Barkley, originally named
Woof-Woof, was a dog character on the children's television program
Sesame StreetSesame Street is an American educational children's television series and a pioneer of the contemporary educational television standard, combining both education and entertainment. Sesame Street is well known for its Muppets characters created by Jim Henson. It premiered on November 10, 1969, and...
.
Introduced in the less-than-successful
A Special Sesame Street ChristmasA Special Sesame Street Christmas was a low-budget 1978 CBS Christmas special, made the same year as the legendary and still popular Christmas Eve on Sesame Street....
, its original actor
Toby TowsonToby Towson is a gymnast and dancer, who did a stint as the puppeteer who first performed the larger-than-life Muppet dog Barkley, starting in A Special Sesame Street Christmas. Towson has had a career in gymnastics, acrobatics, and dance, and was a 1968 and 1969 NCAA Gymnastics Champion...
notes that Barkley was originally intended to be an
acrobaticAcrobatics is the performance of extraordinary feats of balance, agility and motor coordination. It can be found in many of the performing arts, as well as many sports...
apeAn ape is any member of the Hominoidea superfamily of primates. Due to its ambiguous nature, the term ape is less suitable as a means of describing taxonomic relationships....
.
Owned by deaf
librarianA librarian is an information professional trained in library and information science, which is the organization and management of information services or materials for those with information needs. Typically, librarians work in a public or college library, an elementary or secondary school media...
LindaLinda Bove is a deaf American actress who played the part of Linda the Librarian on the children's television program Sesame Street from 1971 to 2003....
, the character made its formal television debut in the tenth season of the show. Its name was changed by popular vote from "Woof-Woof" to "Barkley" in the first episode of season ten.
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Barkley, originally named
Woof-Woof, was a dog character on the children's television program
Sesame StreetSesame Street is an American educational children's television series and a pioneer of the contemporary educational television standard, combining both education and entertainment. Sesame Street is well known for its Muppets characters created by Jim Henson. It premiered on November 10, 1969, and...
.
Introduced in the less-than-successful
A Special Sesame Street ChristmasA Special Sesame Street Christmas was a low-budget 1978 CBS Christmas special, made the same year as the legendary and still popular Christmas Eve on Sesame Street....
, its original actor
Toby TowsonToby Towson is a gymnast and dancer, who did a stint as the puppeteer who first performed the larger-than-life Muppet dog Barkley, starting in A Special Sesame Street Christmas. Towson has had a career in gymnastics, acrobatics, and dance, and was a 1968 and 1969 NCAA Gymnastics Champion...
notes that Barkley was originally intended to be an
acrobaticAcrobatics is the performance of extraordinary feats of balance, agility and motor coordination. It can be found in many of the performing arts, as well as many sports...
apeAn ape is any member of the Hominoidea superfamily of primates. Due to its ambiguous nature, the term ape is less suitable as a means of describing taxonomic relationships....
.
Owned by deaf
librarianA librarian is an information professional trained in library and information science, which is the organization and management of information services or materials for those with information needs. Typically, librarians work in a public or college library, an elementary or secondary school media...
LindaLinda Bove is a deaf American actress who played the part of Linda the Librarian on the children's television program Sesame Street from 1971 to 2003....
, the character made its formal television debut in the tenth season of the show. Its name was changed by popular vote from "Woof-Woof" to "Barkley" in the first episode of season ten. It is of note that producers and Towson spelt the original name "Woov-Woov".
Around this time, Towson's contract ran out, and Brian Muehl replaced him. Later, in 1985, when Muehl left the show, Fred "Garbo" Garver took over until ca. 1992. Since then, R. Bruce Connelly has performed the role.
Barkley was used in the show's closing credit sequence from 1980-1992, in which he and a group of children played in Central Park.
Also, in the Album "Hot Hot Hot Dance Songs", Barkley and
Prairie DawnPrairie Dawn is a fictional character, a rather mature seven-year-old Muppet girl on the beloved children's television program Sesame Street. She is similar in appearance to a character from the Anything Muppets. She is famous for writing school pageants for her friends, mostly Ernie and Bert,...
sang a song called Do the Dog
Barkley remained a major recurring character on the show until the mid- to late-1990s, and rarely appears currently.