Joseph Barbera

Joseph Barbera

Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. ( HAN-ə bar-BAIR-ə, -⁠ BAR-bər-ə), simply known as Hanna-Barbera and also referred to as H/B Enterprises, H/B Production Company Co. and Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc., was an American animation studio founded in 1957 by Tom and Jerry creators and former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer animation directors William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, in partnership with film director George Sidney. For three decades in the 20th century, it was a prominent presence in American television animation with a variety of popular animated characters and a succession of cartoon series, including The Huckleberry Hound Show, The Flintstones, The Yogi Bear Show, The Jetsons, Wacky Races, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! and The Smurfs. Its cartoons won eight Emmys and seven Oscars while a star was given to Hanna and Barbera on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The boys sold the studio to Taft Broadcasting on December 29, 1966. By the mid-1980s, when the profitability of Saturday-morning cartoons was eclipsed by weekday afternoon syndication, Hanna-Barbera's fortunes had declined.

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