Der Hund Bohumil (partially found German Sandmännchen animated children's television series; 1975-1976)

A screenshot from the episode "Pilze Sammeln".

Status: Partially Found

Der Hund Bohumil (translated to English as Bohumil the Dog) is a German Animated Children's TV Series that was created and directed by the Czech book-illustrator and animation-designer Hana Štěpánová (known in Germany as Hana Stepan) and the music was composed by Heinz Funk, using a synthesizer, simulating a zither on many occasions. The series aired on the West German version of the German children's bedtime TV program "Sandmännchen" on NDR Fernsehen and HR Fernsehen from 1975-1976, and was produced by Studio Hamburg. The series used a stop-motion cut-out animation technique, with the hand-drawn characters being layed to the backgrounds and moved frame by frame. 22 episodes of Der Hund Bohumil are said to have been released and produced. As time passed, the series became extremely obscure, with no Home Media release being made for the series.

Premise

The series revolved around an anthropomorphic dog called Bohumil, who had a group of other anthropomorphic animal friends, such as a pig, a bunny, a cow, owls, a bird, and roosters. Bohumil's best friends are a chicken, who has five baby chicks, and a white goose. In each episode, Bohumil and his best friends go on adventures and learn basic lessons, like watching insects through a binocular and learning how to make the laundry. The series was simple: it had an approximately 3-minute run time in each episode, the series had no intro or credits, and all the characters in the series remained mute, with the animals communicating by doing sounds.

International Airings

Despite the series originally airing on the West German Sandmännchen for one year, the series aired internationally in Israel and in Brazil in children's TV programs that featured European cartoons from around the world. In Isreal, the series aired in "רכבת ההפתעות" from the '80s to the '90s. In Brazil, the series aired on "Glub Glub" throughout the '90s. In Brazil, the series gained a small cult following in Lost Media culture. The series also gained another small cult following in Mexico, when the Mexican YouTube channel, "Rarezas", uploaded a video discussing the series.

Reception

The series didn't have many good ratings. The bad ratings were due to the cheap animation and unsettling character designs. An example is in the episode "Ausflug in die Metzgerei". During a moment where Bohumil is eating a sausage, the camera angle cuts to a close-up of Bohumil, where he is eating the sausage with big unsettling eyes and a wide open mouth.

Status

For 39 years, the series wasn't available anywhere online. There was absolutely no information of the series on the Internet. In the 2000s and early 2010s, there were many people from Brazil that commented in several forums about watching the series on "Glub Glub". Despite some people from Brazil who remembered watching the series, the series wasn't watchable anywhere online. However, from 2014-2019, YouTube user "Nostalgic Dreamers (ND CHANNEL)" uploaded 14 episodes from the series that were taken from VHS Tapes of the "Glub Glub" broadcasts of the series. Nostalgic Dreamers (ND CHANNEL) was terminated in the early 2020s, so the videos aren't watchable, with the only surviving footage from the videos being from short clips from some of the videos that were shown in the YouTube video "Desenhos Perdidos da Tv Cultura 01 - Nicolau e a Turma do Quintal" that was uploaded by the YouTube channel "Nostal_Gi", which currently owns all the videos that were uploaded on Nostalgic Dreamers (ND CHANNEL).

On October 5th, 2019, a Lost Media Wiki Forum user "Strekoza" discovered a website documenting German TV channel schedules from April 15th, 1976, including an NDR Fernsehen airdate for a Der Hund Bohumil episode on Sandmännchen. On December 7th, 2019, YouTube user "Canal 8" uploaded the episode "Ein Tag an der Lagune" that was also taken from a "Glub Glub" broadcast from the episode. From 2022-2023, YouTube user "נוסטה לגיה" uploaded 8 episodes of the series, that were also taken from the "רכבת ההפתעות" broadcastes from the series. In 2023, YouTube user "Retro_Cartoons_1990" uploaded 9 episodes that were originally uploaded by "נוסטה לגיה", and restorted the videos with an AI Video Quality Upscaler. On February 5th, 2024, LMW user "PTV for Old TV Times" discovered another website documenting German TV channel schedules from March 1st, 1976, including an HR Fernsehen airdate for a Der Hund Bohumil on Sandmännchen. This episode of Der Hund Bohumil on the scheduled airdate is called "Das Kostümfest" (Translated to English as The Costume Party), but this episode isn't anywhere online, as no footage is available, and there's no episode in the Der Hund Bohumil Wikipedia article called "Das Kostümfest", so it's very likely that the episode doesn't exist. It is likely that it's a Sandmännchen episode, but that's yet to be confirmed.

Book Adaptations

From 2015-2018, Hana Štěpánová, the creator of the series, wrote two books telling all the stories told in the episodes in stories. The illustrations that accompanied the stories and the book, looked similar in style to the moments in the cartoon.

