Theodore Tugboat Too is up for sale at a $495,000 asking price. The Tugboat has entertained many a Halifax Harbor touring person for 20 years. Built with children in mind, Theodore Tugboat’s Big Harbour Tour provided information, entertainment and brought to life the sights and sounds of an actual working harbour. Theodore had a famous song and introduced his friends from one side of the harbour to the other while the water tour was enjoyed by people of all ages.
Theodore Tugboat Too was based on a Canadian children’s TV show about a tugboat named Theodore, who lives with all his friends in the Big Harbour. The show originated and was set as a joint venture between the CBC and the now-defunct Cochran Entertainment in Halifax, N.S. It was filmed on a model set using tugboats, ships, and machinery powered by radio, and debuted on television in 1993.
The show ‘s output ended in 2001, and later its distribution rights were sold to Classic Media (DreamWorks). The show premiered on CBC Television in Canada, went to PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) and was also on Qubo in the United States. At one time the show appeared in 80 different countries. Nonetheless, the show’s main emphasis was to always make the Big Harbour the world’s friendliest harbour and always do a good job with tasks related to their jobs.
A life-size Theodore Tugboat model (called Theodore Too) was designed by the series producers in the late 1990s and then proceeded on a fifty city tour of harbours (to promote Nova Scotia tourism) from Tampa, through the Great Lakes to Chicago, and back to Halifax. Upon returning to Halifax, a tourism company bought the Theodore Too and used it for 20 years for sight-seeing tours of the harbour.
Yet sadly, all good things come to an end. Theodore Too is currently docked at Bedford, waiting for a buyer and no longer does tours. Demand for tours have diminished in the last few years, and Ambassatours Gray Line has been subsidizing Theodore for a few years to kept it touring.