I actually think it's pretty sad how Margaret Hamilton wanted to go on kids shows to show she wasn't scary, and then sesame Street just makes her look extra scary
Margaret Hamilton wound up becoming good friends with Mr. Rogers after her appearance on his show. And it happened purely by accident when Mr. Rogers found out someone else in the Mr. Rogers Neighborhood cast knew her. This person introduced them and they remained friends for the rest of their lives.
"We have truly entered a new era of lost media." I can personally agree with that. One of my first experiences with lost media was a Japanese film called "Yume Yume no Ato (Dream, After Dream)." It was released in 1980 and contained a soundtrack performed by Journey. Despite looking online for its existence, only stills and promotional images existed. That is until most of the film was released in February of this year. From what the uploader stated in the description, the beginning and ending are intact. However, the movie is 30 minutes shorter, theorized to be a tv edit. Regardless, it's fascinating to see many lost media come to light as we progress through the 2020s.
Does the internet have to ruin everything with an explanation can't people just have a good time and be in the moment? Whatever the origin isn't it nice that we have it to enjoy it again?
She really was an amazing actress and was even burned during the shooting of (I believe) the first smokescreen and trap door on stage. They shot the fire a little too early and she was injured pretty bad. It was a different world back then. I'm sure that today, she would have largely been praised for her role.
I got a little emotional when you were talking about how much Margaret Hamilton loved kids and didn't want them to be afraid of her but they were for pretty much the rest of her life :( She sounds like she was such a sweet lady.
Its because oz was a subversion programming and the witch brought about darkness and confusion to the politically ignorant American before the Annihilation war in europe
Sadly, there is nothing we can do for her now that she would ever be aware of, but we can still do the next best thing: honor her legacy. We can show future generations her true self over the character she played. Mr Rogers probably gave her the only thing close to this in her living years, and to be fair it likely did improve her image to millions of children, and we can at least find some closure in the fact that she wasn't completely seen as monster when she left us and she found someone who was certainly a very good friend in Fred Rogers. And we can be led by his example, and not only validate her, but do the same for many others like her. That's probably exactly what she would want anyway.
I was 10 when this episode aired. I'd seen The Wizard of Oz every year, and I knew who Margaret Hamilton was - she guested on stuff all the time. I remember thinking how strange it was that Margaret Hamilton was still walking around dressed like The Wicked Witch, nearly 40 years after the movie. I could swear I'd seen the episode afterwards in re-runs, but I could be wrong. That was around the time I switched from watching kiddie comedy to watching Saturday Night Live adult comedy (SNL also had the Muppets, ironically LOL) I remember enjoying this episode and I'm kinda surprised it was banned. People are so silly, this was Great Art!
My mom remembered watching the episode when it aired (I don’t remember how old she was but at the time she was fairly young) and she remembered enjoying it cause she loved Wizard of Oz (since that was her favorite movie growing up as well as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and when she heard that this episode got banned she got confused. She said to me “Wait this episode got banned? I mean I get the episode had some scary stuff but it was pretty tame” but when I told her this episode got found she was grateful
I feel pretty bad for Margaret Hamilton, she didn't want kids to be scared of her and they were, people took the whole "wicked witch" thing way too seriously back then, and even Sesame Street couldn't give her a "the witch learns to be nice and everyone else learns not to judge people based on their appearance" sort of episode. It must really hurt to think "I'll go on this kids show that's renowned for being nice and positive and happy and hopefully kids won't be as afraid of me or the 'wicked witch' any more" and then the episode you're in is banned due to the backlash it got from parents and considered lost for decades. At least she had Mr. Rogers in her corner...
@@alexvids9232 that wasn't how the contracts worked in the 30s. You played the part you were given or you risked not being cast again until your contract ended. End of career.
@@alexvids9232 wtf? That’s the equivalent of telling someone they’re at fault for not being able to tell the future. “Wow, you’re so dumb, you shouldn’t have taken that job. Don’t you know that something that isn’t that scary would scare a bunch of children & their parents would be so incompetent that they wouldn’t be able to comfort their children properly, and you’d never be able to act w/o that random stigma again?”.
As a huge fan of Oz, I was quite glad to see this finally resurface. Personally, my holy grails for lost media are the Fairylogue and Radio-Plays film, the King Kong spider pit scene, London After Midnight, and the remaining lost Dr. Who episodes. Considering how coveted they are and have been, I think it unlikely they will turn up, though I'd be very glad to be proven wrong.
@@chayden153 to be fair, this one es know to be hoarded media not being released but privately screened aswell as multiple copies existing in prestige condition, it was only a matter of time before footage from the library of congress or sesame workshop would leak online
Has there ever been lost media that was considered "completely lost forever" that was later found? After so long we finally got the Wicked Witch episode so I'm inclined to think "never say never" in regards to the future
I'd say media that was recorded during the time where studios simply recorded over their tapes to record new content is very likely lost forever, this being back when technology like VHS devices were fairly new and expensive, and thus rare probably fits that bill the most. But you're right, there are always surprising finds and holy grails being discovered all the time. You just never know where and when something is gonna pop up.
The best example I can think of is some old Doctor Who episodes. The BBC used to just reuse tapes whenever they needed one, and home recording wasn't really a thing in the 60s so there were episodes that were assumed to be completely lost, but copies of some of them meant for overseas broadcasts have since been found in tv stations in other countries.
I would say stuff people never thought to record- or from a era before easy recording...like early tv ads or early tv broadcasts as a whole. Or, if you consider written media, old scrolls and books! Libraries of information and stories lost to time and war.
i felt really bad for the actress people hated her for doing her job. i think she really did a great job, i hope the actress was another chance to handle a different role.
Yes, and this reminds me of a similar situation, the actress who played Harriet Oleson in Little House on the Prairie. She played such a mean lady on the show, but the actress was reputedly a lovely person in real life. Nonetheless, she and the actress who played Nellie Oleson were despised by kids, because they played their roles so effectively. I wish Sesame Street had done a better job to show Margaret Hamilton was really a nice person, not to be confused with her acting as a witch in a movie. It would have been a great teaching moment for kids to learn this.
I remember hearing about this via BlameItOnJorge's old children's lost media list a very long time ago, and seeing it finally revealed is strange..? It's strange how lost media can resurface for unknown reasons
@@HitchhikingHatbox Everything about this is wrong; you're thinking about the AAPB website (which is actually not where this particular copy of the episode came from) which people were just ripping episodes off of. There was no signatures or anything involved.
I saw a movie once with many women who had breasts that inflated and they floated up.. this was on tv in Australia in the early 80s. Channel 7 if that's any help.. and I believe it was on during the middle of the day.
I was 6 when this was on. It didn’t scare me, what scared the hell out of me was the first time I saw the Orange that sang Carmen. I remember screaming my lungs out and hiding behind the couch with my fingers in my ears whenever that thing came on during later episodes of Sesame Street. I don’t remember if it was the face flying off or something else which scared me, I just remember that it freaked me out more than anything else that I saw on TV as a little kid.
12:03 my working theory is that parents, who had been scared by The Wizard Oz themselves as kids jumped the gun and assumed their kids would be scared (like my dad was terrified of the trees and flying monkeys when they aired it on tv in the 60s, but as an 80s/90s kid, I really wasn't bothered. Except when Dorothy was crying at the end and the Witch taunts her).
My mam didn’t let me watch nightmare on elm street cause she remembered it being way more terrifying back when it came out, it was on tv around Halloween when i was 11 or 12 and the sfx were so bad I laughed at my mam for being afraid of it
The Wizard of Oz scared the shit outta me in the 70s, but so did the Creature From the Black Lagoon and the old Wolfman movie. Times were different back then, but Pepperidge Farm remembers!
My grandfather is Caroll Spinney (who plays big bird and Oscar on sesame street) and every time I go to his house I would see a signed photo of Oscar and the wicked witch on one of the walls. Finding out that photo has so much history is crazy
Hey! My most favorite moments of your grandfather's characters are when they were shown with Northern Calloway who of course gave us David, I love him so much. This one here may be my most favorite. ruclips.net/video/bARE6XMF6-c/видео.html (smiles) Thank you so much for your grandfather's contribution to the show. (hug) God bless you and your family always!!! Holly in east TN
One of the things that I loved about the character design of The Wicked Witch was how they created such a great silhouette with her. The black and the pointy hat made her tall enough to be imposing but lithe and spindly like a spider or a shadow. So much was done phenomenally in that movie.
I saw it when it aired in 1976! I was just a toddler but my mother tells me I wasn't scared, she also remembers it because it had the witch in it. It was great seeing it as an adult considering all I remembered was the broom LOL. Also.. we absolutely are the generation raised on Watership Down. It's just Watership Down wasn't out yet. Never forget CBS aired that and the animated Hobbit as "kids specials".
The animated Hobbit movie traumatized me worse than seeing this very weird episode as a child. Plus the others, plus Charlotte's Web.. "Charlotte! CHARLOTTE!!" I can still hear Wilbur's heartbreak 😨😟😩😭
@@EXTRAT3RRESTRIAL but wouldn't snuffy have come out with wicked witch if it was there because if you want to cement your place in Lost Media history wouldn't you kill two white whales with one harpoon?
