Where are they now, part 1, The Encyclopedia Britannica Kid

Part 1, The encyclopedia Britannica kid.

The encyclopedia Britannica kid. These commercials aired in 1991, and were about this nerdy blond head kid with glasses and a mullet. Those around my age are sure to remember. If not, I have provided a link below:

http://www.retrojunk.com/details_commercial/21/ Watch the clip and get re-familiarized with this atrocity.

Doesn’t it still make your skin crawl? There is an earlier one that is even more annoying, but I wasn’t able to find it in time for my self-imposed deadline. (read: too lazy)

Well, he got a B+ for a report going long on the subject of space. He then turned around and made an A on a report on the human body. The irony of this will be discussed later on. Just notice the excitement he seems to have while flipping through the transparent pages of the human anatomy. But again, we’ll get back to that later.

After extended research, the guy’s name is Donovan Freberg. He was also voice over actor on “The Littles” from 1983-1984. He was born in 1971, so that made him 12 and 13 when he voiced a character on The Littles. “What’s the significance, I DON’T KNOW!” (To quote Pee Wee Herman when he had that meeting in his basement after his bike got stolen in Big Adventure).

However, he was 20 years old when the Encyclopedia Britannica commercials were made. In this commercial, he referred to himself as a kid, which leads me to believe that he was portraying a high school student. Notice the rudeness and arrogance of his character. All I know is that if I was 20 years old, and still in high school, I’d try to show a little more humility. That's being said without the whole suspension of disbelief mess.

In 1999, all of a sudden, his voice acting career came to an end.

Where is he now?

According to research, he is now a blogger. Not only is he a blogger, but apparently posts a lot of pornographic images on his blog. That strikes me as kind of creepy, but a little bit funny. DUE TO THE PORNOGRAPHIC CONTENT, I AM NOT GOING ANYWHERE NEAR THAT BLOG, but if you think back to where I wrote about his excitement flipping through the transparent pictures of the human body, it probably led to a National Geographic infatuation, which led to a full on pornography obsession.

This leads me to believe that transparent photos of the human anatomy (even though they are drawings) are a gateway to being a perv. Parents must supervise their children’s usage of the human anatomy section of any encyclopedia, and should take their child’s interest in a subscription to National Geographic magazine as a warning sign.

Honestly, who would have thought that Encyclopedias were a gateway?

19 years later, and not only is the Britannica kid still most likely annoying, but he’s a perv to boot.

Thank God Al Gore saved us from a lot of these commercials by inventing the Internet. Speaking of internet, my research came from Google, Yahoo, and (not taken too seriously) Wikipedia.

Run along now,

MSJ