THE RED HAND GANG introduction

 

I'd love to do a more comprehensive review of all 12 episodes of this forgotten Sat Morning TV show which evokes a time where there were no cell phones and the VERY young kids (the oldest was 11 and played by Laborteaux of LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRARIE before he was on that show) had to get to a phone booth or use faulty walkie talkies and where crimes could be solved by a cell phone. 1970s America  and particularly California is shown as parks, streets, and docks in a whole different era and feel. Just for that and the FANTASTIC score is this show worth seeing. 

THE RED HAND GANG

 

cast

Frankie--11 year old, oldest of the gang, wears button down shirts      (Matthew Laborteaux)

JoAnne--9 year old blonde girl (Jolie Newman)

Little Bill-Frankie's six year old blonde brother (Johnny Nulan)

Doc-black boy with glasses, a bit heavy but not fat, 10 yr old,      striped shirts (James Bond the III)

JR-tough street kid with long brown hair, sometimes wears      sleeveless T-shirts and has JR written on his T-shirt usually,      10 year old (JR Miller)  

Boomer-their small scruffy white colored dog

Uncle Fred-Joanne's uncle

 

 

stories

1-The Red Hand Gang help a rich boy who was kidnapped by two men and a woman first to a haunted house, then to a boat. 5 episodes.

 

2-Joanne's Uncle Fred is a guard at a hotel where football star Okay Okins is to auction off valuable jewels from Middle East. Crooks make a double of OK. 4 episodes.

 

3-The Gang, through JoAnne's cousin Holly, a deaf girl, discover that a monkey has been taught to rob a museum by two crooks using the old zoo and Devil's Mt. where one pretends to be Bigfoot. 3 episodes.

From the Web: 

Scenes for the series were shot in and around Los Angeles, California.

The opening credits contain scenes that were shot on South Seaside Avenue in San Pedro, showing the gang running along a pier that is part of Terminal Island in the Port of Los Angeles. The same location was used in the first adventure for the scene where the kidnappers are holding the kidnapped boy on board a boat. The pier is located opposite Marine Sheet Metal Works. The pier itself is located at berth 259/260 of the Port of Los Angeles and next to the building of the Southern California Marine Institute.

Some of the outdoor scenes for the first adventure (5 episodes) were filmed in Venice, Los Angeles. During one scene, the character Frankie trails a female kidnapper along what is Windward Avenue, pausing at the intersection of Windward Avenue and Pacific Avenue outside a shop. The shop is now a cafe called Cafe Collage.

During the second adventure about a jewel heist. The fictional football player O.K. Oakins is kidnapped and replaced with a stooge, in order to steal a priceless diamond during a charily auction taking place in a hotel. The hotel used for filming is now the Ritz-Carlton Huntington Hotel in Pasadena. At the time of the filming, the hotel was called the Wentworth Hotel, but uses the fictitious name, The Park Hotel, in the episode. Coordinates: 34°7′7.77″N 118°8′1.67″W.

In the third adventure about a museum robbery, the street scenes are filmed on Clinton Street and North Norton Avenue in Hollywood. The rear of Raleigh Studios doubles as the entrance to the museum. This location is about one block from Melrose Avenue.