_SPGaD_ isn’t lost… But because of the red tape around it, a wide release is unlikely. Perhaps an online release on the parents section on a SW website (so as to not be stumbled upon by kids, if it’s as bad as they claim.) A home media release would be lit but I guess Sesame doesn’t like money. Lol. 🤡
Hopefully, interest in the episode will lead to it to be allowed to be streamed so other people can get a chance to see it & maybe reevaluate the controversy around the episode or heck even use it as a teaching moment, as her story shows how important it is to separate an actor/actress from the characters they portray, which Mr. Rogers clearly understood the importance of!
@@documentmedic9385 Tbf, the 70s was the peak era of stay-at-home moms getting mad at what their kids were watching and organizing letter writing campaigns and whatnot - to the point that most shows had to be super sanitized with what they couldn't show It wasn't until the 1980s when TV was largely deregulated and the recession meant more parents had to work full time and could no longer afford to spend all that time getting mad at stuff
I watched this after it was found, and honestly I found it really funny. I liked Margaret's over the top mannerisms and attitude, it was so cartoonishly hilarious but genuine. But maybe that's just cause I'm an adult 🤷🏻 Also when I told my friend (who isn't into lost media) about this they were like "that's your holy grail? Lol 😆". But I think it's cool :)
I am 61 and NEVER knew about this!!!! HOW? lol. Thanks so much for showing and sharing this 'little tease' but now made us all want to find this! Stay GREEN! I am going to share this on my Horrortube channel....do you mind? Richard
The part where you say "people dont understand how kids found this scary" has alot to do with modern HD vs old tube television broadcasts/VCR recordings being low quality. Alot of old media seems to look more disturbing when not in HD. "Being alone in a room isn't scary if ALL the lights are on".
That witch was scary as crap in the movie. I wouldn't have wanted to see her anywhere else. The whole idea was stupid. What next, the lady from the bathroom scene in the Shining?
There’s no mystery here. The WWofW was no different than any of the other countless things in the world that could be perceived as scary . As a child of the 60s I was fully aware of the Wizard of Oz . Before it became available on VHS in the mid 80s this movie was aired once a year on prime time television and was considered “ can’t miss television” everyone I knew and I presume millions of other Americans had it circled in that weeks issue of TV Guide from day one . In my house it was the only event of any type capable of getting my brother , sister and I all into our pajamas and on the couch with a blanket and popcorn with an unspoken agreement to refrain from anything known to end events and/ or lead to a spanking where we would sit and watch the Holy Grail of childrens television intently in “ Living color” the words spoken by an announcer that would let you know what was about to be broadcasted and that it would be in color for those viewing on a color television which was only some percentage of the audience. We were never particularly scared of the Witch back then. As anyone who watched that movie ,in a time when slow moving Mummies and Martians were considered scary will tell you , it was the Flying Monkees that induced true fear in every child watching. They still creep me out today. For me and many others the movie Halloween marked the moment that the bar for scary was raised significantly for movies and television and the ever increasing violence in the world slowly began to numb our sensitivities and make those things that scared us back then seem ridiculous in 2022. It’s not possible to be frightened by any Witch or Flying Monkees in a world where we watch wars, mass murders and extreme violence on the daily news and extreme violence and sexuality on our televisions
It's like older games being scarier, the lack of image quality leaves more to the imagination. Even some games that weren't intended to be scary just have this ominous feeling to them
Watched all the seventies episode's with my sister's kids when they were young. This WGBH Production forever won our hearts and memories, sure miss those fantastic days!
Lost media is something that I've been interested in for years. The concept of media that has been lost in time, and the attempts to recover it, have always been interesting to me. One of the most prominent pieces of lost media, wherever I went, was a Sesame Street episode, said to star the Wicked Witch of The West from The Wizard of Oz. Personally, I never thought the episode would ever be found, but I'll be damned, I woke up this morning, to find that this episode, one sought after for years, has finally been found, and all mystery circulating it can end.
Wiccans* but is someone gonna tell Christians who hate witches, that lots of those who practice it are religious and use it for good? An infamous one used her practices to solve a murder.
@@roxassora2706 "Christians who hate witches" One, stop generalizing Christians. A Christian shouldn't have any hate in their heart for anyone. Two, magic is not anyone's to play with. I'll be the person to tell _you_ that Sh*t comes back to bite you every time, objective good or objective bad!!! Especially if you do anything incorrectly. Even though it isn't as "powerful" as people think, it's still not something people should use. Ever. This is coming from a former Wiccan (myself, I repented and came back to the Christian faith).
@@NotFckingBen OP literally said "Christians who hate witches", talking about certain Christians who hate witches. They never said all Christians hate witches, THAT'S generalizing.
One of the things I enjoy about your channel is just how enthusiastic and genuinely excited you are about lost media. I have a casual interest but your enthusiasm feeds my own!
Honestly, I don't think the kids were scared in 1976. I think the mothers got PTSD and flashbacks from their childhood and could not handle seeing their Freddy Kruger back on screen again and they complained on behalf of their kids.
I'm proud to see you finally found this episode, and I can finally say: the witch is my third favorite character after rocco and elmo I know kids at the time were terrified, but I can't help but find her funny, because when she shows up and plays a mega distorted guitar it makes her look like a member of a metal band XD
Haven't been on lost media for a while for this is big! I'm so glad it was found. Got to love how hard working people are in the Lost media Community! Cheers for hopefully more lost media :)
This is absolutely incredible! I remember watching lost media videos back in like 2016-17ish and seeing this and hoping it would be found; im so glad it finally has been! I’m most looking forward to finding hitogata or some old 1910s/20s movies I think :D
The Holy Grail of lost footage is Vampira's horror show, broadcast in LA from 1955-56, which was the inspiration for the Elvira reboot 25 years later. It set the precedent for horror movie hosts on TV and inspired countless other horror movie shows across the country.
@oskar ig well not always the case. The Phineas and Ferb Spot the Diff was lost, then found, then lost again (it's found again, but like cases like those happen from time to time).
I like that you have been following this. It seems absurd to me that Sesame Street would bury this performance by a very well acclaimed actress after nearly 50 years. Really? What heck are they thinking? It’s simply unfair to the memory of Margret Hamilton. The Wicked Witch of the West scared me for about 2 minutes, and my mother pointed her out to me in an Addams Family rerun, and I never saw her as a witch again. I saw her as an actress. Another crime committed in the name of the “children”, who today, probably couldn’t care less about the Wizard of Oz.
Sesame Street was the first educational children's media that based their programming on research. So the reason makes sense in that regard. However, it shouldn't be this difficult to find.
It's ironic that in Hollyweird throughout history most of the actors that portray villains turn out to be the nicest people in real life and many who play heroes or superheroes might as well be called villains in real life.
So freakin true. A big villain on The Walking Dead turns out to be super chill and openly/casually religious in real life. Then you've got brave, stunning actors who will literally fire staff for looking at them.
HI I would like to say that I know of a piece of Lost Media that nobody in the world seems to remember except me. When I was a kid, age 12 or under, not sure exactly how old but around there, it was in the early 1970's, no later than 1977, that there was a G rated family movie called Dondi, based on a Sunday newspaper comic strip. There was and still remains a black and white 1961 version of the film, but that one I have never seen except to check out clips of it. The one I am talking about played in the theater in the early half of the 1970's and was definitely in color. I still recall a crazy chase scene where the villain's of the movie are chasing Dondi through what I remember to be a large shopping mall because a large crowd of people and escalators were involved . I know it was a new movie at the time and that it was called Dondi because I never heard that name before and asked my parents who he was and they told me he was from the Sunday comics in the newspaper. I always remembered that unique name of his so it stuck with me. I also recall that a few years after it was shown in the movie theaters it was in reruns a handful of times throughout the years on regular tv and possibly on Cinema 100, ( the first cable tv of its kind in my area). To this day I can't find any info on IMDB or anywhere else on the internet regarding this movie that I have seen at least 3 times in my life that has now disappeared into thin air. Why nobody has ever heard of it just baffles me as it was pretty popular when it first came out. For some reason I seem to associate it coming out when Bugsy Malone did in 1976.
can see why children at the time were scared of it but as an teenanger/adult who grew fond of Margaret performance reparsing her role as the wicked witch brings a smile to them
That performance as the wicked witch was one of THE BEST performances ever given on screen... Acting truly was ACTING back in those days and a performer had to truly poor everything into an acting part! Sad story about a good lady and actor. She truly scared kids and the image of a bad/evil girl on TV was never ever done onscreen. I was a kid when I saw the movie and STILL remember her performance to THIS DAY some 40 years later... No performance on screen has that ever topped!
Glad someone else thought that hideous electric guitar squeal was a bad choice. I get they probably couldn't have used the real Witch leitmotif from the movie, but they certainly could have made some sort of sound-a-like. A playful sounding music riff, rather than "Hey! Let's just step on an electric guitar and record whatever sound it makes." And quite honestly, it feels like a lot of strange writing choices were made in this episode. Really feels that David should have said "if you ask for it nicely, you can have it," and the whole incident unfolds because she's a villain and the villain's code forbids asking for things nicely or something like that. Or at least at the end the Witch being confounded that all it took was asking for it back politely. Something about the episode feels like it needed a redemption of the Witch somehow. I mean, look at how sweetly she reacted when Oscar said she was beautiful. Also, low key, the lost "Surprise" segment was also found. It just didn't get the press or the following this episode had, but it was something highly sought after by the Sesame Street preservationists.
