Decoder Ring | McGruff Takes a Bite Out of Crime, Part 1 (Encore)

McGruff the Crime Dog arrived on the scene at the dawn of the 1980s, just as a firehose of anti-drug PSAs was inundating the youth of America. These messages didn’t always work as intended—but they did work their way into the long term memories of the kids who heard them.

In the first of two episodes, originally released in 2022, we take a look at PSAs and their strange afterlife through the lens of a trench-coat wearing bloodhound and his bizarre, yet catchy anti-drug songs. We’ll talk to Dan Danger, Sherry Nemmers, Joseph Cappella, David Farber, Mike Hawes, and Robin Nelson to discover how the McGruff Smart Kids Album came to exist in the first place.

This episode was written by Willa Paskin. It was produced by Willa Paskin and Katie Shepherd. We had production help from Sam Kim. Editing by Jamie York and Derek John. Decoder Ring is produced by Max Freedman and Evan Chung, our supervising producer. Merritt Jacob is Senior Technical Director. Our intern is Phoebe Mulder.

Thank you to Wendy Melillo, Dan McQuade, Dale Mantley, Larissa Zargeris, Daisy Rosario, Dave Bledsoe, Larre Johnson, Duane Poole, Ari Merkin, Charles and Karen Rosen, and Eric Greenberg.

If you have any cultural mysteries you want us to decode, email us at [email protected] or leave a message on our hotline at (347) 460-7281.

Get more of Decoder Ring with Slate Plus! Join for exclusive bonus episodes of Decoder Ring and ad-free listening on all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe from the Decoder Ring show page on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/decoderplus for access wherever you listen.

Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.