List of Episodes

#	Episode Title (German)	Episode Title (English)	Airdate	Synopsis	Status	Notes
1	Bohumil, der Schläfer	Bohumil, the Sleeper	??/??/1975	Bohumil goes to sleep too late and doesn't want to wake up the next day.	Partially Found
2	Ausflug in die Metzgerei	A Trip to the Butcher	??/??/1975	Bohumil's owner asks Bohumil to go to a butcher shop to buy a sausage. When Bohumil returns from the shop, a black cat tries to steal the sausage but fails.	Found
3	Bohumil und die Küken	Bohumil and the Chicks	??/??/1975	The chicken presents her chicks to Bohumil. He plays with them and pretends to be a car, a plane and other vehicles.	Partially Found
4	Ein Tag an der Lagune	A Day at the Lagoon	??/??/1975	Bohumil and his friends go swimming in a lagoon. There, one of the chicken's chicks falls into the lagoon, but Bohumil saves it before it drowns.	Found
5	Im Schnee Spielen	Playing in the Snow	12/??/1975	Bohumil and his friends play in the snow.	Partially Found	Screenshots exist.
6	Das Fischen	Fishing	??/??/1976	Bohumil and his friends goes to the lagoon to fish. The fish mock them and hang the garbage from the bottom of the lagoon on their hooks.	Lost
7	Haare Schneiden	Hair Cut	??/??/1976	Bohumil goes to the barber to get his hair cut. When he goes outside, the wind chills him and he buys a coat to warm himself up.	Partially Found
8	Eine Gefallene Vogel	A Fallen Bird	??/??/1976	After a heavy snowfall, the chicken finds a bird buried in the snow. She brings him to Bohumil and the goose, and the three of them look after him. Eventually, he recoveres and returns to fly.	Lost
9	Der Neue Fernseher	The New Television	??/??/1976	Bohumil's owner buys a new television and invites him, the goose, and the chicken to watch the television together. In it, they watch a talent show, watch the news, and finally watch an episode of Sandmännchen. Later, when they go to sleep, Sandmännchen himself visits them and brings the three sweet dreams.	Partially Found
10	Gartenarbeit	Gardening	??/??/1976	Bohumil and a bunny compete to see who can plant the biggest bush. He waters his bush with his own urine, but somehow the bush grows unusually and blooms quickly.	Lost	Screenshots exist.
11	Bohumils Zirkus	Bohumil's Circus	??/??/1976	Bohumil and his friends go to the circus. They later decide to create their own circus and attract the attention of the other animals.	Partially Found
12	Das Fernglas	Binoculars	??/??/1976	Bohumil and his friends go up to a mountain to use binoculars. Meanwhile, the black cat takes advantage of Bohumil, who leaves his house to sleep in his bed and eat his food. The goose uses the binoculars to discover the cat in Bohumil's dog house. The three soon scare off the intruder and everything ends well.	Partially Found
13	Wäsche Waschen	Making the Laundry	??/??/1976	Bohumil's owner goes to wash her clothes and the duo decide to help her.	Partially Found	Screenshots exist.
14	Pilze Sammeln	Picking Up Mushrooms	??/??/1976	Bohumil sees his owner collecting mushrooms and decides to collect mushrooms too. He and his friends go to a forest to collect mushrooms and a rabbit helps them with the task.	Partially Found
15	Eine Gescheiterte Entführung	A Failed Kidnap	??/??/1976	The black cat and the fox decide to kidnap the chicken to fry her. However, a bird overhears their conversation and manages to warn the duo in time to prevent disaster.	Partially Found
16	Bohumil Maler	Bohumil, the Painter	??/??/1976	Bohumil decides to paint pictures of his friends and other animals. However, he only paints certain parts of the animals, such as the head of a chicken, the tail of a cow and the legs of his owner.	Lost
17	Ostern	Easter	4/15/1976	Bohumil receives two Easter eggs from his friends. He gets so excited that he trips and breaks the eggs. The Easter Bunny, seeing Bohumil's predicament, gives him two new Easter eggs.	Partially Found
18	Im Blumenfeld	In the Flower Field	??/??/1976	Bohumil and his friends visit a cow in a flower field.	Partially Found
19	Fotografieren	Taking Photos	??/??/1976	Bohumil's owner brings a camera to take photos with Bohumil and his friends. Together they take lots of photos and invite other animals like the cow and a pig to join them.	Partially Found
20	Der Freche Staubsauger	The Cheeky Vacuum Cleaner	??/??/1976	Bohumil uses his owner's vacuum cleaner without her permission. However, he ends up accidentally sucking the duck, the chicken, her chicks, and finally Bohumil himself.	Partially Found
21	Der Mittagessen	Lunch	??/??/1976	Bohumil cooks lunch for his friends.	Partially Found
22	Eine Verlorene Handschuh	A Lost Glove	??/??/1976	Bohumil uses his nose to find a lost glove in a bush. He later discovers that the glove belongs to his owner and returns it to her.	Partially Found	Screenshots exist.

=Videos

Rarezas' video on the subject.

Nostal_Gi's video on the subject.

Episode Screenshots

• 

  A screenshot from the episode "Eine Verlorene Handschuh".

• 

  A screenshot from the episode "Gartenarbeit".

• 

  A screenshot from the episode "Pilze Sammeln".

• 

  A screenshot from the episode "Im Schnee Spielen".

• 

  A screenshot from the episode "Wäsche Waschen".

• 

  Another screenshot from the episode "Eine Verlorene Handschuh".

• 

  Another screenshot from the episode "Eine Verlorene Handschuh".

See Also

• Dingo Pictures (found animated films from German animation studio and English dubs; 1992-2005)
• Alfred J. Kwak (partially lost English dub of Dutch-German-Japanese animated series; 1989-1991)
• Peb & Pebber: Helden Privat (partially found German children's animated TV show; 2006-2012)
• Alfred J. Kwak (partially lost Japanese dub of Dutch-German-Japanese animated series; 1989-1990)
• Aus Tausend und Ein Tag (partially found Germany stop-motion TV series based on The Thousand and One Days; 1976-1977)

External Links

• https://retro-media-tv.de/tvp/70/1976/19760415.htm
• https://tvprogramme.shoutwiki.com/wiki/Mo,_1._M%C3%A4rz_1976
• https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_Hund_Bohumil