Yeah. I don't think the writers of this episode got their message across very well. At the beginning of the episode, David refuses to give the broom back to the witch because, if I'm remembering right, the witch needs to first treat him with "respect" and "dignity". Well, that sends a bad message to kids in that it's telling them you get to keep someone's property if the owner of that property is rude or disrespectful to you. That's not the way life works. You're obligated to give back someone's property even if that person says to you, 'Give it to me!'. I understand the situation would be different if it was between a parent and child, or teacher and student, like when a parent takes a child's toy away. But here the situation is between two adult strangers. I think they should have made it where the witch loses her broom, and she needs the help of Sesame Street to find it. At first, she would be rude and mean, so no one helps her. Only by being nice and polite, using good manners, does she ultimately make friends, who then help her to find the broom. I think the problem with this episdoe is that the writers stayed too true to witch's character as she was in the Wizard of Oz, that is to say, wicked and unredeemable. They would have been better off having the witch show some goodness for once, and I'm sure Margaret Hamilton would have appreciated too.
@@thehighllama8101 It also seems to be missing something without the insert segments breaking it up to let the street scenes breathe. It feels like something's missing seeing it all together, like there was a longer scene here or another scene there. I understand what they're going for. This is all a wacky misunderstanding that got out of control, and I think that angle could have worked if there was another draft. That said, I absolutely love the scene with Oscar being in love with the Witch, and I wish that was explored a little more. That and the part where she turns into a sweet old lady, but basically chokes on politely asking for her broom back really seem like a good moment of "Maybe she's not bad after all," that really should have been explored a little better.
It would have been great if Oscar helped change the witch's heart, even if inadvertently. In other words, he demonstrates love and kindness to her, which inspires her to show genuine kindness to others. I mean, in the episode, Oscar did inadvertently inspire the witch, but it was to deceive. It would have been great (and a bit ironic) if Oscar inspired her to be a genuinely better person. Anyway, yes, this episode demonstrates the importance of revising drafts. Seems like the writers here just didn't completely think things through.
The real holy grail would be finding “saved from the Titanic” over 100 years old, linked to a subject people are interested in and copies are rumoured to exist.
I was so scared by the film, and in facing my fear, I discovered what I wanted to be . I wanted to create characters that could make people actually believe who they were, so I became a Special Effects Makeup Artist. If I wasn't so scared, I would never have sought to find out what was behind it. This show WAS my childhood, and taught me so much. One of the most important messages was the diversity of the cast of this show and "The Electric Company". It showed a kid who grew up where everyone looked alike, that there are people who look different, but that we're all the same. I'll never forget the death of Mr. Hooper episode and how they taught me how to deal with losing a friend. If I had one wish, It would be to be able to give Jim Henson a hug and to tell him what this all meant to millions of kids.
I remember being scared of the Wicked Witch when I was little, so I get where the kiddos were coming from. I feel like Sesame Street missed an opportunity to make an episode about not judging by appearances. Something like Margaret Hamilton coming to town and everyone being scared of her because of the role she played and them slowly making friends when they realize she's not as mean as the witch is. It ends with a lesson about how actors aren't their characters. That's something even adults could stand to learn. But as always, hindsight's 20/20. We were really lucky to get this little piece of history saved in an online format.
The other day a homeless person beat an Olympian (Kim Glass) in the head with a piece of metal and almost blinded the woman for life. Pure evil zombie. Not being aware of the face value of those around you is the first of many mistakes that Witchcraft and those who worship false gods have sought to indoctrinate into an entire generation of youth. Like the story of the woman and the snake, well meaning people have become anesthetized and completely unaware of anything that may be a danger to their lives, by following the directions of those who make evil the victim and darkness appear to be light. Those who are practicing wolves in sheep's clothing always prey on the naivete of the young and unaware. Pointing to the harmless things as being the most harmful, and always ready to provide endless examples of sheep in wolves clothing and implying that wrong is right has always been the slick tactic of the truly diabolical ones who run with the devil.
Three grails for me 1- NC-17 cut of Mrs. Doubtfire 2. The missing subplot of Planes, Trains and Automobiles 3. The Mickey & Minnie short that was made for Walt for a birthday of his, that showed Mickey & Minnie “consummating their relationship” which got two animators fired on the spot.
Hearing about this episode being lost for so long, constantly hearing that it will never be found, it feels so strange and surreal that it's now publicly available
SQUEEE! I totally remember seeing this Sesame Street when I was in first grade. Kids with working-moms went to this after-school daycare place and they'd play Sesame Street on the TV before outside-playtime. I remember thinking it was odd that what should seem like a Halloween episode of Street would be airing in winter. OMG playtime was LIIIIIIT! I vividly remember one girl got a hold of a broom and we made a game of wicked-witch freeze-tag and also were all in trouble for taking the kitchen-broom out on the dirty playground.
When I watched this after the leak, I was at work with a coworker who has a pretty gruff personality. He and I were working on making a copy so that it wouldn't be lost again. Without telling him about the history, he volunteered, "I can see this frightening my 5 year old girl. It's got a creepy vibe to it." And I agreed, because even though it didn't scare me, the music, lighting, and effects certainly were odd.
There was more drama involved than I realized. Great monologue, it made me laugh a few times at how you delivered certain lines. Hopefully more lost footage is released(looking at you, Black Cauldron).
I should also add that the episode could've easily scared kids back then because they tended to be a lot more sheltered due to not having tv! As you said, most of the kids during the testing were just shocked to have a colored tv to watch it on. My mom grew up in that era, and as an adult now, she's amazed how sheltered she was. She only got to watch TV for an hour or two on the weekends. She didn't even know what the F word was until she was 15. In fact, she was terrified of the Wizard of Oz growing up. Even though she's 53 now, she still refuses to watch that movie. Granted, this may not be the case for every family (because my family were Southern Baptists, and that tends to be very strict), but I think that could be the case more than anything. Kids back then weren't exposed to ElsaGate youtube videos, 24/7 news, hypersexualized or hyperviolent tv shows/music/commercials. That's just how it was.
I don't understand how people can be scared of the wicked witch. The Witch seems pretty hilarious me. They remind me of a cartoon villain from the 90s So I guess your sheltered theory makes sense
@@alchemistofsteel8099 because she looks like a scary old woman. Normal kids hate scary old women, the type that pinch your arm and beat you with sticks.
This Sesame Street episode aired in 1976, when TVs were ubiquitous even among poor people. I was born in the late 60s and didn’t know ANYONE who did not have a TV at home.
@@jankk I also grew up at that time. We had zero money and always had a TV. I did have a friend that did not have one. But her family was not poor. They were just kind of hippy dippy weird. And though I watched plenty of TV, I was scared to death of that witch for years and the flying monkeys even more.
Your mom was abnormally sheltered. Everyone had a TV, rarely black & white. The issue was not kids being scared of this episode. It was pearl-clutching religious types imposing their “satanic panic” worldview on Sesame Street.
This makes me think of a book about a boy going to see a chiropractor, and on the way he meets a bent, crabby old witch. He takes her broom and runs off, and she eventually catches up with him to the clinic, whrre she also gets (albeit forcibly) chiropracted on. In the end her back is perfectly straight and she has a big smile.
As a kid in the 70's, I remember Margaret Hamilton doing those Maxwell House coffee commercials and I knew she played the Wicked Witch. I think I was more fascinated that she just came across as a normal 'grandma' type and didn't seem mean at all in the commercials, so I was never scared of The Wicked Witch as a kid, then again, I was always fascinated by 'behind the scenes' of movies, so I knew it was all just an illusion. I remember wanting to be one of those lucky kids who got to appear on Sesame Street (or Wonderama at least).
Kinda related as lost Sesame Street media, my first look at the show was courtesy of the CBS Evening news late in 1969 (I think) while I was in the first grade. My dad was watching the news and he called me over, watching a behind the scenes segment of the making of Sesame Street. So before I watched a single episode, I saw the puppeteers manipulating muppets and a young man in Big Bird’s costume. If I recall, they showed Oscar being performed as well and in another clip, two performers on wheeled chairs acting with muppets (probably Henson and Oz). Yeah, I had no illusions when I saw the actual show.
Unreasonable mass hysteria, overprotective parents and inherent bias. Any of those may have been a force that shunned this episode from the public eye for all these years. Fortunately, until now.
I seriously doubt that many kids (even in 1976) found this episode very frightening. I’m sure a few were, but I’m sure a majority of the backlash was from overzealous Evangelical Christians, who didn’t like the show’s message about being nice to everyone… even Witches.
My question is, why was Sesame Workshop so adamant on keeping this from the public? Margaret Hamilton was an ironic actress and had a large fanbase. This episode didnt do anything to discredit Seaseme Street or Margaret. It was footage of an actress reprising a role she was famous for
Bro, this was MASSIVE. I remember seeing all of it blow up that fateful day. Oscar was really trying hard to get some of that Wicked Wussy and that was the funniest part imo. Still, one of the greatest finds in history. If we could only see that Snuffy one.
The good news is that the one of Snuffy does still exist and was found in the same place as this one. The original masters of both episodes from the CTW archives are now in possession of the Library of Congress.
