Video Vault: WEWS kids program 'KaZoo' hosted by Mark Johnson

CLEVELAND - "KaZoo" started airing on WEWS in 1998. Three seasons were produced, but they aired over the course of five years—don’t ask, it’s complicated.

Mark Johnson hosted the weekly kids’ show that aired on Saturday mornings on NewsChannel 5. Mark remembers the show airing for most of its run at 10 a.m. and rerun during other parts of the broadcast schedule.

Producer Dale Kirk told me the show had two children, Ola Hogan and Chris Gaghan, who were co-hosts during the first two seasons. In its third season, a group of eight kids were featured weekly, Kirk added.

You’ll see in the episode I posted here the eight kid “KaZoo Krew.”

“It was a wonderful educational show that did well in the ratings, and eventually won an Emmy for children’s programming in 2001,” Kirk said. Kirk is in the station’s Commercial Production department today, as is the show’s cameraman Eric Blackburn.

“The premise of the show was that Mark, Chris and Ola would spend a fun day visiting the animal keepers at Cleveland Metroparks Zoo,” Kirk said.

The show often took viewers to areas of the zoo not often seen by the public. Kirk told me the show had four segments with the last segment containing out-takes or bloopers.

According to Dale, “…there was never a shortage of bloopers to put at the end of the show. 

Our video player contains show #301, the first show of season three. The show open and a feeding at Monkey Island is the first segment.

Segment two is a trip to the animal care facility, a behind-the-scenes view of the Siberian tiger exhibit including an interview with the curator

The final segment in our video player is an elephant showing off its painting skills and an explanation of the buddy system for primates. We finish with aforementioned out-takes and bloopers.

Enjoy.