Cartoons throughout American History

Popular children's cartoon movies are often seen on Saturday morning American television programming.

These are the same classic cartoons that were shown just before the feature film in U.S. movie theaters. Cartoon animations were produced by companies like Warner Bros, Looney Tunes and Disney. Later, these old cartoon animations were broadcast on Saturday morning television during the 1950s and 1960s as serials. As most baby boomers grew up in the late 1950's through 1960s, these Saturday morning cartoons were a regular TV event.

Now, they are part of the public domain and free from copyrights. Cartoons, usually directed to children, often held hidden adult or political messages that were about issues of the day. During World War II, many cartoons took a nationalistic focus against enemies overseas as a way to pump up patriotic spirit.

While cartoons movies have been targeted mainly to children, cartoon series like "The Simpsons" brought back the baby boomers (U.S. citizens born after World War II through 1962) to the cartoon format. Now, cable television, DVDs, the Internet and syndicated reruns (including a separate cable channel for cartoons only called The Cartoon Network), fuels the baby boomers' taste for nostalgia and an excuse to watch animated characters instead of celluloid humans.

People around the world are dazzled by 20th Century cartoon animations. They are not only classics in film animation, but an icon of American culture. Japanese anime and cartoon characters are popular among Japanese male adults, and a growing number of Japanese females who discovered the enjoyment of playing video games of animated characters.

Our cartoon movie online collection continues to grow with new titles and serial installments being added often. These classic cartoons and animated movies can be downloaded, edited and freely distributed since they are in the public domain. For more information, read our Free Movie FAQ.

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