Greatest finds in history? King Tut's tomb. The Rosetta Stone. The Dead Sea scrolls. Pompeii. Those were historical finds, this was an episode of a kids tv show.
I remember this vividly. It's great to finally see it again and to know that my brain was not fabricating Ms. Hamilton's appearance on Sesame Street from fragments of her appearance on Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. The way the two shows handled the wicked witch should be part of a course in children's television production.
I saw this episode as a kid. I'd already seen the Wizard of Oz before, where witch literally scared me to tears. I enjoyed her on Sesame Street because I'd already seen her in the movie.
My favorite part about all this: it was never discovered who did the hack and leak, there's someone out in the world who now has an amazing deathbed confession.
Something interesting about this is that the full episode included a segment from Roosevelt Franklin. The segment where he talks about "the difference between sitting down and standing up". That sketch was already documented, but it was used in this episode the whole time.
I remember seeing the episode of Mr. Rogers as a small child back in the late 70s..now having the actual date it 1st aired, I realized it was a rerun. Very cool!
I was born on July 28th 1975 and I totally remembered this episode, didn't bother me , I lived in a bad Brooklyn NY ghetto, and something like this would have never phased me , and you're 1000% wrong, we were a million times tougher than kids today! I still can't believe the narrator said that? Weird? We played with Hammers 🔨 and knives when I was a kid, I know I lived in the Hood but I bet my small town 70s and 80s counterparts would agree with me, let's see?
I was scared of the witch from the wizard of oz as a very young child. I could see how a witch threatening to turn big bird into a feather duster would be scary to a kid
I watched the episode and Margaret Hamilton is such a freaking legend and badass. She's SO good at what she does being terrifying that it's so effective towards her audience. She's so good that it got this episode banned, lol. I mean, even Big Bird was going to beat her ass with a bat and hockey stick in the episode, so yeah! 😆 My mind was blown when in the episode she turned into a regular cute old lady as a disguise and her voice was so soft and sweet (entirely the opposite of her witch voice). It's like she can change into character like flipping a switch. May she rest in peace. 🔮💚🖤👠
I hate she got typecast but I don’t believe anyone could have played her role as brilliantly as she did. A kind hearted woman who loved kids, forever know as an evil witch is quite poetic even if it is a bit sad. Her work in the movie is part of so many childrens lives, my own included.
You know, I haven't seen the episode, but it sounds a "lot" more like the darker tone of *SEVERAL* of the "Sesame Street Live" shows when I was a kid in the 90's. They were just overall much darker than your average Sesame Street episode, probably to help the parents sit through them, to the calibur of things like Big Bird being cursed with spots that also make him ill in one of them by an alien queen.
I actually remember parts of that episode, I was 9 years old and sesame street was the daily babysitter back then. but my mother absolutely loved Margaret Hamilton from her theatrical work and I remember her making a huge deal out of her appearance, going on and on about Broadway this and theater that, and I'm sitting there wondering how long it took her to fly that broom all the way to sesame street from her wizard of oz castle.
You have no idea how excited my gf and I were when we first heard that this episode was found!! (Along with how fast we saved the episode, just in case.)
This is one of the last pieces of lost media I expected to be seen. It’s a little messed up that everyone betrayed the Sesame Street team’s trust but aye.
Fred Rogers brought Margaret Hamilton to PBS both as herself but also as a character in the land of make believe... a sweet, friendly Witch named "Margaret H. Witch". He had no problems over it...none that he couldn't handle, anyway. Fred Rogers seemed to have done a much better job of bringing Margaret and kids together. Maybe Sesame Street was just unlucky enough to have aired their episode during the years of the satanic panic...which, even though it didn't get rolling big until the 80's, got started in the late 70's. Parents were already grilling their teens about their music choices...starting to find reasons to ban certain books from school libraries...getting REAL anxious about anything even vaguely supernatural...and feeling real, real suspicious of any d & d groups. Some of the political mommies whose organizations became so influential in the 80's got a lot of their confidence from easy victories like this one. They killed a Sesame Street episode and felt omnipotent...so, naturally, they kept looking for more stuff to ban, ruin, and misunderstand. All in the name of protecting the innocent.
So I've been in the lost media scene since about 2015(around the time Rude Removal was found) and this is one piece that I've been the most fascinated by (ranking up there with the Conflict episodes of Mr. Rogers) and when I heard it was found I was ecstatic. Personally I don't think it's that scary, but I am a 24 year old adult but I can definitely understand why kids would've frightened
Especially in the 1970s when kids hadn't been exposed to much scary stuff. It's like how some horror movies that used to be considered scary would be considered tame now
I really wanna know why they kept it locked up for SO long. Yeah it scared kids when it first aired but that was decades ago. I can get why they wouldn’t stick it in the same playlist as the rest of the episodes in case it scares kids again, but they seemed to just. Refuse to publicly release it under any circumstance. Did they think another civil war would break out if it was publicly available?
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The way Mr. Rogers handled it doesn't surprise me. He was passionate about stressing the difference between fiction and reality to children.
This isn’t Mr Rogers - it’s Sesame Street.
@@Demille40 2:30
I actually think it's pretty sad how Margaret Hamilton wanted to go on kids shows to show she wasn't scary, and then sesame Street just makes her look extra scary
Tbh she wasn't even that scary.. like compared to the original movie her character is much softer
She doesn't look extra scary her make up isn't even done all the way up.
Makes her look extra scary and then makes the scenes of her looking scary completely infamous as an eerie lost media case
They never mentioned that there was an equal amount of kids who liked this episode. Alot of kids also thought it was funny
Margaret Hamilton wound up becoming good friends with Mr. Rogers after her appearance on his show. And it happened purely by accident when Mr. Rogers found out someone else in the Mr. Rogers Neighborhood cast knew her. This person introduced them and they remained friends for the rest of their lives.
Cool❤
I believe that was Betty Aberlin, though I could be mistaken.
She actually slobber him off innumerable times
"We have truly entered a new era of lost media."
I can personally agree with that. One of my first experiences with lost media was a Japanese film called "Yume Yume no Ato (Dream, After Dream)." It was released in 1980 and contained a soundtrack performed by Journey. Despite looking online for its existence, only stills and promotional images existed. That is until most of the film was released in February of this year. From what the uploader stated in the description, the beginning and ending are intact. However, the movie is 30 minutes shorter, theorized to be a tv edit. Regardless, it's fascinating to see many lost media come to light as we progress through the 2020s.
I’ve heard about this episode so many times, I’m actually in shock that someone found the episode! This is big!
They didn't find it, they went into the archive and ran off a copy. This happens ALL THE TIME.
Does the internet have to ruin everything with an explanation can't people just have a good time and be in the moment? Whatever the origin isn't it nice that we have it to enjoy it again?
u do know that the JWT is in L2
@@kevingossett8881 LOL. Yes, truth and explanations are “ruining everything”. If by ruining, you mean dismantling misinformation.
Omg fr fr!!
She really was an amazing actress and was even burned during the shooting of (I believe) the first smokescreen and trap door on stage. They shot the fire a little too early and she was injured pretty bad. It was a different world back then. I'm sure that today, she would have largely been praised for her role.
everyone on that movie set was awful to Judy except Margaret.
I got a little emotional when you were talking about how much Margaret Hamilton loved kids and didn't want them to be afraid of her but they were for pretty much the rest of her life :( She sounds like she was such a sweet lady.
Its because oz was a subversion programming and the witch brought about darkness and confusion to the politically ignorant American before the Annihilation war in europe
The nicest people seems to to play the best villains.
Sadly, there is nothing we can do for her now that she would ever be aware of, but we can still do the next best thing: honor her legacy. We can show future generations her true self over the character she played. Mr Rogers probably gave her the only thing close to this in her living years, and to be fair it likely did improve her image to millions of children, and we can at least find some closure in the fact that she wasn't completely seen as monster when she left us and she found someone who was certainly a very good friend in Fred Rogers. And we can be led by his example, and not only validate her, but do the same for many others like her. That's probably exactly what she would want anyway.
That’s what I was gonna say
Yeah she sounds like an lovely lady and if she was still alive I would give her a hug if I could :(
I was 10 when this episode aired. I'd seen The Wizard of Oz every year, and I knew who Margaret Hamilton was - she guested on stuff all the time. I remember thinking how strange it was that Margaret Hamilton was still walking around dressed like The Wicked Witch, nearly 40 years after the movie. I could swear I'd seen the episode afterwards in re-runs, but I could be wrong. That was around the time I switched from watching kiddie comedy to watching Saturday Night Live adult comedy (SNL also had the Muppets, ironically LOL) I remember enjoying this episode and I'm kinda surprised it was banned. People are so silly, this was Great Art!
My mom remembered watching the episode when it aired (I don’t remember how old she was but at the time she was fairly young) and she remembered enjoying it cause she loved Wizard of Oz (since that was her favorite movie growing up as well as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and when she heard that this episode got banned she got confused. She said to me “Wait this episode got banned? I mean I get the episode had some scary stuff but it was pretty tame” but when I told her this episode got found she was grateful
I feel pretty bad for Margaret Hamilton, she didn't want kids to be scared of her and they were, people took the whole "wicked witch" thing way too seriously back then, and even Sesame Street couldn't give her a "the witch learns to be nice and everyone else learns not to judge people based on their appearance" sort of episode. It must really hurt to think "I'll go on this kids show that's renowned for being nice and positive and happy and hopefully kids won't be as afraid of me or the 'wicked witch' any more" and then the episode you're in is banned due to the backlash it got from parents and considered lost for decades. At least she had Mr. Rogers in her corner...
