws Butler) is the smooth-talking title character throughout each cartoon. His main hobby in life was to outsmart and coax the clueless out of free meals or places to stay, much of which he seemed to do so with ease, despite possible consequences later on. Hokey typically wears his trademark green bow tie with white collar and a violet-colored hat. His personality would later be recycled for fellow Hanna-Barbera characters such as Top Cat, who starred in a prime-time sitcom that ran from 1961 to 1962 that followed a very similar concept. His voice is inspired by Phil Silvers.
Ding-A-Ling Wolf (voiced by Doug Young) is the young sidekick of Hokey Wolf who always accompanies him throughout each misadventure. He is usually eager to follow in his mentor's ambitious con-artist footsteps, but often reconsiders the plans he will come up with in many situations. Ding typically wears a bowler hat (sometimes red, sometimes black), a sleeveless green shirt, and a black vest. His voice is inspired by Buddy Hackett.
A farmer (voiced by Daws Butler) whose name varies per episode runs a farm where he raises his livestock. He would often work to keep them from falling into Hokey and Ding-A-Ling's hands which varying results for all three of them.
In total, Hokey and Ding-A-Ling Wolf starred in 28 seven-minute cartoons throughout the third and fourth seasons (1960–1961) of The Huckleberry Hound Show.[6] Their pilot episode was Tricks and Treats. The Hokey Wolf series would come to an end with the episode Bean Pod’ners, airing on December 1, 1961. Below is a complete listing of all cartoon shorts with the protagonist Hokey Wolf:
The episodes Tricks and Treats and Castle Hassle are on the DVD Hanna-Barbera 25 Cartoon Collection, part of The Best of Warner Bros. collection series.
While the initial series ended in December 1961, Hokey Wolf went on to appear in four other animated Hanna-Barbera series alongside other classic characters. These were as follows:
