The segments featuring the tugboats in the harbour used footage from the British television series
Tugs, the sister series to
Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends produced in 1989 by
Britt Allcroft,
Robert D. Cardona and
David Mitton. Whilst Allcroft drove the Thomas series to popularity among North American audiences (through the
PBS series
Shining Time Station),
Tugs did not spread far beyond its country of origin, lasting one season of 13 episodes due to the bankruptcy of its distributor,
TVS Television (although it was aired and merchandised in the Japanese and Australian markets). As a result of this, Sunbow saw fit to use the series' animation as a part of ''Salty's Lighthouse'', licensing the use of the footage from Cardona. However, they repurposed the footage drastically to suit the needs of the show's pre-school audience. (Cardona was not involved in the show's production; however, he was credited as the creator of the model footage.) The original episodes of
Tugs centered on two rival fleets of tugboats, working in 'Bigg City Port' in the 1920s, with its plotlines involving action and drama intended for an audience of older children. Due to the difference in the intended demographic, the original plotlines (as well as the premise of rival tug fleets) were not used. Instead, the producers of ''Salty's Lighthouse'' wrote entirely new stories of the boats in 'Snugboat Harbor', relating to the theme of the main animated segment, with footage from the series edited and re-dubbed to tell these stories. (This creates an interesting comparison to the
Thomas segments of
Shining Time Station; as Britt Allcroft intended to introduce
Thomas to North America through that series, so the UK terms used in that series (i.e. trucks) were modified to reflect the U.S. terms, but the episodes were still faithful to their source. In the case of ''Salty's Lighthouse'', the show was completely repurposed for a new market, instead of attempting to create a faithful 'equivalent' of
Tugs.) Along with the newly created stories, various changes were made to the characters featured in them. The characters of
Sunshine,
Captain Star (the narrator), and
Little Ditcher were made female, presumably to appeal to a wider audience. (Sunshine was referred to in some episodes as fellow switcher
Ten Cents' sister.) The U.S. accents of the new voiceover replaced a range of British accents from the original characters (for example, the
Glaswegian Scottish of
Big Mac, or the
Cockney accents of
Ten Cents and
Zorran). Some character names were also changed, mostly to avoid confusion with others of the same name: Of the main characters,
Big Mac became “Big Stack”, possibly to avoid legal trouble from
McDonald's over the name of
their well-known burger,
O.J. became “Otis” to avoid association with
O. J. Simpson or the fact that O.J. are the initials for
orange juice.
Zebedee became 'Zeebee' although his original nameplate is left uncensored possibly from mispronouncing it.
Izzy Gomez had an American accent instead of a Mexican one, despite sporting a sombrero. This was to avoid offensive stereotypes.
The Fultan Ferry was given a voice (despite not having a visible face
or megaphone), and was confirmed as a male character. He also went under the name 'Fultan' by Grampus. Excluding the human characters, most of the faceless characters (such as
Little Ditcher,
Scuttlebutt Pete, and
Puffa) do not speak through their visible megaphones (with the exception of
Tramper (Nantucket) in "Salty Come Lately"). Many supporting and incidental characters were also repurposed, to fit particular ''Salty's Lighthouse'' stories: •
Johnny Cuba (a smuggler) was written as 'Steamer', a friendly character. •
Sea Rogue was used as a villain, stealing cargo and only appearing in a dream of Top Hat's. • Two different characters (
Coast Guard and the
Coast Guard's Messenger) were merged into a single character named 'Cappy'. •
Puffa became "The Train" or "Chooch". •
Jack the Grappler became 'Scoop'. • The scrap dealers (
Burke and Blair) became movie producers named 'Mr. Boffo' and 'Mr. Socko'. •
Nantucket went under the name 'Tramper', and also became a friendly character. Sometimes he appeared in speaking parts, and sometimes only communicated through a foghorn. •
The Quarry Master gained the name 'Stoney'. Some of the other characters (such as the Fire Tug, Big Mickey, Mighty Mo, Pearl, the Shrimpers, and the Buoys) do make several appearances, but have no dialogue, whilst others, such as Sea Rogue's Uncle and the Pirates (a.k.a. The Green-Eyed Things) never made any appearances (although Sea Rogue's Uncle did make a cameo appearance in the episode "Who Took My Crayons?", and one of the Pirates was shown in the place of Sea Rogue when he covered Lillie Lightship and a bell buoy with a blanket in the episode "Dream On"). ==See also==