Sounds like bs. If she didn't want that, she shouldn't have done it.
At least she and Mr Rogers remains friends for the rest of their lives.
@@alexvids9232 that wasn't how the contracts worked in the 30s. You played the part you were given or you risked not being cast again until your contract ended. End of career.
@@alexvids9232 wtf? That’s the equivalent of telling someone they’re at fault for not being able to tell the future. “Wow, you’re so dumb, you shouldn’t have taken that job. Don’t you know that something that isn’t that scary would scare a bunch of children & their parents would be so incompetent that they wouldn’t be able to comfort their children properly, and you’d never be able to act w/o that random stigma again?”.
I remember that episode. It was great. It made me wonder why so many adults were upset about witches... didnt they know they werent real? Lol 😅
As a huge fan of Oz, I was quite glad to see this finally resurface. Personally, my holy grails for lost media are the Fairylogue and Radio-Plays film, the King Kong spider pit scene, London After Midnight, and the remaining lost Dr. Who episodes. Considering how coveted they are and have been, I think it unlikely they will turn up, though I'd be very glad to be proven wrong.
Personally I'd never thought this would be found due to how secretive CTW was about the episode and the backlash it sparked
@@chayden153 to be fair, this one es know to be hoarded media not being released but privately screened aswell as multiple copies existing in prestige condition, it was only a matter of time before footage from the library of congress or sesame workshop would leak online
Has there ever been lost media that was considered "completely lost forever" that was later found? After so long we finally got the Wicked Witch episode so I'm inclined to think "never say never" in regards to the future
I'd say media that was recorded during the time where studios simply recorded over their tapes to record new content is very likely lost forever, this being back when technology like VHS devices were fairly new and expensive, and thus rare probably fits that bill the most. But you're right, there are always surprising finds and holy grails being discovered all the time. You just never know where and when something is gonna pop up.
The best example I can think of is some old Doctor Who episodes. The BBC used to just reuse tapes whenever they needed one, and home recording wasn't really a thing in the 60s so there were episodes that were assumed to be completely lost, but copies of some of them meant for overseas broadcasts have since been found in tv stations in other countries.
I would say stuff people never thought to record- or from a era before easy recording...like early tv ads or early tv broadcasts as a whole. Or, if you consider written media, old scrolls and books! Libraries of information and stories lost to time and war.
i still think the fact we got the Christine Chubbuck audio is up there
Old silent films have a history of being considered completely lost, but then turning up in private collections from other countries.
i felt really bad for the actress people hated her for doing her job. i think she really did a great job, i hope the actress was another chance to handle a different role.
Yes, and this reminds me of a similar situation, the actress who played Harriet Oleson in Little House on the Prairie. She played such a mean lady on the show, but the actress was reputedly a lovely person in real life. Nonetheless, she and the actress who played Nellie Oleson were despised by kids, because they played their roles so effectively.
I wish Sesame Street had done a better job to show Margaret Hamilton was really a nice person, not to be confused with her acting as a witch in a movie. It would have been a great teaching moment for kids to learn this.
I remember hearing about this via BlameItOnJorge's old children's lost media list a very long time ago, and seeing it finally revealed is strange..? It's strange how lost media can resurface for unknown reasons
I also rememeber when I saw that video also.
@@HitchhikingHatbox cope
@@HitchhikingHatbox Everything about this is wrong; you're thinking about the AAPB website (which is actually not where this particular copy of the episode came from) which people were just ripping episodes off of. There was no signatures or anything involved.
Yeah I watched the "found" episode like a year ago. You guys are slow on this part of youtube...
I had a silly dream about this episode airing on Sprout/PBS Kids Sprout one time
Her image and the way she acts as the Witch is so iconic that when the word "Witch" comes to mind, she is the first thing we all think of!
"Are they being waterboarded by Big Bird?"
I love how he just breezed past that joke without pausing. Makes it even funnier to me xD
The witch inventing t-posing was the one that got me, that caught me way off guard
Now i have the mental image of Big Bird getting waterboarded insted of that terrorist in a scene from the movie Zero Dark Thirty
I saw a movie once with many women who had breasts that inflated and they floated up.. this was on tv in Australia in the early 80s. Channel 7 if that's any help.. and I believe it was on during the middle of the day.
@@garystinten9339 Inflatable breasts not gonna lie that sounds kinky
😂 was looking for this comment to like, i laughed out loud.
I was 6 when this was on. It didn’t scare me, what scared the hell out of me was the first time I saw the Orange that sang Carmen. I remember screaming my lungs out and hiding behind the couch with my fingers in my ears whenever that thing came on during later episodes of Sesame Street. I don’t remember if it was the face flying off or something else which scared me, I just remember that it freaked me out more than anything else that I saw on TV as a little kid.
12:03 my working theory is that parents, who had been scared by The Wizard Oz themselves as kids jumped the gun and assumed their kids would be scared (like my dad was terrified of the trees and flying monkeys when they aired it on tv in the 60s, but as an 80s/90s kid, I really wasn't bothered. Except when Dorothy was crying at the end and the Witch taunts her).
My mam didn’t let me watch nightmare on elm street cause she remembered it being way more terrifying back when it came out, it was on tv around Halloween when i was 11 or 12 and the sfx were so bad I laughed at my mam for being afraid of it
@@Darceyab fucking same, my mother tried to bar me from watching robo cop cause her brother watched it when she was a kid and it freaked her out
@@tyedollasign4034 I think kids should be allowed to get at least a little scared lol
My ma was terrified of the Witch in the 70s and my conservative Italian Grandfather was even more scared of it at her age!
The Wizard of Oz scared the shit outta me in the 70s, but so did the Creature From the Black Lagoon and the old Wolfman movie. Times were different back then, but Pepperidge Farm remembers!
My grandfather is Caroll Spinney (who plays big bird and Oscar on sesame street) and every time I go to his house I would see a signed photo of Oscar and the wicked witch on one of the walls. Finding out that photo has so much history is crazy
Hey! My most favorite moments of your grandfather's characters are when they were shown with Northern Calloway who of course gave us David, I love him so much. This one here may be my most favorite. ruclips.net/video/bARE6XMF6-c/видео.html (smiles) Thank you so much for your grandfather's contribution to the show. (hug) God bless you and your family always!!! Holly in east TN
Your grandfather is an absolute icon
One of the things that I loved about the character design of The Wicked Witch was how they created such a great silhouette with her. The black and the pointy hat made her tall enough to be imposing but lithe and spindly like a spider or a shadow. So much was done phenomenally in that movie.
Exactly!
Can you imagine what cinema would've been like if MGM had gone with their original choice of making the witch a Bette Davis esque vamp
I think it's scary because she's so good in that role. As a kid seeing The Wizard Of Oz, she terrified me. She's almost too real.
I saw it when it aired in 1976! I was just a toddler but my mother tells me I wasn't scared, she also remembers it because it had the witch in it. It was great seeing it as an adult considering all I remembered was the broom LOL.
Also.. we absolutely are the generation raised on Watership Down. It's just Watership Down wasn't out yet. Never forget CBS aired that and the animated Hobbit as "kids specials".
I wasn’t scared of her as a kid either, maybe because all the painted sets and backgrounds tipped me off and reminded me it wasn’t real
The animated Hobbit movie traumatized me worse than seeing this very weird episode as a child. Plus the others, plus Charlotte's Web.. "Charlotte! CHARLOTTE!!" I can still hear Wilbur's heartbreak 😨😟😩😭
@@catwhisperer9524 Oh I feel that. The Hobbit scared me bad and Charlotte's web... that part still gets me right in the gut.
@@catwhisperer9524 Charlotte's Web still gets me to this day. As well as the quote at the end of the movie
I was a baby that year so I never saw it, but I wasn't afraid of her as a kid, either, because my mom was a fan so I only heard nice things about her.
Margaret Hamilton: "I don't want to scare kids with this character."
Hollywood: "Lets traumatize some children!"
It’s a huge win for everyone!!!
Now if only Snuffy’s parents get a divorce can get found, but that’s extremely unlikely
That was more of a test episode I would be surprised if they archived it
@@daxmoney5011 I've seen clips from it on here and I'm sure it was shown during that lost and found event so it could be on the cards
I mean it says in the video it was archived in that library
@@EXTRAT3RRESTRIAL but wouldn't snuffy have come out with wicked witch if it was there because if you want to cement your place in Lost Media history wouldn't you kill two white whales with one harpoon?
_SPGaD_ isn’t lost… But because of the red tape around it, a wide release is unlikely. Perhaps an online release on the parents section on a SW website (so as to not be stumbled upon by kids, if it’s as bad as they claim.) A home media release would be lit but I guess Sesame doesn’t like money. Lol. 🤡
Hopefully, interest in the episode will lead to it to be allowed to be streamed so other people can get a chance to see it & maybe reevaluate the controversy around the episode or heck even use it as a teaching moment, as her story shows how important it is to separate an actor/actress from the characters they portray, which Mr. Rogers clearly understood the importance of!
