"The Winning Ticket" (1938) (Patreon)

Here’s another rare Captain and the Kids cartoon I decided to share on this Patreon—The Winning Ticket, released October 1, 1938. This time around, this entry features the aforementioned kids, Hans and Fritz, and pirate sea captain Long John Silver, voiced by Mel Blanc.

Besides the crew of animators mentioned in The Captain’s Pup, one of the new hires at the studio was Bill Nolan, a pioneering East Coast animator who partnered with Walter Lantz on the Oswald Rabbit cartoons at Universal years prior. (He had previously held a position at Charles Mintz’s studio— his signature loose drawing/animation can be seen in the 1936 Color Rhapsody The Merry Mutineers, animating on sequences with Bing Crosby and the Three Stooges, respectively.) In this cartoon, Nolan animates the scenes that play from 3:44-4:12.

This is sourced from a screen recording via the WatchTCM app, so the frame rate might not be ideal. However, this is one of a handful of Captain and the Kids cartoons not included as a bonus feature on DVD, which makes this quite a rarity in its decent picture quality.

There is no directorial credit for this cartoon. One theory might involve another new hire at the studio, Burt Gillett. Having been terminated from Disney’s, Fred Quimby hired Gillett in May 1938, but this stint was very brief—he left to work as a director at Walter Lantz’s studio, and was put on the payroll by September 26. (Thanks to Joe Adamson and Michael Barrier for this information.) Given the quick production schedule allotted for black-and-white cartoons, this seems possible, but there is no absolute confirmation to make this claim.