Kid’s TV Used To Be Post Apocalyptic Van Life In A Badass Vehicle Built From A Garbage Truck

Producers of Saturday-morning television programming in the seventies were truly inspired. Their outstanding work attempted to educate our elementary-school-age selves about grown-up things like how government works or emerging environmental concerns. The sad thing is that not all of us now-fiftysomethings retained any of it.

I can still sing “I’m just a bill” but then forget most of the lyrics after that. The short-lived kids’ show Ark II was apparently about the consequences of mistreating our planet, but all I can remember now are the cool vehicles used in the program. Maybe you don’t even know what I’m talking about, but I can fix that rather quickly.

Wouldn’t A True “Ark” Have More Animals Than One Talking Monkey?

In retrospect, the premise of the show Ark II was rather heady stuff for 8-year-olds eating a bowl of Fruit Loops. This was the intro voiceover:

For millions of years, Earth was fertile and rich. Then pollution and waste began to take their toll. Civilization fell into ruin.

This is the world of the 25th century. Only a handful of scientists remain, men who have vowed to rebuild what has been destroyed.

This is their achievement: Ark II, a mobile storehouse of scientific knowledge, manned by a highly trained crew of young people. Their mission: to bring the hope of a new future to mankind.

Will nothing remain except barren wasteland? Then why was my mom upstairs spraying half a can of Final Net onto her hair and into the ozone later? Why did McDonald’s sell breakfasts in eighth-inch-wide Styrofoam boxes you threw into a landfill? Sorry, Earth!

Honestly, we really didn’t understand, nor did we care once the Ark II vehicle appeared. [Ed note: “The Ecology” and the danger it was in was very much part of my 1970s grammar school education, and kid-me was totally worried about it right up until Star Wars came out – Pete]

The mobile Ark II lab was essentially a futuristic motorhome, manned by three young scientists who drove across the desert-like land of 2576 trying to help the survivors they encountered. How they obtained food or stayed so clean-looking was never discussed.

It was like a Road Warrior-style environment without leather-clad Australian thugs and no hopped-up V8 Holdens. Oh, and Ark II had an intelligent monkey that talked, albeit in a sort of grunting Slingblade sort of way, as you can see in the first 90 seconds of the episode below. [Pete here again. Producer Lou Schiemer voiced the monkey – Adam, he has a name you guys – by speaking while inhaling. These are the kinds of facts I know.]

There have been a lot of rumors floating around about the Ark II vehicle over the years. One such rumor is unfounded: it was not the work of the famous Dean Jeffries, creator of a multitude of vehicles for movies and television like the Monkeemobile and The Green Hornet Imperial. This falsehood also sparked the rumor that the Ark II was the basis for the “Landmaster” vehicle in the film Damnation Alley, which is also not true. In fact, the development of Ark II was done by Brubaker Industries, the company responsible for the famous Brubaker Box, which … well, you’ll see a little later.

Another rumor is that the Ark was built on a garbage truck chassis; this is partially correct. Under the Ark II’s skin was a 1971 Ford C-700 cabover truck that might well have had sanitation duty in its early life. This is the infamous truck series that Jason always likes to point out as having a monster face.

The 44-foot-long fiberglass body of the Ark II was placed on top with a pointed nose not unlike the Eagles of Space 1999 or even the Rectrans camper of the early seventies.

Most of the show was shot at Paramount Ranch near Malibu (same filming site as M*A*S*H and countless other shows). How did the Ark II get from one filming location to another? They drove it on the road! This clip from the video below shows an image of the giant Ark on the road in 1976 (near Malibu and getting passed by a Malibu.) They’d better get a move on since it’s getting dark and the Ark had zero exterior lighting.

Apparently, it was impossible for the driver to see out of it from the Ford cab hidden behind all of that fiberglass, not to mention local traffic being distracted by what appeared to be the Space Shuttle cruising by. Considering that the operator was driving somewhat blind, all high-speed driving scenes were filmed at Rogers Dry Lakebed at Edwards Air Force Base where the behemoth couldn’t hit anything:

Of course, in typical sci-fi show style, the interior sets were totally independent of the exterior shots, and in a Tardis-like way they looked way too cavernous. Laboratories, living quarters AND a garage space in back on this forty-foot camper? Get real.

From some views, it looked more realistic, but considering it’s the width of a school bus or motorhome, there’s a lot of exaggeration happening here:

It’s immensely cool looking inside and out, but the Ark II had even bigger tricks up its sleeve.

A Former Bug Under A Box In A Box

To gain entry into the Ark II, there was a drop-down staircase under the nose, but in back was the real party trick. Ramps deployed, and a smaller four-passenger ground-based “shuttle craft” sort of vehicle emerged. I don’t remember my reaction as a kid at the time, but I think it involved me getting lightheaded and possibly passing out.

This vehicle was the Ark Roamer, and if the front end of this open-topped thing looks familiar, it’s because it started life as a Brubaker Box.

The Brubaker Box was a body kit that sat on top of a Volkswagen Beetle chassis to create a sort of low-slung futuristic minivan. Brubaker reportedly sold only three kits in the early seventies; a later attempt to market it as the “Sports Van” moved about 25 more units before the whole project was abandoned in 1979.

It is supposedly one of those first three “Boxes” that was converted into the Ark Roamer with open sides and a T-bar roof. I’ve read that the Roamer was based on a Brubaker Box sitting on a 1968 Beetle chassis “with an automatic;” if so, that would mean the dreaded “Stickshift Automatic” with the gear-knob clutch switch. If that was still working in the year 1976, much less 2576, I’m shocked. In the show, based on the dubbed-in noise and the off-center outlet in back, I think it was supposed to be jet-powered, despite the VW exhaust hanging down.

I bet it REALLY pulled to the right on full jet force like a car with a busted half shaft.

A Very Short Story Ar(k)

After the run of sixteen shows, Ark II came to an end in December of 1976. That was typical of many shows during that time and had nothing to do with ratings. The question you probably have is: what happened to these awesome Ark vehicles?

Well, if you’ve wasted the time reading this post so far, you absolutely MUST spend the fifteen minutes or so watching the video below for the answer:

To summarize the YouTube spot, the Ark II was a nightmare to keep functioning, and reinstalling parts that fell off was a constant job. Despite being only around five years old at the time, the Ford truck underneath was supposedly a total clunker that barely ran. “We bought the truck for around $75 and ended up spending about $75,000 on it”, said one producer.

After filming ended, the whole thing was scrapped except for the nose cone, which went on to be used in the 1977 kids’ show Space Academy and later Jason of Star Command, as the full-size prop representing the nose of the “Seeker” spaceship, which was obviously designed around the existing Ark front end.

Thankfully, the Ark Roamer survived. Ironically, it was reportedly converted to a stock enclosed Brubaker Box after the show ended, but according to the YouTube video above, it is rumored that the owner is working to convert it back to the open Roamer design. That’d be a great 50th anniversary tribute to a beloved but largely forgotten show.

I certainly didn’t forget it, but I did pretty much seem to ignore the ecological message of Ark II with my current 12 MPG daily driver. And Schoolhouse Rock? Don’t even get the editors here started on my punctuation.

Top graphic images: Filmation/CBS TV