Adults: "THIS IS EVIL, THIS IS AN OUTRRAGE, THIS IS HORRIBLE, IT'S BAD, IT SHOULD NEVER BE SHOWN!!!"
Kids: "Wow, look at her green skin!! Awesome!"
It almost makes me think the parents who originally claimed their kids were scared were lying so they could justify their anger
@@CaptainJZH I am actually surprised the parents reacted the way they did. Back then, we routinely watched things that were more traumatic.
@@documentmedic9385 Tbf, the 70s was the peak era of stay-at-home moms getting mad at what their kids were watching and organizing letter writing campaigns and whatnot - to the point that most shows had to be super sanitized with what they couldn't show
It wasn't until the 1980s when TV was largely deregulated and the recession meant more parents had to work full time and could no longer afford to spend all that time getting mad at stuff
@@CaptainJZH you're lost me now, we just have different ppl get mad at stuff now, way more than before if anything
Heh, children
Man, the shot of David weeping in fear of her return, being consoled by the others, is powerful. And the electric guitar music. This is dark stuff!
I watched this after it was found, and honestly I found it really funny. I liked Margaret's over the top mannerisms and attitude, it was so cartoonishly hilarious but genuine. But maybe that's just cause I'm an adult 🤷🏻
Also when I told my friend (who isn't into lost media) about this they were like "that's your holy grail? Lol 😆". But I think it's cool :)
I feel the same! I watched it with my mom, and we had a blast.
i watched it myself, but my mom also saw it
nah....kids loved her
i was one of those kids
How did I watch this? It aired Before I was born!
I am 61 and NEVER knew about this!!!! HOW? lol. Thanks so much for showing and sharing this 'little tease' but now made us all want to find this! Stay GREEN! I am going to share this on my Horrortube channel....do you mind?
Richard
The part where you say "people dont understand how kids found this scary" has alot to do with modern HD vs old tube television broadcasts/VCR recordings being low quality. Alot of old media seems to look more disturbing when not in HD.
"Being alone in a room isn't scary if ALL the lights are on".
That witch was scary as crap in the movie. I wouldn't have wanted to see her anywhere else. The whole idea was stupid. What next, the lady from the bathroom scene in the Shining?
There’s no mystery here.
The WWofW was no different than any of the other countless things in the world that could be perceived as
scary . As a child of the 60s I was fully aware of the Wizard of Oz . Before it became available on VHS in the mid 80s this movie was aired once a year on prime time television and was considered “ can’t miss television” everyone I knew and I presume millions of other Americans had it circled in that weeks issue of TV Guide from day one .
In my house it was the only event of any type capable of getting my brother , sister and I all into our pajamas and on the couch with a blanket and popcorn with an unspoken agreement to refrain from anything known to end events and/ or lead to a spanking where we would sit and watch the Holy Grail of childrens television intently in “ Living color” the words spoken by an announcer that would let you know what was about to be broadcasted and that it would be in color for those viewing on a color television which was only some percentage of the audience.
We were never particularly scared of the Witch back then. As anyone who watched that movie ,in a time when slow moving Mummies and Martians were considered scary will tell you , it was the Flying Monkees that induced true fear in every child watching.
They still creep me out today.
For me and many others the movie Halloween marked the moment that the bar for scary was raised significantly for movies and television and the ever increasing violence in the world slowly began to numb our sensitivities and make those things that scared us back then seem ridiculous in 2022.
It’s not possible to be frightened by any Witch or Flying Monkees in a world where we watch wars, mass murders and extreme violence on the daily news and extreme violence and sexuality on our televisions
It's like older games being scarier, the lack of image quality leaves more to the imagination. Even some games that weren't intended to be scary just have this ominous feeling to them
Watched all the seventies episode's with my sister's kids when they were young. This WGBH Production forever won our hearts and memories, sure miss those fantastic days!
Lost media is something that I've been interested in for years. The concept of media that has been lost in time, and the attempts to recover it, have always been interesting to me. One of the most prominent pieces of lost media, wherever I went, was a Sesame Street episode, said to star the Wicked Witch of The West from The Wizard of Oz. Personally, I never thought the episode would ever be found, but I'll be damned, I woke up this morning, to find that this episode, one sought after for years, has finally been found, and all mystery circulating it can end.
I don't like this comment :(
11:30 You have no idea how hard I laughed at that. That was the best laugh I had all week. Thank you.
"Wiccans concerned about the stereotyping of Witches" that's the last thing caught me off guard.
Wiccans* but is someone gonna tell Christians who hate witches, that lots of those who practice it are religious and use it for good? An infamous one used her practices to solve a murder.
@@roxassora2706 "Christians who hate witches" One, stop generalizing Christians. A Christian shouldn't have any hate in their heart for anyone. Two, magic is not anyone's to play with. I'll be the person to tell _you_ that Sh*t comes back to bite you every time, objective good or objective bad!!! Especially if you do anything incorrectly. Even though it isn't as "powerful" as people think, it's still not something people should use. Ever. This is coming from a former Wiccan (myself, I repented and came back to the Christian faith).
@@NotFckingBen OP literally said "Christians who hate witches", talking about certain Christians who hate witches. They never said all Christians hate witches, THAT'S generalizing.
@@NotFckingBen all of this aside, I’m glad to hear the last part.
That's actually a really common thing, and a legitimate issue.
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS VIDEO ( EVERYTHING MATTERS BUT NOTHING MOVES )
One of the things I enjoy about your channel is just how enthusiastic and genuinely excited you are about lost media. I have a casual interest but your enthusiasm feeds my own!
Honestly, I don't think the kids were scared in 1976. I think the mothers got PTSD and flashbacks from their childhood and could not handle seeing their Freddy Kruger back on screen again and they complained on behalf of their kids.
I'm proud to see you finally found this episode, and I can finally say: the witch is my third favorite character after rocco and elmo
I know kids at the time were terrified, but I can't help but find her funny, because when she shows up and plays a mega distorted guitar it makes her look like a member of a metal band XD
Who's that in your pfp and what anime is it from I wanna watch it
@@Curlyheart I think thats from Komi Can't communicate.
@@tanith117 Thanks!
I’m 51 and can vaguely remember the Witch threatening to turn Big Bird into a feather duster. 😎
YES!! Episode 847 has finally been found after so many decades of being locked away!!
Haven't been on lost media for a while for this is big! I'm so glad it was found. Got to love how hard working people are in the Lost media Community! Cheers for hopefully more lost media :)
This is absolutely incredible! I remember watching lost media videos back in like 2016-17ish and seeing this and hoping it would be found; im so glad it finally has been!
I’m most looking forward to finding hitogata or some old 1910s/20s movies I think :D
The Holy Grail of lost footage is Vampira's horror show, broadcast in LA from 1955-56, which was the inspiration for the Elvira reboot 25 years later. It set the precedent for horror movie hosts on TV and inspired countless other horror movie shows across the country.
I hope people are actively archiving this so it doesn't become lost again.
Oh, they are. Don't worry
I have a copy. I am putting it on Internet Archive.
I have a copy of it that I downloaded on my computer.
@oskar ig well not always the case. The Phineas and Ferb Spot the Diff was lost, then found, then lost again (it's found again, but like cases like those happen from time to time).
@oskar ig Spot the Diff was a special that aired on Disney Channel. So, no. Videos can also get lost again
I like that you have been following this. It seems absurd to me that Sesame Street would bury this performance by a very well acclaimed actress after nearly 50 years. Really? What heck are they thinking? It’s simply unfair to the memory of Margret Hamilton. The Wicked Witch of the West scared me for about 2 minutes, and my mother pointed her out to me in an Addams Family rerun, and I never saw her as a witch again. I saw her as an actress. Another crime committed in the name of the “children”, who today, probably couldn’t care less about the Wizard of Oz.
Sesame Street was the first educational children's media that based their programming on research. So the reason makes sense in that regard. However, it shouldn't be this difficult to find.
It's ironic that in Hollyweird throughout history most of the actors that portray villains turn out to be the nicest people in real life and many who play heroes or superheroes might as well be called villains in real life.
We both think about Ezra Miller, right?
It seems those most concerned with being loved or accepted are the worst at being human beings.
outside appearances are often deceiving.
So freakin true. A big villain on The Walking Dead turns out to be super chill and openly/casually religious in real life.
Then you've got brave, stunning actors who will literally fire staff for looking at them.
@@GownoPrawdaTV1 HAHAHAHA SO DID I!
HI I would like to say that I know of a piece of Lost Media that nobody in the world seems to remember except me. When I was a kid, age 12 or under, not sure exactly how old but around there, it was in the early 1970's, no later than 1977, that there was a G rated family movie called Dondi, based on a Sunday newspaper comic strip. There was and still remains a black and white 1961 version of the film, but that one I have never seen except to check out clips of it. The one I am talking about played in the theater in the early half of the 1970's and was definitely in color. I still recall a crazy chase scene where the villain's of the movie are chasing Dondi through what I remember to be a large shopping mall because a large crowd of people and escalators were involved . I know it was a new movie at the time and that it was called Dondi because I never heard that name before and asked my parents who he was and they told me he was from the Sunday comics in the newspaper. I always remembered that unique name of his so it stuck with me. I also recall that a few years after it was shown in the movie theaters it was in reruns a handful of times throughout the years on regular tv and possibly on Cinema 100, ( the first cable tv of its kind in my area). To this day I can't find any info on IMDB or anywhere else on the internet regarding this movie that I have seen at least 3 times in my life that has now disappeared into thin air. Why nobody has ever heard of it just baffles me as it was pretty popular when it first came out. For some reason I seem to associate it coming out when Bugsy Malone did in 1976.
can see why children at the time were scared of it but as an teenanger/adult who grew fond of Margaret performance reparsing her role as the wicked witch brings a smile to them
That performance as the wicked witch was one of THE BEST performances ever given on screen... Acting truly was ACTING back in those days and a performer had to truly poor everything into an acting part! Sad story about a good lady and actor. She truly scared kids and the image of a bad/evil girl on TV was never ever done onscreen. I was a kid when I saw the movie and STILL remember her performance to THIS DAY some 40 years later... No performance on screen has that ever topped!
Glad someone else thought that hideous electric guitar squeal was a bad choice. I get they probably couldn't have used the real Witch leitmotif from the movie, but they certainly could have made some sort of sound-a-like. A playful sounding music riff, rather than "Hey! Let's just step on an electric guitar and record whatever sound it makes." And quite honestly, it feels like a lot of strange writing choices were made in this episode. Really feels that David should have said "if you ask for it nicely, you can have it," and the whole incident unfolds because she's a villain and the villain's code forbids asking for things nicely or something like that. Or at least at the end the Witch being confounded that all it took was asking for it back politely. Something about the episode feels like it needed a redemption of the Witch somehow. I mean, look at how sweetly she reacted when Oscar said she was beautiful. Also, low key, the lost "Surprise" segment was also found. It just didn't get the press or the following this episode had, but it was something highly sought after by the Sesame Street preservationists.
Yeah. I don't think the writers of this episode got their message across very well. At the beginning of the episode, David refuses to give the broom back to the witch because, if I'm remembering right, the witch needs to first treat him with "respect" and "dignity". Well, that sends a bad message to kids in that it's telling them you get to keep someone's property if the owner of that property is rude or disrespectful to you. That's not the way life works. You're obligated to give back someone's property even if that person says to you, 'Give it to me!'. I understand the situation would be different if it was between a parent and child, or teacher and student, like when a parent takes a child's toy away. But here the situation is between two adult strangers. I think they should have made it where the witch loses her broom, and she needs the help of Sesame Street to find it. At first, she would be rude and mean, so no one helps her. Only by being nice and polite, using good manners, does she ultimately make friends, who then help her to find the broom. I think the problem with this episdoe is that the writers stayed too true to witch's character as she was in the Wizard of Oz, that is to say, wicked and unredeemable. They would have been better off having the witch show some goodness for once, and I'm sure Margaret Hamilton would have appreciated too.
@@thehighllama8101 It also seems to be missing something without the insert segments breaking it up to let the street scenes breathe. It feels like something's missing seeing it all together, like there was a longer scene here or another scene there. I understand what they're going for. This is all a wacky misunderstanding that got out of control, and I think that angle could have worked if there was another draft. That said, I absolutely love the scene with Oscar being in love with the Witch, and I wish that was explored a little more. That and the part where she turns into a sweet old lady, but basically chokes on politely asking for her broom back really seem like a good moment of "Maybe she's not bad after all," that really should have been explored a little better.
It would have been great if Oscar helped change the witch's heart, even if inadvertently. In other words, he demonstrates love and kindness to her, which inspires her to show genuine kindness to others. I mean, in the episode, Oscar did inadvertently inspire the witch, but it was to deceive. It would have been great (and a bit ironic) if Oscar inspired her to be a genuinely better person. Anyway, yes, this episode demonstrates the importance of revising drafts. Seems like the writers here just didn't completely think things through.
Hands down the best account to get lost media information and the only one I will listen to. Love your enthusiasm and narration style.
The real holy grail would be finding “saved from the Titanic” over 100 years old, linked to a subject people are interested in and copies are rumoured to exist.
Lost early films are not holy grails, they're a whole Atlantis
@@Henrex2000 they aren’t even Atlantis’ they’re Excaliburs.
I feel the Lost Spider Pit from the 1932 King Kong would rank hire for me
when I heard about this being found I got goosebumps! It's so amazing it was found
contact terminal brain cancer
@@Mastrrone contact terminal 60< views per video. Oh wait....
All we need now is the smoking gun video of shooter behind the picket fence in Kennedy assasination
I was so scared by the film, and in facing my fear, I discovered what I wanted to be . I wanted to create characters that could make people actually believe who they were, so I became a Special Effects Makeup Artist. If I wasn't so scared, I would never have sought to find out what was behind it. This show WAS my childhood, and taught me so much. One of the most important messages was the diversity of the cast of this show and "The Electric Company". It showed a kid who grew up where everyone looked alike, that there are people who look different, but that we're all the same. I'll never forget the death of Mr. Hooper episode and how they taught me how to deal with losing a friend. If I had one wish, It would be to be able to give Jim Henson a hug and to tell him what this all meant to millions of kids.
Had fun that night after downloading the episode from Reddit. Haven't watched a Sesame Street episode in 20 years but this was well worth it.
Same! Then saved it on to my Google drive
9:28 I'm sorry I laughed but "Snuffy's Parents Get a Divorce" sounds like the title of a parody episode lol
I remember being scared of the Wicked Witch when I was little, so I get where the kiddos were coming from. I feel like Sesame Street missed an opportunity to make an episode about not judging by appearances. Something like Margaret Hamilton coming to town and everyone being scared of her because of the role she played and them slowly making friends when they realize she's not as mean as the witch is. It ends with a lesson about how actors aren't their characters. That's something even adults could stand to learn. But as always, hindsight's 20/20.
We were really lucky to get this little piece of history saved in an online format.
Love the name
@@UrMomsChauffer Thanks!
I love your idea. Too bad they didn't do something like that.
The other day a homeless person beat an Olympian (Kim Glass) in the head with a piece of metal and almost blinded the woman for life. Pure evil zombie.
Not being aware of the face value of those around you is the first of many mistakes that Witchcraft and those who worship false gods have sought to indoctrinate into an entire generation of youth.
Like the story of the woman and the snake, well meaning people have become anesthetized and completely unaware of anything that may be a danger to their lives, by following the directions of those who make evil the victim and darkness appear to be light.
Those who are practicing wolves in sheep's clothing always prey on the naivete of the young and unaware.
Pointing to the harmless things as being the most harmful, and always ready to provide endless examples of sheep in wolves clothing and implying that wrong is right has always been the slick tactic of the truly diabolical ones who run with the devil.
kinda like the mr rogers one?
Three grails for me
1- NC-17 cut of Mrs. Doubtfire
2. The missing subplot of Planes, Trains and Automobiles
3. The Mickey & Minnie short that was made for Walt for a birthday of his, that showed Mickey & Minnie “consummating their relationship” which got two animators fired on the spot.
@IncognitoNX I beg to differ. Like the topic of the video, it’s the stuff of urban legend. And probably buried deep in the bowels of the Disney vault.
@IncognitoNX this is the kind of legend I’m talking about. It’s hope that’s keeping my fingers crossed.
Hearing about this episode being lost for so long, constantly hearing that it will never be found, it feels so strange and surreal that it's now publicly available
SQUEEE! I totally remember seeing this Sesame Street when I was in first grade. Kids with working-moms went to this after-school daycare place and they'd play Sesame Street on the TV before outside-playtime. I remember thinking it was odd that what should seem like a Halloween episode of Street would be airing in winter. OMG playtime was LIIIIIIT! I vividly remember one girl got a hold of a broom and we made a game of wicked-witch freeze-tag and also were all in trouble for taking the kitchen-broom out on the dirty playground.
You are way too old to be talking like that.
My jaw dropped when I saw this man
Here's to finding more hyped up pieces of lost media!
When I watched this after the leak, I was at work with a coworker who has a pretty gruff personality. He and I were working on making a copy so that it wouldn't be lost again. Without telling him about the history, he volunteered, "I can see this frightening my 5 year old girl. It's got a creepy vibe to it." And I agreed, because even though it didn't scare me, the music, lighting, and effects certainly were odd.
Finding this lost holy grail proves how big the lost media community is.
There was more drama involved than I realized. Great monologue, it made me laugh a few times at how you delivered certain lines. Hopefully more lost footage is released(looking at you, Black Cauldron).
I should also add that the episode could've easily scared kids back then because they tended to be a lot more sheltered due to not having tv!
As you said, most of the kids during the testing were just shocked to have a colored tv to watch it on.
My mom grew up in that era, and as an adult now, she's amazed how sheltered she was. She only got to watch TV for an hour or two on the weekends.
She didn't even know what the F word was until she was 15.
In fact, she was terrified of the Wizard of Oz growing up. Even though she's 53 now, she still refuses to watch that movie.
Granted, this may not be the case for every family (because my family were Southern Baptists, and that tends to be very strict), but I think that could be the case more than anything.
Kids back then weren't exposed to ElsaGate youtube videos, 24/7 news, hypersexualized or hyperviolent tv shows/music/commercials. That's just how it was.
I don't understand how people can be scared of the wicked witch. The Witch seems pretty hilarious me. They remind me of a cartoon villain from the 90s
So I guess your sheltered theory makes sense
@@alchemistofsteel8099 because she looks like a scary old woman. Normal kids hate scary old women, the type that pinch your arm and beat you with sticks.
This Sesame Street episode aired in 1976, when TVs were ubiquitous even among poor people. I was born in the late 60s and didn’t know ANYONE who did not have a TV at home.
@@jankk I also grew up at that time. We had zero money and always had a TV. I did have a friend that did not have one. But her family was not poor. They were just kind of hippy dippy weird. And though I watched plenty of TV, I was scared to death of that witch for years and the flying monkeys even more.
Your mom was abnormally sheltered. Everyone had a TV, rarely black & white. The issue was not kids being scared of this episode. It was pearl-clutching religious types imposing their “satanic panic” worldview on Sesame Street.
This makes me think of a book about a boy going to see a chiropractor, and on the way he meets a bent, crabby old witch. He takes her broom and runs off, and she eventually catches up with him to the clinic, whrre she also gets (albeit forcibly) chiropracted on. In the end her back is perfectly straight and she has a big smile.
As a kid in the 70's, I remember Margaret Hamilton doing those Maxwell House coffee commercials and I knew she played the Wicked Witch. I think I was more fascinated that she just came across as a normal 'grandma' type and didn't seem mean at all in the commercials, so I was never scared of The Wicked Witch as a kid, then again, I was always fascinated by 'behind the scenes' of movies, so I knew it was all just an illusion. I remember wanting to be one of those lucky kids who got to appear on Sesame Street (or Wonderama at least).
I'm shocked she never got a nose job
I'd argue that London After Midnight, Slamfest '99, and the lost Doctor Who episodes are the REAL Holy Grails of Lost Media.
Props to that anonymous person who somehow got and posted it on the internet
They are probably arrested at this point.
@@timbo303official9 Doubtful
Thank you, Julian Assange.
Kinda related as lost Sesame Street media, my first look at the show was courtesy of the CBS Evening news late in 1969 (I think) while I was in the first grade. My dad was watching the news and he called me over, watching a behind the scenes segment of the making of Sesame Street. So before I watched a single episode, I saw the puppeteers manipulating muppets and a young man in Big Bird’s costume. If I recall, they showed Oscar being performed as well and in another clip, two performers on wheeled chairs acting with muppets (probably Henson and Oz). Yeah, I had no illusions when I saw the actual show.
Unreasonable mass hysteria, overprotective parents and inherent bias. Any of those may have been a force that shunned this episode from the public eye for all these years. Fortunately, until now.
I seriously doubt that many kids (even in 1976) found this episode very frightening. I’m sure a few were, but I’m sure a majority of the backlash was from overzealous Evangelical Christians, who didn’t like the show’s message about being nice to everyone… even Witches.
No, I believe the kids really did respond that way
I think this was one of the first peices of lost media I've heard of. That was nearly a decade ago
There’s a missing silent film starring Babe Ruth. I’d like to see that. The original Back to the Future with Erik Stolz
My question is, why was Sesame Workshop so adamant on keeping this from the public? Margaret Hamilton was an ironic actress and had a large fanbase. This episode didnt do anything to discredit Seaseme Street or Margaret. It was footage of an actress reprising a role she was famous for
This would be a controlled release, big media know how to trigger the most attention when needed
A leo comment with three likes and no replies after two years? Lemme fix that
Bro, this was MASSIVE. I remember seeing all of it blow up that fateful day. Oscar was really trying hard to get some of that Wicked Wussy and that was the funniest part imo. Still, one of the greatest finds in history. If we could only see that Snuffy one.
The good news is that the one of Snuffy does still exist and was found in the same place as this one. The original masters of both episodes from the CTW archives are now in possession of the Library of Congress.
Greatest finds in history? King Tut's tomb. The Rosetta Stone. The Dead Sea scrolls. Pompeii. Those were historical finds, this was an episode of a kids tv show.
I remember this vividly. It's great to finally see it again and to know that my brain was not fabricating Ms. Hamilton's appearance on Sesame Street from fragments of her appearance on Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. The way the two shows handled the wicked witch should be part of a course in children's television production.
Wow June 18th was my birthday. This is a great present from the internet!
I saw this episode as a kid. I'd already seen the Wizard of Oz before, where witch literally scared me to tears. I enjoyed her on Sesame Street because I'd already seen her in the movie.
That’s wild, I just happened to watch a video about her appearance on Mr Rogers on Friday. Margaret Hamilton made a ton of movies in her day.
this gives me so much hope for other pieces of lost media. even stuff like the Sonic 1 Tokyo Toy Show demo might be out there!
The witch needs to find a way to assert her dominance and invents t-posing LMAOOOOO
Even back then it was the ultimate way to assert dominance
My favorite part about all this: it was never discovered who did the hack and leak, there's someone out in the world who now has an amazing deathbed confession.
Something interesting about this is that the full episode included a segment from Roosevelt Franklin. The segment where he talks about "the difference between sitting down and standing up". That sketch was already documented, but it was used in this episode the whole time.
I remember seeing the episode of Mr. Rogers as a small child back in the late 70s..now having the actual date it 1st aired, I realized it was a rerun. Very cool!
i like that you include the dog who played toto as one of the actors. its what they deserve
I was born on July 28th 1975 and I totally remembered this episode, didn't bother me , I lived in a bad Brooklyn NY ghetto, and something like this would have never phased me , and you're 1000% wrong, we were a million times tougher than kids today! I still can't believe the narrator said that? Weird? We played with Hammers 🔨 and knives when I was a kid, I know I lived in the Hood but I bet my small town 70s and 80s counterparts would agree with me, let's see?
Finale the holy grail of lost media has been founded after all theses years
I was scared of the witch from the wizard of oz as a very young child. I could see how a witch threatening to turn big bird into a feather duster would be scary to a kid
I watched the episode and Margaret Hamilton is such a freaking legend and badass. She's SO good at what she does being terrifying that it's so effective towards her audience. She's so good that it got this episode banned, lol. I mean, even Big Bird was going to beat her ass with a bat and hockey stick in the episode, so yeah! 😆
My mind was blown when in the episode she turned into a regular cute old lady as a disguise and her voice was so soft and sweet (entirely the opposite of her witch voice). It's like she can change into character like flipping a switch. May she rest in peace. 🔮💚🖤👠
Big Bird said "F around and find out!" 😂
I hate she got typecast but I don’t believe anyone could have played her role as brilliantly as she did. A kind hearted woman who loved kids, forever know as an evil witch is quite poetic even if it is a bit sad. Her work in the movie is part of so many childrens lives, my own included.
You know, I haven't seen the episode, but it sounds a "lot" more like the darker tone of *SEVERAL* of the "Sesame Street Live" shows when I was a kid in the 90's. They were just overall much darker than your average Sesame Street episode, probably to help the parents sit through them, to the calibur of things like Big Bird being cursed with spots that also make him ill in one of them by an alien queen.
Live--acronym for Evil...
I actually remember parts of that episode, I was 9 years old and sesame street was the daily babysitter back then. but my mother absolutely loved Margaret Hamilton from her theatrical work and I remember her making a huge deal out of her appearance, going on and on about Broadway this and theater that, and I'm sitting there wondering how long it took her to fly that broom all the way to sesame street from her wizard of oz castle.
You have no idea how excited my gf and I were when we first heard that this episode was found!! (Along with how fast we saved the episode, just in case.)
First time I’ve ever seen this channel. High quality video! Subscribed and looking forward to watching the other offerings from you guys 😁
This is one of the last pieces of lost media I expected to be seen. It’s a little messed up that everyone betrayed the Sesame Street team’s trust but aye.
Fred Rogers brought Margaret Hamilton to PBS both as herself but also as a character in the land of make believe... a sweet, friendly Witch named "Margaret H. Witch". He had no problems over it...none that he couldn't handle, anyway. Fred Rogers seemed to have done a much better job of bringing Margaret and kids together. Maybe Sesame Street was just unlucky enough to have aired their episode during the years of the satanic panic...which, even though it didn't get rolling big until the 80's, got started in the late 70's. Parents were already grilling their teens about their music choices...starting to find reasons to ban certain books from school libraries...getting REAL anxious about anything even vaguely supernatural...and feeling real, real suspicious of any d & d groups. Some of the political mommies whose organizations became so influential in the 80's got a lot of their confidence from easy victories like this one. They killed a Sesame Street episode and felt omnipotent...so, naturally, they kept looking for more stuff to ban, ruin, and misunderstand. All in the name of protecting the innocent.
So I've been in the lost media scene since about 2015(around the time Rude Removal was found) and this is one piece that I've been the most fascinated by (ranking up there with the Conflict episodes of Mr. Rogers) and when I heard it was found I was ecstatic. Personally I don't think it's that scary, but I am a 24 year old adult but I can definitely understand why kids would've frightened
Especially in the 1970s when kids hadn't been exposed to much scary stuff. It's like how some horror movies that used to be considered scary would be considered tame now
I really wanna know why they kept it locked up for SO long. Yeah it scared kids when it first aired but that was decades ago. I can get why they wouldn’t stick it in the same playlist as the rest of the episodes in case it scares kids again, but they seemed to just. Refuse to publicly release it under any circumstance. Did they think another civil war would break out if it was publicly available?